President cote d ivoire laurent gbagbo biography
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Considered the main organizer of the "teachers' conspiracy" by the government, Gbagbo was forced to leave the country and seek refuge in France. After him are Shamshi-Adad I, Louis Desaix, Emperor Go-Sai, Alfonso I of Asturias, Shalmaneser V, and Lucius Vitellius the Elder.
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Contemporaries
Among people born in 1945, Laurent Gbagbo ranks 72.
His involvement in both illegal activities and lecturing at the University of Abidjan led to his arrest and imprisonment in military prisons, namely Seguela and Bouake, from March 1971 to January 1973. He worked as a history and geography teacher at a classical high school in Abidjan and actively participated in the professional movement and illegal opposition.
From 1988 to 1997, he served as the Secretary-General of the Ivorian Popular Front, and from 1997 to 2000, he was the Chairman of the party. His upbringing in the "cocoa loop," a region economically dominated by agriculture under French control, deeply influenced his political perspectives later in life.
Education
Gbagbo pursued extensive higher education both in Côte d'Ivoire and France.
Growing up in rural Ivory Coast, Gbagbo was exposed early on to colonial administrative structures and French cultural influences, which shaped his worldview. Laurent Gbagbo is the 3,339th most popular politician (down from 3,033rd in 2024), the 3rd most popular biography from Côte d'Ivoire (up from 4th in 2019) and the 3rd most popular Ivorian Politician.
Laurent Gbagbo was the president of Cote d'Ivoire until he was overthrown in 2011.
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Among POLITICIANS
Among politicians, Laurent Gbagbo ranks 3,339 out of 19,576.
He founded the Ivorian Popular Front, which provided a platform for opposition in a country previously dominated by a single party for decades. His tenure was marked by significant political turmoil, including civil war and a disputed election that led to his arrest and trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, where he became the first former head of state to be tried.
Known as the country's first center-left president, Gbagbo gained prominence through his opposition politics and trade union activism. He is married and has children, but detailed public information about his family is limited. He comes from the Bété ethnic group and was raised in a Roman Catholic family. A historian, Gbagbo was imprisoned in the early 1970s and again in the early 1990s, and he lived in exile in France during much of the 1980s as a result of his union activism.
His presidency coincided with two major civil conflicts that devastated Côte d'Ivoire and left thousands dead. Following Houphouet-Boigny's death in 1993 and accession of Henri Konan Bedie to the Presidency, Gbagbo called for a revision of the electoral code for the next general election of 1995, including the removal of foreigners' rights to vote and the establishment of a voting age of 18 years old.
As an academic turned politician, he challenged longstanding autocratic rule and helped usher in multiparty democracy. The disputed 2010 presidential election, where official bodies recognized different winners, led to a violent political crisis. Before him are Alassane Ouattara (1942), and Félix Houphouët-Boigny (1905).
In 1969, he obtained his history license from the University of Abidjan.
Political Activism and Imprisonment
In 1970, Laurent married Simone Gbagbo, a devout Catholic, and Christianity became an important part of his ideological beliefs. Gbagbo's complex legacy reflects his role as a passionate nationalist and a controversial figure in Ivorian history.
Childhood
Laurent Gbagbo was born on May 31, 1945, in Gagnoa, located in the southwestern region of what was then French West Africa.