Ivory Coast president appoints third prime minister in a year

President Alassane Ouattara named close confidant Patrick Achi as prime minister on Friday.

CAPE TOWN, March 28 (ANA) – Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara has appointed the West African country’s third prime minister in a year, after the deaths of the previous two, local and international media reported.

Ouattara named close confidant Patrick Achi as prime minister on Friday.

Achi is Ouattara’s former chief of staff and had served as interim prime minister since Hamed Bakayoko, aged 56, was hospitalised this month with cancer, according to a report by news broadcaster Al Jazeera.

Bakayoko, who died in the German city of Freiburg on March 10, had been appointed prime minister last July after his predecessor Amadou Gon Coulibaly, died of a heart attack, aving returned from France where he received two-months’ heart treatment.

According to Al Jazeera, Gon Coulibaly had been slated to be the governing party’s candidate for last October’s presidential election.

Local and international media reported that his sudden death led incumbent President Alassane Ouattara to run and win a controversial third term, arguing that a 2016 constitutional amendment reset the clock on the country’s two-term limit.

According to a report by Turkish-based news outlet Anadolu Agency, an appointment statement from president Alassane Ouattara on Friday said Achi would have to “propose a government as soon as possible,” taking into account “generational renewal.”

The new prime minister’s main task is to bring stability to a fragile Covid-19 hit economy, which saw economic growth slow to below two percent in 2020 from 6.5 percent a year earlier.

– African News Agency (ANA), Editing by Stella Mapenzauswa