Côte d'Ivoire: Date Is Set For Presidential Election

Côte d'Ivoire's President Alassane Ouattara speaks to his supporters as he makes his state visit at the Ouaninou village, in Touba, in northwestern Ivory Coast July 22, 2015. Reuters/Luc Gnago

Côte d'Ivoire's government on Wednesday fixed Oct. 25 as the date for a presidential election considered a key step in overcoming a decade of political turmoil and civil war. More than 3,000 people were killed in a brief war sparked by incumbent president Laurent Gbagbo's refusal to recognize his defeat to Alassane Ouattara in the country's last presidential election in 2010. Gbagbo was eventually captured by rebels backing Ouattara and is now awaiting trial before the International Criminal Court in The Hague for alleged crimes against humanity.

Reuters report continues:

Meanwhile Ouattara, now president, has overseen a rapid post-war economic revival that has seen French-speaking West Africa largest economy record some of the continent's highest growth rates over the past three years.

Investors have taken notice, but analysts believe many are waiting to see if this year's polls will remain peaceful before taking the plunge in Côte d'Ivoire, the world's top cocoa grower.

Government spokesman Bruno Kone announced the election date following a cabinet meeting in the commercial capital Abidjan.

"Everything will be done in order to keep to that (date)," he told journalists.

Côte d'Ivoire's last presidential election was delayed five years amid a political crisis that divided the country between a rebel-held north and government-controlled south.

Ouattara was expected to officially register his candidacy with the election commission later on Wednesday. He is heavily favoured to win a second five-year term in office, having already secured the support of his main coalition partner, the Democratic Party of Côte d'Ivoire (PDCI).

A poll released by the Washington-based International Republican Institute in June found that 77 percent of respondents approved of the job being done by his office, and two-thirds said the country was heading in the right direction.

However, Ouattara has come under criticism from human rights groups and some war victims who accuse him of failing to foster reconciliation and even-handed post-war justice.

He is expected to face his main challenges from Pascal Affi N'Guessan, who heads Gbagbo's Ivorian Patriotic Front (FPI), and from the National Coalition for Change, a new bloc composed largely of PDCI dissidents and a faction of FPI hardliners.