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Ivory Coast’s constitutional council confirms Ouattara 3rd term win

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Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara won a third term with 94.27% of the vote, final results showed on Monday, after an election that opposition parties largely boycotted and dismissed as illegal.

Main opposition figures are facing criminal charges after denouncing the Oct. 31 vote and creating a rival government in protest.

Opposition groups say Ouattara violated the constitution, which limits presidents to two terms. Ouattara says the approval of a new constitution in 2016 allows him to restart his mandate.

Clashes in the run-up to the vote and on election day killed around 35 people, officials said, raising concerns about the stability of Ivory Coast, the world’s top cocoa producer.

At a press conference on Monday, constitutional council president Mamadou Kone officially announced Ouattara’s victory, confirming last week’s provisional results.

Meanwhile, Ivorian opposition leader and former prime minister Pascal Affi N’Guessan has been placed under arrest for creating a rival government after Ouattara’s election victory.

Prosecutors in Ivory Coast are pursuing terrorism charges against more than a dozen opposition leaders who boycotted the 31 October vote in which Ouattara won a third term in office and announced they were creating a transitional council.

The standoff has raised fears of protracted instability in the world’s top cocoa producer, whose disputed 2010 presidential election led to a brief civil war. More than 40 people have died in clashes before and since the latest vote.

N’Guessan was arrested overnight after the public prosecutor confirmed on Friday that he was being sought by the police, his wife, Angeline Kili, said.

“I confirm that my husband was arrested during the night, but I don’t know where he is right now,” she said.

Geneviève Goëtzinger, a spokeswoman for N’Guessan, said on Twitter he was arrested in the south-eastern town of Akoupé while en route to his home town, Bongouanou.

The police were not immediately available for comment.

N’Guessan served as prime minister from 2000-2003 under President Laurent Gbagbo, whose refusal to concede defeat to Ouattara after the 2010 election led to a civil war that killed an estimated 3,000 people.

Reuters

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