Abidjan:
Ivory Coast’s government resigned today after President Alassane Ouattara vowed to bring more “efficiency” to the West African state just two months after he was re-elected.
Prime Minister Daniel Kablan Duncan presented his resignation and that of his government at what was to have been the first cabinet meeting of the year in a move observers said was expected.
But after praising the 73-year-old economist for astutely handling his brief during three years in the post, Ouattara’s office said Kablan Duncan would remain as head of a new team.
“The president of the republic (has signed) a decree nominating Daniel Kablan Duncan as prime minister and government head and has instructed him to propose a new government as soon as possible,” presidential secretary general Amadou Gon Coulibaly said.
Prior to Coulibaly’s announcement on Kablan Duncan’s retention, Ouattara had declared a new cabinet would be “put in place in the coming days—targeting greater cohesion and more efficiency of government action.”
Ouattara, 74, says he is seeking to mould a “new Ivory Coast” to draw a line under the turmoil of the civil war in 2011.
Reelected for a second-five year term on October 25, Ouattara has said he wants to deepen national reconciliation and draw up a new constitution which he plans to put to a referendum.
Other aims include redistributing uneven wealth and tackling high youth unemployment.
