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Benin: Former President Mathieu Kerekou dies at 82
Benin’s former president Mathieu Kerekou, nicknamed “the chameleon”, died on Wednesday. He was 82.
“I announce with regret and deep sadness the death on Wednesday October 14 of President-General Mathieu Kerekou at about 1:30 pm local time (8:30 am EDT),” President Thomas Boni Yayi said in a statement.
The government said there would be one week of national mourning from Friday, with Benin’s flags to be flown at half-staff across the country.
Kerekou, who earned his peculiar nickname when he first came to power, famously said in a statement that he was planning on moving slowly and surely – like a chameleon – in the running of Benin.
But the name stuck and later was used to describe his ability to adapt to the changing times in order to stay in power.
Finally in 2006, he stepped down aged 72, having reached the constitutional age limit to serve as president.
Kerekou was one of the country’s towering political figures and led as both as a Marxist-inspired military ruler and a democratically elected president.
After military school in Mali and Senegal, he joined the French military, undergoing officer training in Paris before becoming the aide-de-camp of the then-Dahomey’s first president, Hubert Maga.
He was fascinated by the “revolutionary struggle of oppressed people of the Third World”, installed a Marxist-Leninist regime and declared the People’s Republic of Benin. In December 1989, he renounced Marxist ideology in the wake of a grave economic crisis and social unrest lasting more than a year.
He publicly recognized his errors, asked for forgiveness and agreed to install a transitional government with former World Bank official Nicephore Soglo as prime minister. Soglo won presidential elections in 1991, beating Kerekou in the second round of voting.
Five years later, Kerekou emerged from retirement to win the presidency, backed by most of Soglo’s opponents. He was re-elected in 2001 for his final term.
Kerekou acted as mediator in a number of conflicts, notably in Ivory Coast, and as head of a body forging closer links between francophone Benin, Togo, Niger, Ivory Coast and Burkina Faso.
Incumbent president Boni Yayi, who succeeded him in 2006, after beating Adrien Houngbedji, steps down next year after reaching his maximum two-term limit as president.
Source: Associated Press