Ex-Credit Suisse CEO Thiam Wins Bid for Shot to Lead Ivory Coast

Katarina Hoije
·3 min read

(Bloomberg) -- Former Credit Suisse chief Tidjane Thiam has won his bid to lead Ivory Coast’s opposition in presidential elections scheduled for 2025.

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Results of a vote announced late Friday showed the 61-year old former banker convincingly defeating his sole opponent to be the head of the Democratic Party of Ivory Coast, which ruled the West African nation for decades after independence in 1960 but has been out of power since 1999.

The victory puts him in a strong position to be the PDCI’s candidate in the 2025 elections.

“We have been in opposition for 25 years,” Kouame Yao, a civil servant, said by phone from the commercial capital, Abidjan, before the vote. “PDCI needs a shakeup. Thiam has the qualities to revive and reinforce the party.”

Ivory Coast, the world’s top producer of cocoa, has endured two civil wars since the PDCI left power. But more recently it’s emerged as an African economic success story, averaging almost 6% growth in gross domestic product following the restoration of peace in 2011.

Even so, while living standards have improved, almost 40% of the population of 28 million live in poverty, according to the World Bank.

“We face crucial challenges that need leadership,” Thiam told supporters in Yamoussoukro as he launched his campaign on Dec. 9. “We will have to work for a peaceful, prosperous Ivory Coast.”

Thiam, who left Ivory Coast following a 1999 coup, faced party veteran Jean-Marc Yace, the current mayor of Abidjan’s Cocody neighborhood, a PDCI stronghold. Thiam beat him soundly, collecting almost 97% of the votes cast.

Three other candidates dropped out of the race ahead of the vote. One of them, businessman Noel Akossi Bendjo, threw his support behind Thiam.

Yace knew the field, having remained in Ivory Coast as Thiam pursued a career abroad. But the former banker has deep central Ivory Coast roots in the ethnic Baoule community where PDCI has traditionally built its base, said Ousmane Zina, a professor of political science at the Alassane Ouattara University.

“Never underestimate the geopolitics of ethnics within the PDCI,” Zina said by phone from the northern city of Bouake. “Thiam can trace his lineage back to Ivory Coast’s first president, the party’s founding father.”

Thiam’s mother was a niece of Felix Houphouet-Boigny, the country’s first president after independence.

For his own part, Thiam has highlighted his leadership skills in posts at Aviva Plc, Prudential Plc and at Credit Suisse, where he became the first Black executive to lead a European bank.

“In all the structures I’ve managed, I’ve always believed in decentralization,” Thiam said in Yamoussoukro on Dec. 9. “Giving autonomy and power to the grassroots is the condition for success.”

Thiam left the Swiss lender following an espionage scandal in 2020.

Critics have accused Thiam of being estranged from his native Ivory Coast. He holds both French and Ivorian citizenship and would have to give up the former if he runs for president, something he says he’s prepared to do.

He’s also decisively younger than other political leaders. Incumbent President Alassane Ouattara will turn 83 in 2025, should he decide to seek a fourth term.

The two men have similar trajectories. Ouattara moved from a career in international banking at the International Monetary Fund to politics while Thiam has floated between the private sector and public service.

He held posts in President Henri Konan Bédié’s administration between 1994 and 1999, leading the National Bureau for Technical Studies and Development and also becoming Minister of Planning and Development.

(Updates with more details from the ninth paragraph.)

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