Guinea: Opposition leader and former Prime Minister Sidya Touré has died

Former Guinean Prime Minister and two-time presidential candidate Sidya Touré died last night in Paris. The opposition leader passed away at the age of 81 without ever having been able to return to his country.

Until his medical evacuation, Sidya Touré lived in exile in Ivory Coast, his adopted country, where he spent most of his career in the civil service. He had been in exile since his youth, having fled the regime of Sékou Touré. He held several important positions, first at the Treasury, then at the Ministry of Domestic Trade. He even served as chief of staff to Alassane Ouattara, then Prime Minister under Félix Houphouët-Boigny.

"Sidya current"

In 1996, Sidya Touré made his grand return to the country. He was appointed Prime Minister by Lansana Conté in the aftermath of the mutinies that nearly toppled the regime. Sidya managed to revive an economy on the brink of collapse by re-establishing dialogue with international donors and implementing significant reforms that earned him a reputation as a technocrat. But it was above all his efforts to provide access to water and electricity that earned him the affectionate nickname "Sidya the Current."

Ousted after three years as Prime Minister, Sidya Touré entered politics and took the helm of the Union of Republican Forces (UFR) in 2000, at a time when the military had once again seized power. This choice would later lead to a serious head injury during the massacres of September 28, 2009, at the Conakry stadium.

The first open presidential election in 2010 allowed him to mobilize his electorate, mainly in the Lower Coast region, where he is from and where he has invested heavily in agriculture, and thus establish himself as the third man in Guinean politics.

New exile after the fall of Alpha Condé

In 2016, he was appointed high representative of President Alpha Condé. A three-year interlude that caused incomprehension in the ranks of the opposition, which he rejoined immediately afterwards, in the fight against the third term.

The fall of Alpha Condé on September 5, 2021, opened the final chapter of Sidya Touré's life, marked once again by exile. Forced to leave his Conakry home in February 2022, dispossessed of some of his property, without a passport, prevented from running in elections, his party dissolved, he was kept out of the official political scene.

The man with the moustache and small glasses, calm, composed, thoughtful, has bowed out without abandoning his political fight.

RFI