On the official schedule of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), Today Monday 31 August is a busy day with no less than twelve candidates on the agenda, not counting those, already registered, who have to come and deposit the missing documents in their files.
If the final filings go as planned, a total of thirty-six applications will have been submitted. Among them, well-known figures of Ivorian politics such as Alassane Ouattara, of course, Henri Konan Bedié or Pascal Affi N’Guessan but many “small candidates” also trying their luck.
In addition, two candidates are particularly awaited this Monday, August 31, before the closing, those of Laurent Gbagbo, in the morning, and Guillaume Soro, later in the afternoon.
Both men were technically deregistered and lost their civil rights. As a result, they are not normally allowed to run for office. Their lawyers and supporters consider these decisions unjust and political. As such, they have decided to go through with the case, although they are well aware that these cases will most likely be rejected by the Independent Electoral Commission.
These two depots are expected to be supported by processions of supporters of the two aspiring candidates, despite bans on public gatherings until mid-September, which the other candidates were nonetheless allowed to do to a reasonable extent.