(Bloomberg) -- The speaker of Ivory Coast’s National Assembly, former rebel leader Guillaume Soro, resigned, fueling speculation he may run in next year’s presidential elections.
A key political figure in the West African nation, 46-year-old Soro led an insurgency that split the West African nation for almost a decade into a government-run south and a rebel north, and served as prime minister in a government of national unity under former President Laurent Gbagbo. Members of his rebel movement fought alongside United Nations and French troops in 2011 to oust Gbagbo from the presidential palace after he refused to acknowledge defeat in a 2010 presidential vote.
“The time has come for me to follow my convictions and my moral s,” Soro, who is believed to have widespread support among the army, told lawmakers during an extraordinary parliament session in the commercial capital, Abidjan, on Friday.
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