AFP/Abidjan


Former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo’s ex-budget minister yesterday called allegations that he robbed banks during his country’s 2011 post-election crisis politically motivated as he took the stand to fight his extradition from Ghana.
Justin Kone Katinan, who fled to neighbouring Ghana during the conflict, said current Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara was orchestrating the charges against him.
Extradition proceedings have been under way for months against Katinan, who has acted as Gbagbo’s spokesman since the former Ivorian strongman’s arrest.
“He decided to put pressure to Ghanaian government authority to arrest me,” Katinan said, referring to Ouattara. “I think that this... is only a political case.”
Katinan is charged with 20 counts of conspiracy to rob and robbery. Prosecutors in Ivory Coast allege he robbed a series of banks in the commercial capital Abidjan to help keep afloat Gbagbo’s government, which was crippled by sanctions after he refused to cede power after losing the 2010 vote to Ouattara.
Katinan was arrested last August after returning from South Africa to Ghana. In the hearing yesterday, he said he was in South Africa at the invitation of former South African president Thabo Mbeki, who invited Katinan to his foundation.
Katinan said he also met with Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who had been elected chairwoman of the African Union.
“I am the spokesman of President Gbagbo, who has been in jail since 11 April 2011. He needs to defend his interests,” Katinan said.
Katinan responded to the allegations by saying that he had carried out a court order to reopen two of the country’s largest banks, which had been shuttered during the crisis by a French decree. He said public servants could not access their money while the two banks were closed, and ordered the police and prosecutor to reopen the branches, though he was not at the banks himself.