# Alleged coup plot against General Guéï (September 2000)

URL: https://allhistories.com/ivory-coast/timeline/2000-alleged-coup-plot-against-general-guei
Location: Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire
Themes: main-event

In September 2000 the transitional government announced that it had foiled an attempted coup against General Guéï. Several officers and soldiers, many from the north, were arrested, and the affair was blamed on supporters of Ouattara. Some of the accused later said they were targeted in a campaign of intimidation, while others were reported to have fled to Burkina Faso. The government's version was widely questioned. The episode revealed the fault lines inside the army and the junta's distrust of its own northern officers. Many of those implicated later took part in the 2002 rebellion, among them figures who had left the army for exile in neighbouring countries. Details, including the exact date and number of arrests, remain disputed in available accounts. The affair also illustrates the climate of distrust under the military government, when accusations of plots were frequent. At the date of this event the principal authority over the largest part of present-day Côte d'Ivoire, by the convention of this dataset, lay with Robert Guéï, Head of the National Committee of Public Salvation / President (military ruler) (1999–2000). The government was headed by Prime Minister Seydou Diarra. The plot and its repression helped create the exiled officer networks that organised the 2002 uprising. It illustrates how the military transition divided the army along regional lines, a division that later proved decisive when disgruntled soldiers launched the 2002 rebellion.

## Why it matters
The purge of northern soldiers in 2000 seeded the military networks behind the 2002 rebellion.

Ruler at the Time: [Robert Guéï](https://allhistories.com/ivory-coast/rulers/robert-guei)

Prime Minister of Côte d'Ivoire (Guéï era): Seydou Diarra

## Sources
- [Robert Guéï](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Guéï)
- [First Ivorian Civil War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Ivorian_Civil_War)
- [Ivory Coast](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivory_Coast)