ABIDJAN: As members of Ivory Coast's football team became national heroes with their dramatic Africa Cup of Nations victory, President Alassane Ouattara has moved to turn their popularity into a political scoring opportunity of his own.
Since the Elephants won Ivory Coast's first Africa Cup of Nations championship in 23 years Sunday in a 9-8 penalty shootout win over Ghana, Ouattara has seemingly been everywhere -- orchestrating the resulting explosion of collective joy, and pumping some of that popular elation into his own looming re-election bid.
Opposition politicians complain that the Ivorian leader often referred to as ADO (for Alassane Dramane Ouattara) has brazenly appropriated the country's collective footballing triumph for his own political interests.
And they say he began that effort almost as soon as the second goalkeeper Boubacar Barry knocked the winning goal into the net.
After rushing to hail the victory on images broadcast from his presidential palace Sunday night, Ouattara promptly decreed Monday a national paid holiday so fans could welcome the team home.
He personally greeted Elephant stars at the airport and headed the motorcade driving them around commercial capital Abidjan.
He then officiated at the ceremony honouring the squad in jam-packed Felix Houphouet-Boigny stadium, where fans clad in orange Elephant jerseys waved celebratory placards.
Some several hundred of the placards even bore the message "The Ivory Coast is rising, thank you ADO."
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