Thousands of people turned out Saturday to see Ivory Coast’s former president Laurent Gbagbo announce his bid to return to office even though he is ineligible.

Supporters came from all over the country to Agboville, 70 kilometres (43 miles) north of Abidjan, to hear 78-year-old Gbabgo denounce “the high cost of living” in a lengthy speech lasting more than two hours.

Gbagbo, who was president from 2000 to 2011, would like to represent the African People’s Party–Cote d’Ivoire (PPA-CI) but is barred from running because of a 20-year jail sentence for looting the Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO) in 2011 during a bloody post-election crisis that left 3,000 dead.

Even if he was acquitted in 2021 by the International Criminal Court of human rights abuses allegedly committed during the crisis and pardoned by President Alassane Ouattara a year later for the BCEAO case, he has not been amnestied, which bars him from electoral lists.

“I am not guilty”, he declared Saturday, saying he would divulge documents in the coming days to “reveal the truth.”