WASHINGTON : Visit From Benin
Nicephore Soglo, the first democratically elected president of Benin since its independence, arrives in Washington on Wednesday for a four-day visit highlighted by a meeting with President Clinton on Thursday.
Benin (the former Dahomey) is looked on as one of the few examples of an African dictatorship transforming itself into a democracy. Col. Mathieu Kerekou took power in a coup in 1972, proclaimed Benin a Marxist-Leninist state and ruled for almost two decades.
Kerekou succumbed to European pressure in the beginning of the post-Cold War era and agreed to hold presidential elections. He was defeated in the 1991 voting by Soglo, a former executive director of the World Bank in Washington.
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