Covington & Burling is wading into a fight between the recognized president-elect of the Ivory Coast and the man who refuses to hand over power to his successor. Covington will be filing disclosure documents today that show the firm has been hired to represent Alassane Outtara, the president-elect of the Ivory Coast who is working to unseat renegade President Laurent Gbagbo.
Outtara, a former International Monetary Fund economist, was declared the winner of the Ivory Coast’s Nov. 28 election and has been recognized by just about every other world leader and the United Nations. Gbagbo has refused to concede defeat in that election.
