Early Life
Ouattara was born on 1 January 1942, in Dimbokro, Côte d'Ivoire, French West Africa. He is a descendant from his father's side of the Muslim rulers of the Kong Empire (Outtara himself is Muslim), also known as the Wattara or Ouattara Empire. He received a bachelor of science degree in 1965 from the Drexel Institute of Technology, which is now called Drexel University, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Ouattara then obtained both his master's degree in economics in 1967 and a PhD in economics in 1972 from the University of Pennsylvania.
Ouattara is married to Dominique Nouvian, a French-Ivorian businesswoman, since 1991. Their wedding ceremony should have been held in the town hall of the prestigious 16th arrondissement of Paris. Although there have been claims that the marriage ceremony was presided over by French President Nicolas Sarkozy when he was mayor of Neuilly, this was not actually the case.
Read more about this topic: Alassane Ouattara
Famous quotes related to early life:
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)