Early Life, Business Career, and Early Political Career
Olympio was born in Lomé in December 1936. He was educated in Ghana at Achimota School and at the Kumasi University of Technology now renamed Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology. He further studied mathematics and philosophy in the United Kingdom, attending successively the London School of Economics and Oxford University, where he received a doctorate in economics. He started his career at the United Nations, working on fiscal and financial studies for the Organization from 1963 to 1964, and then went on to work as an economist for the International Monetary Fund (IMF) from 1964 to 1970. After these early years in America, Mr. Olympio returned to Africa where he joined Lonrho as one of its senior business development managers. Mr. Olympio later became a very successful businessman with interests in various companies throughout West Africa. But throughout this time, he also gained more and more exposure as an outspoken critic and political opponent of the Togolese regime. He was sentenced to death twice in absentia by the regime of Gnassingbé Eyadéma. After he was accused of plotting a coup together with other opponents based in Ghana, a warrant was issued for his arrest on 13 July 1979, but the Regime could not imprison him because he was not in Togo. The regime attempted to kidnap him and to have him arrested abroad on several occasions but failed, as Mr. Olympio received the protection of various countries including successively, the United Kingdom, France and Ghana.
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