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The Foreign Ministry of the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville) |
Jean-Claude Gakosso
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation
Jean-Claude Gakosso was born on July 25th, 1957 in Inkouélé, Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville) and has been serving as the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation for the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville).
Gakosso obtained his master degree in journalism from the University of Leningrad in 1983. He went on to write his dissertation at the University of Paris II regarding historical journalism in Africa. After his return to Congo, he worked as a lecturer in journalism at the Marien Ngouabi University in Brazzaville. His first move into politics came in 1997 following the civil war when he became a special advisor for communication, post, and telecommunications to the government. In 2002 he was appointed Minister of Arts, Culture and Tourism and also simultaneously continued to represent the Ministry of Communications in the Congolese Parliament. In 2007 he ran for office as a parliamentarian for the Ongogni constituency and also retained his position as Minister of Arts, Culture, and Tourism, at this point he gave up his representation of the Ministry of Communications. In 2012 with new elections, he was reappointed as Minister of Arts, Culture, and Tourism as well as Parliamentarian for the Ongogni constituency. In 2015 he was given the title of Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation and he now solely focuses on this job.
Gakosso is a long time member of the Congolese Labour Party (Parti Congolais du Travail), although he has also sympathized with candidates from the political association called National Initiative for Peace.
Gakosso is a close partner of Russia, which probably is tied to the long history in a former Marxist-Leninist Pro-Soviet political party and his education in the Russian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic. Gakosso met with the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergei Lavrov in 2015 and again in 2017. After the last election in the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville) Gakosso asked Saskia De Lang, the representative of the European Union to the Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville) to leave the country after criticizing the fairness of the election. In another strange act, Gakosso recalled 16 Congolese ambassadors abroad to return to the Republic.
