Coming out of retirement in France’s Medoc region, De-nard replayed the plan he devised in 1978, when he went ashore from a rusty freighter. This time about 50 rebels seized the airport and captured President Mohamed Djohar, killing seven people in the process. In his place they installed former interior minister Combo Ayouba, who had been jailed since a 1992 coup attempt. “The public didn’t know how to get out of the mess they were in,” Ayouba said. “The solution was Bob Denard and myself.”
No one knows what De-nard was paid, or whether he will regain his lucrative old sinecure- overseeing tourism. French troops evicted him in 1989, but so far this time the former colonial power has stood aside.
