Where is the Honorable Michel Sodjinou? Lawyer Renaud Agbodjo’s statement that sows doubt
In an address to the people this Saturday, October 18, Me Renaud Agbodjo, candidate of the party Les Démocrates for the 2026 presidential election, sounded the alarm over what he calls an “attempt to exclude” his political formation from the presidential process of April 12, 2026. At the heart of this crisis is the unexplained disappearance of the honorable Michel Sodinou, the party’s deputy and the sponsor of the designated candidate.
According to Me Agbodjo, it all began after the National Council on October 13, 2025, during which Les Démocrates formalized their ticket. A few hours later, legal proceedings were reportedly launched against the party, presented as coming from Michel Sodinou. However, he says, the latter has been untraceable since that date. “All attempts to reach him have been in vain,” Me Agbodjo declared, even expressing fear for the parliamentarian’s life.
The lawyer recounts having had a final phone exchange with Michel Sodinou on October 10, 2025, during which Sodinou allegedly “assured him three times that he would not disappoint the Beninese people.” Since then, there has been no further contact. Yet official documents are circulating, signed or attributed to his name, notably a new endorsement form reportedly withdrawn from the Autonomous National Electoral Commission (Céna). It is here that suspicions of manipulation begin to take shape.
Me Agbodjo points the finger at a bailiff, Me Maxime Assogba, first presented as a representative of the Céna, then as Michel Sodinou’s personal bailiff. “How can a bailiff of the Céna act in the name of an untraceable deputy?” he asks, suggesting collusion between the electoral institution and the “invisible hands of the Republic.” The lawyer asserts that the Céna continued to receive documents in the name of the missing elected official, in the presence of bailiffs with ambiguous status and under the supervision of an increased police deployment.
In a climate of growing tension, Me Agbodjo publicly asks: “Where is the honorable Michel Sodinou? Is he free to move? Has he really authorized someone to act on his behalf? Is he still alive?” So many questions remain unanswered to this day. He calls on the Beninese people and the international community to remain vigilant in the face of what he considers a maneuver aimed at “stripping the people of their sovereignty.”
Fearing for his own safety, Me Agbodjo says he has received kidnapping threats. He concludes by placing his trust “in the hands of God and the ancestors,” denouncing a “sinister campaign of political destabilization” which, he says, endangers Beninese democracy just months before an already tense presidential election.
