The military junta, which has ruled Niger since its coup, has formed a government, according to a decree by the country’s new strongman, General Abdourahamane Tiani, read on national television on the night of Wednesday August 9 to Thursday August 10. . This team is led by Prime Minister Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine and includes 20 ministers; those of defense and the interior being generals of the National Council for the Safeguarding of the Fatherland (CNSP) which took power.
The announcement comes ahead of a crucial summit of Niger’s West African neighbors in Abuja, Nigeria. The leaders of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), opposed to the July 26 coup, meet after the expiration on Sunday of their ultimatum to the soldiers who took power.
“Important decisions” are expected at this summit, ECOWAS warned on Tuesday, which reaffirmed that it favors diplomatic means to restore constitutional order in Niger, while maintaining its threat of the use of force.
ECOWAS, through Nigeria, which holds the rotating presidency of the organization, spoke for the first time since the expiration on Sunday evening of a seven-day ultimatum issued to the Nigerien junta demanding the reinstatement of President Mohamed Bazoum in his functions.
However, the new masters of Niger have so far seemed to ignore the attempts at negotiations by ECOWAS. This raises fears that Thursday’s summit materializes the threat of military intervention, as feared as it is criticized in the region.
Again on Tuesday, a joint delegation of ECOWAS, the African Union (AU) and the United Nations (UN) tried to go to Niamey. In vain, the putschists blocked their way, citing “security” reasons.
“Coups must be banned”
The only bright spot on the eve of the summit, a meeting Wednesday evening in Niamey between the new strongman of Niger, General Abdourahamane Tiani, and the former emir of the Nigerian state of Kano Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, a close friend of the President of Nigeria , Bola Tinubu.
“We came hoping that our arrival will pave the way for real discussions between the leaders of Niger and those of Nigeria,” said Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, specifying however that he was not a Nigerian “government emissary”.
On the sidelines of these diplomatic attempts, the ECOWAS chiefs of staff met on Friday in Abuja, where they defined the outlines of a possible military intervention.
Flying to Abuja on Wednesday evening, Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embalo claimed that “the only recognized president” in Niger is President Bazoum. “Coups must be banned”, he added, considering that ECOWAS, of which his country and Niger are a part, was gambling its existence after the putsches in three other member states of the organization (Mali , Guinea, Burkina Faso) since 2020.
For their part, Mali and Burkina Faso showed their solidarity with the Niamey junta. They claimed that if Niger were attacked by ECOWAS, it would be “a declaration of war” for them. On Tuesday, they sent joint letters to the UN and the AU calling for their “responsibility” to prevent “any military intervention against Niger whose magnitude of security and humanitarian consequences would be unpredictable”.
Paris and Washington in support of ECOWAS
In its efforts to restore President Bazoum, ECOWAS can count on the support of Western powers, first and foremost the United States and France, which had made Niger a pivot of their anti-jihadist system in the Sahel.
The United States expressed concern on Wednesday about the conditions of detention of Mohamed Bazoum, kidnapped since the coup in his presidential residence. The number two of American diplomacy traveled to Niamey on Monday to meet the perpetrators of the coup, but she was not received by General Tiani. And she couldn’t meet Mr. Bazoum either. The discussions “were extremely frank and at times quite difficult,” she acknowledged.
France, a former colonial power regularly vilified during demonstrations in West Africa, said Tuesday from diplomatic sources that it supported “the efforts of the countries of the region to restore democracy” in Niger.
Since the military came to power, France has suspended military cooperation agreements with Niamey. The Nigerien soldiers themselves denounced these agreements last week, which Paris rejected, on the grounds that they had been signed by the legitimate Nigerien authorities.
On Wednesday, the Nigerien junta accused Paris of having violated the country’s airspace in the morning, closed since Sunday, with a French army plane from Chad, and of having “liberated terrorists”. Charges immediately denied by France.
