The President of Ghana, Nana Akufo-Addo, who is also the current President of Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) is on a mission of the 15 nation-bloc in Bamako.

He was received by the transitional president Bah Ndaw on Sunday to take stock of the political transition and discuss the next steps to ensure that the deadline of the eventual election is met.

All activity is towards regional solidarity with the now embargo-free Mali still regrouping post-coup d’état August.

The Ghanaian president is the first head of state to visit the West African nations since the ECOWAS-imposed sanctions were lifted.

Source: Africa News

Thousands of opposition supporters have rallied in Abidjan to protest against Ivorian President Alassane Ouattara’s plan to seek a third term, as tensions rise in the lead-up to the country’s high-stakes election.

Three weeks before the October 31 vote, some 20,000 people made their way into a stadium in Ivory Coast’s commercial capital by early afternoon on Saturday, with some holding banners reading: “The people say no to an illegal third term.”

Ouattara, 78, announced in August he will seek another term after the sudden death of his handpicked successor the previous month created a leadership vacuum at the governing RDHP party.

The president’s decision infuriated the opposition who says Ouattara is violating the constitution by seeking another term. Ouattara, in power for a decade, says a 2016 constitutional change means his two-term limit has been reset.

The constitutional council has cleared him and three other candidates to run, including 86-year-old former President Henri Konan Bedie. Those barred include Ouattara’s predecessor Laurent Gbagbo and former rebel leader and Prime Minister Guillaume Soro, both of whom played key roles in a crisis that claimed more than 3,000 lives after disputed elections a decade ago. Both men are living outside the country but retain powerful support at home.

More than a dozen people have been killed in violent protests in recent weeks, sparking memories of the 2010-2011 civil war that broke out when Gbagbo refused to stand down after the electoral commission declared Ouattara the winner.

Opposition figures have called for a civil disobedience campaign and for the election to be postponed, but have stopped short of saying they will boycott the poll, while the RDHP has said the election will take place regardless of whether they participate.

Protester Bohui Armel said the people taking part in Saturday’s rally wanted “to simply to say no to Ouattara’s third term”.

“This is not a political party story. It is not a story of sympathisers but it is a story of the people of Ivory Coast who want to claim their freedom.”

“My advice to President Ouattara is that Ivorians should sit down to discuss. We want peace. We don’t want war,” Eve Botti, a supporter of the FPI opposition party, told the Reuters news agency.

The polls are seen as the biggest test yet of the tenuous stability achieved in the world’s top cocoa producer since the post-election violence that engulfed the country a decade ago.

“This is an extremely big test for Ivory Coast,” Jessica Moody, a researcher in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera last month. “There is a high risk that the election will be contentious and will send the country back to war.”

Amid the rising tensions, envoys from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) regional bloc, the African Union and the United Nations headed earlier this week to Abidjan where they met officials, the opposition and members of the civil society.

“The joint mission expressed deep concern over the lack of trust among Ivorian political actors,” according to a joint statement from the delegation led by Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey, Ghana’s foreign minister and current chair of the ECOWAS council of ministers.

The delegation “strongly condemned the acts of violence and hate speech with ethnic overtones, which have unfortunately entered the field of political competition and are likely to have a negative impact on the progress made so far in the country”. it said.

This week’s mission was the second by the UN’s special envoy for West Africa, Mohamed Ibn Chamba, who last month called for a “peaceful, inclusive, transparent and credible presidential election” after meeting with President Ouattara.

The International Crisis Group last week called for the election to be postponed and for ballot preparations to be overhauled.

“The chances of this election spawning a serious crisis are high,” the independent think-tank said.

SOURCE : AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

Eleven political and military figures arrested during Mali’s coup have been released, including former prime minister Boubou Cisse, the transition authorities announced.

New army strongman Assimi Goita issued an official statement late Wednesday saying “the political and military personalities arrested on August 18 have been set free”.

They would however “remain at the disposition of the courts if needed”.

Those released including former National Assembly speaker Moussa Timbine and eight generals.

The rebels put in place a president and a transition government while retaining a grip on power.

A transition government tasked with leading Mali back to civilian rule was appointed on Monday, with numerous members of the junta occupying key posts.

Colonel Goita was named vice president of the transition government last month.

West African regional bloc ECOWAS on Tuesday lifted its tough sanctions on Mali after recording “notable advances towards constitutional normalisation”.

The 15-nation group called for the civilian and military figures detained during the bloodless coup to be freed.

ECOWAS has also demanded the dissolution of the junta, which calls itself the National Council for the Salvation of the People.

(AFP)

Mali’s interim president Bah Ndaw appointed a 25-strong government on Monday in which members of the military occupy key posts, according to a decree broadcast live on state television.

At least four central cabinet posts — defence, security, territorial administration and national reconciliation — go to colonels in the army, said the decree read by the president’s secretary-general Sekou Traore.

(AFP)

Bah Ndaw, a retired colonel who has been designated Mali’s interim president following last month’s coup, made his first public appearance on Thursday, meeting a regional mediator, AFP reporters saw.

Ndaw, 70, met former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan, in Bamako on a mission for the 15-nation bloc ECOWAS, on the eve of his swearing-in.

Ndaw’s appointment was announced on Monday by Colonel Assimi Goita, who heads a junta of young military officers who seized power on August 18, ousting elected president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita.

Goita himself will serve as vice president, under the announcement.

The interim president will rule for a maximum of 18 months before staging nationwide elections.

ECOWAS — the Economic Community of West African States — slapped sanctions on Mali on August 20 to push for swift restoration of civilian government, including the appointment of civilians as interim president and prime minister.

The bloc may announce on Friday whether the plan meets criteria for easing sanctions, Jonathan said on Thursday.

An official close to the sanctions discussion, who declined to be named, said that “there are still consultations going on”.

Jonathan was due to meet other Malian officials on Thursday, besides Ndaw, including prominent figures whom the military detained after last month’s coup.

ECOWAS has demanded the release of all detainees. Keita was released, but former prime minister Boubou Cisse, among other officials, remains in detention.

Mali’s neighbours have taken a hard line with the junta, fearful that the fragile nation of some 19 million people could spiral into chaos.

Swathes of the vast country already lie outside of government control, due to a lethal jihadist insurgency that first emerged in 2012. It has also inflamed ethnic tensions.

Current restrictions include border closures and a ban on commercial trade and financial flows but not on basic necessities, drugs, equipment to fight coronavirus, fuel or electricity.

Source: AFP

Ivory Coast ex-rebel leader and former premier Guillaume Soro, whose bid for the presidency has been invalidated by a court, insisted Thursday his candidacy was “irrevocable” even as he attacked the October 31 elections as a scheme to enshrine 78-year-old Alassane Ouattara as head of state.

“My candidacy is firm, unchangeable and irrevocable,” Soro told journalists in Paris, adding his country was “on the brink” since President Alassane Ouattara’s decision to seek a third term in office.

Soro urged the country’s opposition parties to unite against Ouattara even as he insisted that the October 31 presidential poll “does not make any sense” as it was designed to “endorse the institutional state coup d’etat of Alassane Ouattara”.

Soro, who served as prime minister from 2007 to 2012, urged Ivory Coast opposition leaders to unite and to “seize (regional bloc) ECOWAS in order to obtain transparent elections”.

And he insisted that on October 31, “there will be no election”, without further explanation.

Ivory Coast’s top court rejected 40 presidential election candidates, validating the contested bid of the incumbent head of state but sidelining his predecessor, Laurent Gbagbo and Soro, a one-time Ouattara ally.

On Tuesday the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights called on the Ivorian authorities to allow Soro to contest the vote.

Tensions are running high ahead of the poll in the West African state where more than 3,000 people died in post-election violence in 2010-11.

This week, protests broke out in several cities including in southeastern Bonoua, the hometown of Gbagbo’s wife Simone, where about 300 people, mainly youngsters, marched against Ouattara’s candidacy in defiance of a ban on demonstrations.

Ouattara had said in March that he would not seek a third term but made a U-turn just four months later when his preferred successor, prime minister Amadou Gon Coulibaly, died of a heart attack.

The argument behind his bid pivots on modifications to the constitution in 2016. Supporters say this has reset the two-term limits to zero, entitling him to run again.

Violent protests against Ouattara’s candidacy left around 15 dead last month, reviving memories of the post-election bloodshed nearly a decade ago.

(AFP)

Former Ivorian rebel leader and ex-prime minister Guillaume Soro, who has been barred from contesting an upcoming presidential election, should be allowed to run, the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights said Tuesday.

The court — established by members of the African Union in 2004 — issued a provisional ruling calling on Ivory Coast to “take all necessary measures to immediately remove all obstacles” preventing Soro from competing in the October 31 vote.

However, the ruling is likely to have limited impact, as Ivory Coast withdrew its recognition of the court’s jurisdiction in April this year.

(AFP)

Tensions mounted on Saturday between Mali’s military junta and the country’s longtime political opposition after the coup leaders failed to invite prominent opposition figures to a planned forum on the country’s political future.

The meeting ultimately was cancelled and the junta leadership instead met with imam Mahmoud Dicko, an opposition leader who on Friday urged the junta to speed up the transition to civilian rule so the West African country could avoid further crushing financial sanctions.

“I ask them to be part of the solution and not another problem,” he said.

Only a week earlier, the opposition coalition known as M5-RFP that includes Dicko had publicly backed the coup, with thousands of their supporters taking to the streets after the junta’s overthrow of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita. M5-RFP had led several months of demonstrations calling for his resignation three years before his final term was due to end.

In a statement late Friday, one M5-RFP leader said the alliance regretted not being invited to take part in Saturday’s planned discussions between the junta and various political actors.

“The M5-RFP is and remains a major player in this desired change and must be at the forefront in determining the structure of the transition,” Choguel Maiga said.

The path back to democracy has been a stumbling point with West African heads of state, who on Friday urged the junta to restore civilian rule within a year. But the junta has proposed a three-year timeline. That has led to the unraveling of talks and more threats of sanctions.

The regional bloc known as ECOWAS already has cut financial flows to Mali, and neighboring countries have closed their borders in a bid to step up pressure on the coup leaders.

The international community has expressed alarm over the coup, fearing that the political vacuum could allow Islamic extremists to expand their reach. A similar coup in 2012 led to the militants overtaking major towns in the north where they implemented their strict interpretation of Islamic law, amputating the hands of those charged with theft.

A French-led military operation in 2013 ousted the extremists from power but the Malian military and its partners have faced an insurgency ever since.

There are concerns that the new political upheaval could erode what gains have been made in the fight to stabilize Mali.

Source: AP

West African countries on Friday demanded an immediate civilian transition in Mali and elections within 12 months as they considered sanctions after rebel troops toppled the country’s president and seized power.

The demands were spelt out after the new junta released ousted president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, seized in the August 18 coup, but also apparently granted their new chief the powers of head of state.

The coup shocked Mali’s West African neighbours and ally France, heightening worries over instability in a country already struggling with an Islamist insurgency, ethnic violence and economic stagnation.

After a video summit, the 15-nation Economic Community of West Africa State called on the junta “to initiate a civil transition immediately” and the “rapid establishment of a government to (…) prepare the legislative and presidential elections within 12 months.”

In a closing statement, Niger President Mahamadou Issoufou, who also chairs ECOWAS, said sanctions would be “gradually lifted depending on the implementation” of the bloc’s requests.

“Staging coups is a serious sickness for a country,” he said in earlier remarks. “To cure them, there’s only one prescription: sanctions.”

ECOWAS slapped sanctions on Mali after the August coup, including a closure of borders and ban on trade and financial flows.

It demanded the release of Keita and other detained leaders and insisted on a swift return to civilian rule.

Keita, 75, was elected in 2013 as a unifying figure in a fractured country and was returned in 2018 for a second five-year term.

But his popularity crashed as he failed to counter the country’s raging jihadist insurgency and brake Mali’s downward economic spiral.

After an escalating series of mass protests, young army officers mutinied on August 18, seizing Keita and other leaders and declaring they now governed the country.

They have called the junta the National Committee for the Salvation of the People (CNSP), led by a 37-year-old colonel, Assimi Goita.

Friday’s video summit came after a three-day ECOWAS visit foundered over a timetable for civilian transition, and the junta’s announcement on the eve of the conference that Keita had been freed.

Issoufou said Keita had told the ECOWAS envoys “that he resigned quite freely, convinced that this decision was necessary for peace and stability in Mali.”

Handover issue

Within hours of taking control, the junta promised to enact a political transition and stage elections within a “reasonable time.”

According to the chief ECOWAS envoy, former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan, the coup leaders wanted a three-year handover period.

This was rejected by the ECOWAS team, which called for an interim government, “headed by a civilian or retired military officer, to last for six or nine months, and maximum of 12 calendar months,” Jonathan said on Wednesday.

ECOWAS on Friday said that the person overseeing the handover should be “an individual, civilian, recognised… for their intellectual and moral standing” and that there should be a “civilian prime minister.”

“No military structure should be above the transition president,” it said.

But a new document posted on Mali’s Official Journal, a gazette which publishes new laws and regulations, invests the head of the CNSP with the powers of the head of state.

Named “Basic Act N°001/CNSP,” the document was posted online on Thursday.

The CNSP “designates a president who assures the duty of the head of state… embodying national unity… and guaranteeing national independence, territorial integrity… (and) respect for international agreements,” it says.

This individual appoints senior civil servants and military and “accredits” foreign ambassadors, according to the document. AFP has asked the junta’s spokesman to confirm its authenticity.

Jihadist warning

In other remarks, Issoufou lashed the Malian military for launching the coup when the country was in the throes of an eight-year-old jihadist insurgency.

Thousands of lives have been lost, hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes and swathes of the country have been abandoned to armed Islamists by the state.

The junta “is refusing to return to the barracks at a time when, more than ever, the army is required to focus on its traditional mission,” Issoufou said.

He warned that the jihadists sought to “exploit the current institutional void” — a scenario that happened after Mali’s last coup in 2008.

(AFP)

Mali’s new military rulers said Thursday that former president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who was detained during the country’s coup on August 18, had been freed.

The announcement came on the eve of a summit by Mali’s neighbours, who are to decide whether to ratchet up pressure on the fledgling junta.

Keita’s ousting by rebel troops sent shockwaves through the region and in France, which sees Mali as a linchpin in its campaign against jihadism in the Sahel, where more than 5,000 French troops are based.

“President IBK is free in his movements, he’s at home,” a spokesman for the junta, Djibrila Maiga, told AFP, referring to Keita by his initials, as many Malians do.

The junta, calling itself the National Committee for the Salvation of the People (CNSP), said on Facebook it was “informing public and international opinion that former president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita has been released and is currently in his residence”.

A Keita relative, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the 75-year-old former leader had returned overnight to his house in the Sebenikoro district of the capital Bamako.

The source did not say whether he was still subject to any restrictions.

Keita, prime minister Boubou Cisse and other senior officials were seized by young officers who mutinied at a base near Bamako.

In the early hours of August 19, Keita appeared on national TV to announce his resignation, saying he had had no other choice, and wanted to avoid “bloodshed”.

His release — and other leaders — is a key demand of Mali’s neighbours, its ally France and international organisations, including the African Union and European Union.

Former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan, heading a team from the regional bloc ECOWAS, was given access to Keita last Saturday, and said he seemed “very fine.”

The announcement Thursday came on the eve of a virtual summit by the 15-nation ECOWAS — the Economic Community of West African States — which has imposed sanctions against Mali for the coup.

Those measures include a closure of borders and a ban on trade that threaten to worsen Mali’s already severe social and economic troubles.

Jonathan’s three-day mission to Bamako foundered on the question of the transition to civilian rule.

The junta have promised to enact a political transition and stage elections within a “reasonable time” but not spelt out details.

Discussing progress with Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari, Jonathan said the coup leaders wanted to stay in power for a three-year transition period, an offer rejected by the mediators, according to a statement from the presidency.

“We also told them that what would be acceptable to ECOWAS was an Interim Government, headed by a civilian or retired military officer, to last for six or nine months, and maximum of 12 calendar months,” Jonathan was quoted as saying in the presidency statement late Wednesday.

Jihadist worries

Keita was elected in 2013 as a unifying figure in a fractured country and was returned in 2018 for a second five-year term.

But his popularity plummeted as he failed to counter a bloody jihadist campaign that has claimed thousands of lives and driven hundreds of thousands from their homes, and to reverse the country’s downward economic spiral.

In a visit to the Estonian capital of Tallinn on Thursday, the head of the French armed forces, Francois Lecointre, said, “Our wish is to maintain the Malian army’s commitment in the fight against armed terrorist groups.”

He pointed to a campaign launched earlier this year to regain control over the strategic “three-border” zone, where the frontiers of Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso come together.

“We are going to see if the Malian armed forces are able to maintain the momentum… we have told them that this appears essential to us,” said Lecointre.

“The corps commanders are still there, the area commanders are still there, these aren’t people who took part in the coup, and so we are continuing to cooperate with them,” he said.

(AFP)