Military Junta Opposes ECOWAS’ Demand That Conde Be Allowed To Leave Guinea
The military junta opposes ECOWAS’ demand that Conde be allowed to leave Guinea.
Guinea’s military junta said on Friday that it would not cave to regional pressure and release President Alpha Conde, who has been incarcerated since his ouster on September 5.
Alassane Ouattara of Ivory Coast and Nana Akufo-Addo of Ghana undertook a one-day visit to Conakry on Friday to ask coup leader Mamady Doumbouya, a special forces commander and former French Legionnaire, for Conde’s release.
A senior regional government official told Reuters that Ouattara had hoped to leave Guinea with Conde.
“The former president of Guinea is still there. The junta stated in a statement broadcast on state television that it would not submit to any pressure.
ECOWAS has demanded a return to constitutional rule since the special forces unit seized control of the presidential palace, detained Conde and declared itself in charge.
The bloc agreed on Thursday to freeze the financial assets of the junta and their relatives and bar them from travelling. The junta has not responded.
‘COUP-BELT’
Events in Guinea followed coups in Mali and Chad earlier this year that have raised fears of a democratic backslide in a region only just shedding its “coup-belt” reputation.
Guinea’s coup leaders have held a week of consultations with public figures and business leaders to map out a framework for a transitional government.
ECOWAS’s credibility in Guinea has been strained since 2018, when the bloc failed to condemn Conde for running for a third term in office last year, despite a law declaring that presidents must step down after two and widespread protests.
Ouattara himself used a constitutional change as an excuse to run for a third term last year, a move critics decried as illegal.
Following Thursday’s summit, during which ECOWAS also pressured Mali’s transitional government to hold elections by February 2022, the regional body said it would be reviewing protocols on democracy and good governance.
On departing the airport in Conakry, the ECOWAS motorcade passed dozens of pro-junta demonstrators brandishing signs.
One read, “ECOWAS does not decide for us.”