There are three days left before the end of the ultimatum – Sunday August 6 – issued by ECOWAS to the junta that overthrew President Mohamed Bazoum in Niger. In addition to the sanctions decided on July 30, the organization says it does not rule out military intervention if there is no return to constitutional order. The Chiefs of Defense of the Member States are meeting in Abuja, Nigeria, to discuss the various possible scenarios.
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Two visions of what is happening at the moment in Niamey, in Niger, oppose. On the one hand, the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) believes that the action of the junta, which overthrew power on July 26, cannot be qualified as a coup. For the organization, by holding the president hostage mohamed bazoum, the mutineers are guilty of a criminal act and not of a political action. Even if a military intervention East ” the last option on the table », the use of the expression « illegal detention gives another dimension to the events.
This justifies a different approach, according to Olushegun Adjadi Bakari, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Benin, interviewed on RFI: “ When we are faced with a hostage-taking or a kidnapping, we are not in a negotiation or proposals. The primary objective is to be able to free the hostage, to ensure that President Bazoum, president democratically elected by the people of Niger, resumes his duties. »
Also to listenCoup d’etat in Niger: “It is a hostage-taking and a kidnapping”, considers the head of diplomacy of Benin
Opposite, the Nigerien junta is playing the card of solidarity with Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso. Traveling to Ougadougou on Wednesday August 2, General Salifou Modya member of the National Council for the Safeguarding of the Homeland (CNSP), also warned against the consequences of a military intervention: ” During our exchanges, we spoke precisely about this situation, because we would not like Niger to become a new Libya. »
With this evocation of Libya, General Mody recalls that Western intervention in 2011 had thrown the country into instability. An instability that he intends to avoid at all costs in Niger.
Niger: the analysis of researcher Arthur Banga on the standby force of ECOWAS