Hours after troopers seized energy within the West African nation of Niger, the nation’s ousted president sounded a defiant word on Thursday morning, vowing to guard his “hard won” democratic beneficial properties, at the same time as he was being held hostage within the presidential palace by his personal guards.
But his military chief poured chilly water on such hopes, saying in a press release that the military was backing the mutineers to keep away from bloodshed and stop infighting among the many safety forces.
The navy command was supporting the ouster of President Mohamed Bazoum “to avoid a deadly confrontation between the different forces which could provoke a blood bath and impinge on the security of the population,” Gen. Abdou Sikikou Issa, the military chief, mentioned within the assertion.
If the coup holds, will probably be West Africa’s sixth navy takeover in lower than three years, following within the footsteps of Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso. It would even be a critical blow to democracy efforts in a area that’s quickly regaining its undesirable fame because the “coup belt” of Africa.
Mr. Bazoum, elected two years in the past in Niger’s first peaceable switch of energy, has been a key Western ally towards surging Islamist militancy within the Sahel, an arid area suffering from the ravages of local weather change and the failure of fragile states to supply alternatives for his or her exploding, youthful populations.
By Thursday night, 36 hours after Mr. Bazoum disappeared from public view, energy nonetheless hung within the stability in Niger, though his possibilities of reversing the coup gave the impression to be receding. Earlier within the day, an enormous sandstorm rolled via the abandoned streets of Niamey, the place companies remained closed, including to the sense of uncertainty.
Some of Mr. Bazoum’s minister clung to hopes the coup might be reversed. “Everything can be achieved through dialogue,” the international minister, Hassoumi Massaoudou, informed France24.
But the troopers holding the president, who referred to as themselves the National Council for the Safeguarding of the Country, made it clear they meant to press forward with their plan.
After asserting on Wednesday that Niger’s borders could be closed, the federal government suspended and a nighttime curfew imposed, on Thursday the troopers suspended all political exercise within the nation.
One notable exception to that ban: Hundreds of people that gathered to assist the coup-makers in entrance of the nationwide Parliament — the identical location the place a crowd of comparable measurement got here out for Mr. Bazoum on Wednesday. Some of the coup supporters waved Russian flags. The scene was paying homage to the January 2022 coup in neighboring Burkina Faso, the place the navy has have moved nearer to Moscow in latest months.
One distinguished determine in Russia appeared to view the coup as a possibility.
In an audio assertion, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, the mercenary chief whose Wagner personal navy firm has spearheaded the Kremlin’s push into Africa lately, characterised the coup in Niger as “a battle by the people of Niger against their colonizers.”
Mr. Prigozhin, in a prolonged tirade, claimed that “colonizers” — an obvious reference to troopers from France — needed to maintain Nigeriens “in the conditions that were in Africa hundreds of years ago.”
Mr. Prigozhin’s assertion extra intently resembled a business pitch: If international troopers couldn’t convey order to Niger, he mentioned, Wagner’s fighter may “bring about order” and shield civilians from terrorists.
Mr. Bazoum is relying partly on his Western allies to get via the disaster. In a name on Wednesday night, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken assured the beleaguered chief that he had Washington’s “unconditional support.”
The United States has at the very least 1,100 American troops and two drone bases in Niger, a cornerstone of the American marketing campaign towards Islamist militants within the Sahel. U.S. forces in Niger have been ordered to remain on their bases or headquarters until it’s an emergency, mentioned a U.S. navy official talking on situation of anonymity.
Mr. Bazoum was freely elected two years in the past within the nation’s first peaceable democratic switch of energy since independence from France in 1960.
As Islamist militant teams unfold throughout the Sahel area lately, some based mostly in Niger’s distant deserts, neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso turned to mercenaries from Russia’s Wagner personal navy firm to assist push them again. But Mr. Bazoum caught with France and the United States.
The coup had caught many abruptly.
A senior West African intelligence official mentioned he was struggling to know why the troopers have been disgruntled with Mr. Bazoum, given his concentrate on rising Niger’s financial system and its navy power. Like a number of different officers, he declined to be named as a result of he wasn’t licensed to talk publicly.
Others pointed to indicators of tensions contained in the navy. Rumors had been circulating for months that Mr. Bazoum meant to fireside Omar Tchiani, the commander of the presidential guard, mentioned J. Peter Pham, a former particular U.S. envoy to the Sahel. The presidential guard is the department that surrounded the palace on Wednesday and detained the president inside.
Rivalries contained in the armed forces have been additionally an element, Mr. Pham mentioned. Nigerien particular forces skilled by the United States, France and their allies have emerged as a brand new elite inside Niger’s navy, and they’re thought of particularly near Mr. Bazoum, he mentioned.
But the rise of the particular forces was a supply of resentment amongst extra conventional navy models, just like the presidential guard — and when the mutineers started to maneuver on Wednesday, the particular forces models have been stationed removed from the capital, unable to rally to Mr. Bazoum’s protection, Mr. Pham mentioned.
The leaders of West Africa’s remaining democracies, alarmed by the flurry of navy coups of their yard, nonetheless hope they will persuade the coup plotters to return to their barracks. President Patrice Talon of Benin was scheduled to reach in Niamey on Thursday for mediation talks on behalf of ECOWAS, West Africa’s financial bloc.
But Mr. Talon’s whereabouts remained unclear late Thursday, and a spokesman for his authorities didn’t reply to requests for remark.
Michael R. Shurkin, a former C.I.A. analyst now on the Atlantic Council, a nonprofit group in Washington mentioned that Mr. Bazoumhad been “an ideal partner for Western powers” — competent, pragmatic about safety, attentive to governance and financial points, and democratically elected.
“It’s a terrible blow to the region,” he mentioned.
Omar Hama Saley contributed reporting from Niamey, Niger and Paul Sonne from Berlin.
Source: www.nytimes.com