Gen. Abdourahamane Tchiani, the head of Niger\u2019s presidential guard, with other members of Niger\u2019s armed forces, on Friday declared himself head of a transitional government he called \u201cthe National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland,\u201d while international leaders and organizations including the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) strongly condemned the coup.<\/p>\n
On Sunday, ECOWAS leaders met in an extraordinary summit and gave Tchiani and the other coup leaders seven days to step down and reinstate civilian President Mohamed Bazoum, with the threat of force should they not comply in the timeframe. In the immediate term, ECOWAS closed the borders between Niger and ECOWAS countries, instituted a no-fly zone for commercial flights in and out of the country, froze the country\u2019s assets in ECOWAS central banks and commercial banks, and instituted a travel ban and asset freeze for those involved in the coups and their families, among other actions.<\/p>\n
Bazoum was democratically elected in 2021 in Niger\u2019s first peaceful transfer of power, and \u201cremains the only legitimate President of Niger,\u201d as European Union High Representative Josep Borrell said in a statement Saturday calling on the coup leaders to release Bazoum. Members of the military involved in the coup meanwhile warned in a television address Friday of the \u201cconsequences that will flow\u201d should any foreign forces intervene. The US built and helps run an air base in Niger, and France has about 1,500 troops in the country, according to France24.<\/p>\n
ECOWAS authorities will hold negotiations on Sunday to attempt to convince Tchiani to hand power back to Bazoum; the economic body is reportedly considering sanctions against Niger as a form of leverage, though it\u2019s not yet clear what those measures would look like. The EU has already withdrawn funding and military support \u201cwith immediate effect\u201d due to the \u201cunacceptable attack on the integrity of Niger\u2019s republican institutions.\u201d The EU had reserved $554 million of its budget for the 2021 to 2024 period to support education, governance, and sustainable economic growth, as Al Jazeera reported.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the fifth successful military coup in Niger since its independence from France in 1960. A series of coups has toppled the governments of several African countries over the past three years, but Niger is a bit of an outlier among its neighbors, particularly due to the vociferous support Bazoum\u2019s government has enjoyed. Though Niger, like many other West African nations, had suffered from poor economic growth and stunted democratic and public institutions, Bazoum\u2019s tenure produced improvements in education and public health, as well as the security and economic outlooks compared with neighbors like Mali and Burkina Faso.<\/p>\n
French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna is referring to Tchiani\u2019s takeover as an \u201cattempted coup\u201d because \u201cwe don\u2019t consider things final, there is still a way out if those responsible listen to the international community,\u201d she said Thursday. On Saturday, she announced via Twitter that France had immediately suspended \u201call its development aid and budget support actions from Niger\u201d and called for Bazoum\u2019s immediate release and reinstatement.<\/p>\n
Wednesday\u2019s coup was tenuous \u2014 and the outcome remains uncertain
\nTchiani\u2019s claim to power rests on the idea that Bazoum\u2019s government had failed to deal with the violent Islamist extremism that has festered in the region over the past decade. That claim has driven coups elsewhere in the region, such as Mali. Military leaders can present themselves as a strong security alternative in unstable and violent nations, but in the case of Niger, the security situation was actually improving, especially in relation to its neighbors in the Sahel region \u2014 the band of north-central Africa stretching from northern Senegal to Sudan.<\/p>\n
According to a February report from the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, the vast majority \u2014 90 percent \u2014 of last year\u2019s violent events related to Islamist extremism in the Sahel occurred in Mali and Burkina Faso. And while the number of violent events in Niger doubled to 214, the number of deaths due to extremism declined by half.<\/p>\n
Approximately 40 percent of all violent activity by Islamist groups in Africa occurs in the Sahel \u2014 more than any other African region. The terror \u2014 summary executions, kidnappings, rapes, and looting \u2014 that groups like the Jama\u2019at Nusrat al Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM) coalition, Ansaroul Islam, Ansar Dine, and the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) perpetrate is real, and it is devastating. But if the situations in Mali and Burkina Faso are any example, military rule only exacerbates the violence.<\/p>\n
Tchiani told Nigeriens on a televised address Friday that he had taken over to stop \u201cthe gradual and inevitable demise\u201d of the country because \u201cthe security approach today has not brought security to the country despite heavy sacrifices.\u201d As Al Jazeera reported, Tchiani told Nigeriens that Bazoum had duped them into thinking the situation was improving, while \u201cthe harsh reality [is] a pile of dead, displaced, humiliation and frustration.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bazoum had reportedly tried to force Tchiani into retirement, as Daniel Eizenga, a research fellow at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, points out. \u201cThe coup justifications have no foundation to stand on in Niger,\u201d Eizenga said, adding that the power grab seems to be due to \u201cthe egotistical motivations of this individual.\u201d<\/p>\n
Indeed, Tchiani did not initially have the full support of the armed forces, though he has since commandeered the endorsement of some of Niger\u2019s military leaders. Civilian protests immediately after Tchiani\u2019s takeover insisted that Bazoum be returned to office; however, as Eizenga told Vox, those protests were violently suppressed by the presidential guard, Tchiani\u2019s unit, creating a \u201cchilling effect\u201d against further civilian protest.<\/p>\n
A tradition of military rule is proving hard to shake
\nWhile coups around the world and in the Sahel region have both broad and specific commonalities, it\u2019s critical to understand the differences between these events, Joseph Sany, the vice president of the US Institute of Peace\u2019s Africa Center told Vox in an interview last year.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hate the term \u2018contagion\u2019 because it\u2019s a blanket term,\u201d Sany said at the time. \u201cYou can\u2019t put Guinea in the same group as Mali and Burkina Faso.\u201d<\/p>\n
Successful coups often have some common elements like weak democratic institutions, tension between the military and the civilian government, rampant and unpunished corruption, a history of coups, and governments unable or unwilling to provide necessary services.<\/p>\n
Niger has a history of a politicized military, as do other nations which have undergone undemocratic changes in government over the past three years. \u201cThe recent changes in government, through the coup and counter-coups, is more or less a reflection of the past,\u201d Bonnie Ayodele, a professor of political science at Ekiti State University in Ado Ekiti, Nigeria, told Vox in an interview.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you try to change that, there are going to be actors within the military that perceive that as their interests being negatively affected,\u201d Eizenga said. The presidential guard, which Tchiani has headed since 2011, also have a degree of influence and autonomy from the regular military, which can create a sense of exceptionalism.<\/p>\n
Though Russia\u2019s Wagner Group has been linked to military regimes in Mali, the Central African Republic, and potentially to Sudan, there\u2019s no evidence that the proxy force headed by Yevgeny Prigozhin was part of Wednesday\u2019s coup. Prigozhin did, however, issue a statement that appealed to the anti-colonialist sentiment Wagner has stoked in neighboring Mali. \u201cWhat happened in Niger is nothing other than the struggle of the people of Niger with their colonizers,\u201d Prigozhin posted on Telegram Thursday, according to Reuters. \u201cWith colonizers who are trying to foist their rules of life on them and their conditions and keep them in the state that Africa was in hundreds of years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Ayodele told Vox, threats from France and the EU are unlikely to sway Tchiani and his fellow coup-plotters. \u201cIt has never deterred them \u2014 sanctions, banning them, slamming them with a lot of punishments, it doesn\u2019t work. They did that against the Junta in Mali, they did that against the junta in Burkina Faso […] so I\u2019m not sure this will work.\u201d<\/p>\n
The emergency ECOWAS summit needs to take forceful action to follow Nigerian president and ECOWAS Chairman Bola Tinubu\u2019s condemnation of the coup attempt, Ayodele said. Benin\u2019s President Patrice Talon, dispatched by Tinubu to Niger to assess the situation on the ground, said in a statement that, \u201cI believe that all means will be used if necessary to restore constitutional order in Niger, but the ideal would be for everything to happen in peace and harmony.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for what ECOWAS can actually do, \u201cnothing is off the table,\u201d Abdel Fatau Musah, ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs and Security told Daybreak Africa.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a protocol that many West African countries have signed to with regards to unconstitutional changes in government, that that particular country is no longer part of ECOWAS bloc,\u201d Ayodele told Vox. \u201cBut we\u2019ve seen some of these countries relapse into a military regime again, and ECOWAS is incapacitated to respond in a way that can bring about a democratic regime.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ultimately, a united international front and stronger action from ECOWAS, particularly Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, could prove decisive for Niger. President Bazoum has refused to resign and has broad and forceful support not only from Western nations but within ECOWAS and the African Union.<\/p>\n
And it\u2019s those blocs and African nations, particularly Nigeria, that have a strong interest in returning civilian rule to Niger. Even deeply flawed civilian regimes are better than military rule, and garner more international support while also being more stable and less violent. If Niger\u2019s coup can be overturned or reversed, it would send a strong signal of support for civilian government in Africa, and would help to reverse recent democratic backsliding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
President Mohamed Bazoum has refused to resign despite Wednesday\u2019s military takeover.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12963,"featured_media":32925,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,15],"tags":[7,26,25],"class_list":{"0":"post-32928","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"category-politics","9":"tag-apie-project","10":"tag-news","11":"tag-politics"},"yoast_head":"\n