"Norbert" in Niamey's "Le Courrier" paper has interesting piece on the ineffectiveness of Tandja's Interior Minister Abouba Albadé. Albadé, a Tandja-ist of the first water served briefly as PM and importantly headed up the police and internal paramiltary (FNIS) services. He was one of the men most associated with Tandja's power grab. While the author refers to Albadé's well funded "Gestapo", the fall of the President suggests those funds may have gone somewhere other than for intelligence. Le Courrier repeats rumors that Albadé was getting 120,000 Euros a year directly from Tandja. When PM Ali Gamatie (on whom the writer hangs the Hausa slur "Bak'in Bature" : essentially "an Uncle Tom") tried to cut the funds, Albadé went over his head to keep them. The piece ends with a bizarrely obscure Diderot quote from his 1769 harangue against Frederick II ("Pages contre un tyran"), saying that when power praise "truth" while lying, people may only yearn for truth even more. True?
Afrique
Niger: Council of Ministers names former PM’s offical Secretary General
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
Niger's state paper reports a preliminary meeting of Ministers were given instruction by the Junta Head of State Cmdt. Salou Djibo on Wednesday (3 March). A "Secretary General" of the Council was named: Mrs. Adama Saliah Gazibo. The report describes her as a Judge, which she is. But she was also one of the chief officials of former PM Hama Amadou, the once scion of Tandja who later became his arch foe. Hama is seen by some conspiratorially minded as the backer of this coup. Adama Saliah Gazibo's appointment won't help this. She is also the official who famously attempted to discredit the slavery testimony of a Nigerienne Mariama Oumarou's at the 2001 Durban racism conference. About the girl, who was married at 15 to a Nigerian by her Tuareg noble master and used as a servant and raped, Saliah said a Niger court "found that the girl's marriage was legitimate under traditional law. This girl should not come here and disgrace her country when the legal process has done its work."
Mali: Crime and guns in the north threaten health work
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
Médecins du Monde Belgium reports that three of their health workers were carjacked in the desert north of Youwarou Cercle, Kidal Region on 2 March. Men armed with AK-47s stole a landrover and abandoned the workers in the desert. The MMB workers were part of a anti-Dracunculiasis (Guinea Worm) clinic in Youwarou. Sadly, such car robberies are not unknown, especially after the wave of weapons that flooded the region during the 2007-2008 insurgency. Similar robberies from aid agencies were reported after the 1990s and the 2006 violence, with cars taken across the border to Mauritania or as far away as Morocco to be sold. While I'm sure someone will blame "terrorists" it seems clear if you give young men guns and no jobs, especially in a region with a centuries old tradition of trade / smuggling, you'll get car robberies. I would hope government might deal with these issues before calling in AFRICOM with their missiles and bombs.
Niger: Short bio of a new Minister and spokesman
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
Mahaman Laouali Dan Dah, who was appointed by the CSRD junta on Monday as Minister of Secondary Education, has also been appointed spokesman for the new provisional government. Laouali Dan Dah is an interesting character: a gadfly under the Bare regime, he led the Magistrates union SAMAN (syndicat autonome des magistrats du Niger), and was nominated for the CENI electoral commission. After the April 1999 coup he served as Justice Minister, and has since run his own law firm in Niamey. More generally, Laouali Dan Dah seems a representative – if particularly distinguished – member of the provisional government. These are technocratic professionals who have a record of opposing the worst excesses of Nigerien regimes, but have no qualms about working with all other political poles of the society.
Niger: Farmers migrate north looking for work, and find little
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
The UN's IRIN news has a piece well worth reading in full: "NIGER: Food pressures spread north" along with the a portrait of a southern Niger farmer ("Mariama Adao, 'We help each other… but it is hard'") whose crop failures have driven her to seek work in the equally troubled north. The two paint a more subtle picture of the problems facing a third of Niger's population, all most all of whom depend on small scale farms or pastoralism just to get by. A recent FEWS report from neighboring Mali stresses how the stop and start rains of last June have done in the northern seasonal pastures upon which local pastoralists rely, causing a cascade of pressure as they move south into well producing farms. In pockets of Niger's south we had the same effect: crops withered after spotty rains. Mariama Adao from Matameye migrated early looking for farm work in Agadez to find that floods there had halved the work available. This is how in a poor society any mixed harvest could become a disaster.
African Cup Final ’56
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
One doesn’t see much film, let alone color film, of colonial era African football. So you can imagine my delight when I stumbled across clips of a French colonial propaganda newsreel featuring the my favorite African club side wining a colonial cup final from 1956.
Niger: More Tandja loyalists freed
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
Libération-Niger reports that three security heads were freed from custody: Col. Hamidou Maïgari, head of the 600 man Presidential Guard under Tandja was freed along with a Captain of the same unit. Both were held at Camp Bagagi Iya, best known for the football stadium where the FNIS and Army teams play. The later is headed by junta no 2 Col. Pele Hima Mamadou, coincidentally or not.
As noted earlier, Army Colonel Abdou Sidikou Issa was just transferred to head the FNIS (which commands the Guard). The former FNIS head Colonel Assoumane Abdou remained loyal to Tandja, and is one of only a handful of top commanders to have disappeared from the scene. Most others previously seen as close to Tandja have rallied to the new Junta. Liberation also points out that Col. Bagué, Tandja's Aide de camp (and conflated in some earlier reports with CSRD Secretary Col. Abdoulaye Badie), was released by the junta several days earlier.
Niger: Other appointments for military titans
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
I've argued that continuity and inclusiveness is the watchword of the new CSRD junta in Niger. Some additional appointments announced today underscore this. Disgraced Tandja Military chief and co-conspirator General Moumouni Boureïma's aide Col Abdou Sidikou Issa is one of the main field commanders to rise from the 99 coup. He was Prefect of Maradi in 99, chief of the Zinder Defence Zone at the beginning of the recent Tuareg conflict, and moved in the highest army circles. He's now been named as the head of the FNIS the paramilitary force of the Interior Ministry, which also runs the Presidential Guard. Général de Brigade Seyni Garba, one of the four Joint Chief generals thought loyal to Tandja and Boureima (along with Mai Manga Oumara, Abdou Kaza, and Mamadou Ousseini, now all Ministers) is Inspector General of the Gendarmerie. Pele Hima Hamadou, presumed Junta no. 2, is made Counselor to the President with Rank of Minister: so technically that's six officers now ministers.
Niger: Junta appeals to authority
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
Like many nations, Nigeriens make a distinction between "political" figures and "National" figures. Of course this distinction is artificial and changeable: deposed President Tandja tried to position himself as "above" politics, as a justification for taking dictatorial powers, and see where that got him. But one of the most interesting re-appearances of the last few weeks is former President-Général (1987-1991/3) Ali Saibou. At the time he was the weak consensus candidate after the death of Seyni Kountché, hard man of the 1974-1991 military Junta. He vacillated about democracy, oversaw a brief bloody crackdown on dissent, and then gave up meekly to a citizens council and stayed on as a figurehead for two years. Living in obscurity, he has been visited by both the coup leaders and the PM in recent days, who hold him up as "a chief of state who loved Niger". With the other living ex-heads of state (Ousmane and Tandja) still active politically, Saibou seems sainted.
Niger: Junta names new military joint chiefs
by Tommy Miles • • 0 Comments
While Monday's announcement kicked three long standing generals up to provisional ministers, the junta in Niger has named the new joint chiefs, with continuity to the fore (again). Those how moved up to ministerial positions were replaced by their adjutants. Air Corps General Souleymane (Seyni) Salou, one of the four officers favored by Tandja, is now Joint Chief, with the only obvious political casualty of the coup former joint Chief Général de Division Moumouni Boureima still under arrest. With Gen. Mamadou Ousseini a Minister, his adjutant Col. Salifou Mody (Modi) is head of the Army. He's another member of the Junta and member of the 99 junta. Air Col. Hassane Mossi, the former adjutant becomes head of Air Forces. He too is on the CSRD junta. Their assistants are previously anonymous Colonels Didili Amadou (to the Chief), Iro Oumarou (Army), and Issa Hamza (air). Note that Gen Seyni Salou, for having been bought off by Tandja, now appears beside Djibo Salou in meetings.