Guinean military leaders must allow civilian rule-Analyst

Even as Guineans are still celebrating the recent coup d’etat, critics are presenting new dynamics that seem unanswered, that is, how can the military guarantee a successful transition?

Africanews spoke to a Guinean political journalist Seidik Abba who affirmed that the military rule has more pressing issues to handle and that includes how to hand over power to civilian rule.

"They can, as we have seen elsewhere, propose a transition of 18 months to 2 years, and then start discussions with the West African Economic Community to agree on a transition period, Secondly, as you know, the international community is up in arms against the coup d'etat that has just been perpetrated in Guinea and one way to reassure them is to propose a transition that is both military and civilian, with perhaps a military transitional president and a civilian government later. ...all this must be discussed but it is in the interest of the military that this must be done very quickly. Time is against them. The longer they take to propose the nature of the transition and its duration, the stronger the challenges will be, both from sub-regional organizations such as ecowas, the African Union and the united nations," Seidik said.

Seidik Abba said that the situation in guinea could have been avoided if the international community had taken over its responsibilities on time.

"The international community did not say a word when the previous president decided to force his way into a third mandate, nor did it say a word, apart from the European Union, when more than 200 people were killed after the presidential elections. We shouldn't act strange over what happened but we have to avoid this essence of not learning from our mistakes. There was a coup d'etat in august 2020 in mali, we saw the coup coming, the first signs were perceptible, the international community did nothing for guinea. We saw the situation deteriorate, we even saw the coup coming but the international community said nothing. It is not right to condemn military power. What they should do is to support the transition in guinea," he added.

Seidik further said that the recent coup d’etat in West Africa especially in Mali should have served as a warning to the international community.

"The coup d'etat happens because there are pretexts, there is the confiscation of democracy, the non-respect of the institutions and values of democracy. We should have been cautious just after the Mali coup when we had the Assimi Gotta 1 and Assimi Goita 2 cops. Guinea just had a coup d'etat, Let's not forget that in Niger there was a coup in 2010, in 2014 Compaore was overthrown to the street. So every time if there will be a retreat of democracy in Africa, a confiscation of power by a few. There will be coups or the military will feel obliged to come and act as referees," Seidik said.

Guinea, one of the world's poorest countries despite boasting significant mineral resources, has long been beset by political instability.

The coup plotters announced a so-called national committee for assembly and development, which will be tasked with consulting political and civil society figures on the way forward.