2023-08-22 19:01:03
Mohamed Bazoum (center), elected president of Niger, and former president Mahamadou Issoufou (right) during his inauguration at the International Conference Center in Niamey, April 2, 2021. BOUREIMA HAMA / AFP
The closeness forged throughout thirty years of political companionship was such that it was customary to say in Niamey that one might not slip a sheet of cigarette paper between Mahamadou Issoufou and Mohamed Bazoum, the successor of the first to the presidency of Niger. Since the July 26 coup, this certainty has wavered, whether in the entourage of the two men or in neighboring capitals.
The former head of state (2011-2021) Mahamadou Issoufou is, at best, criticized for not condemning with sufficient ardor the putsch led by the commander of his presidential guard, who had been kept in office by his ” friend of thirty years. At worst, he is suspected of having, knowingly, let the military carry out their factional project.
It was only three weeks following the coup that Mahamadou Issoufou actually broke his silence. He did so on August 17 in the columns of Young Africa, French media specialized on the continent. He then said that he was part of a process of mediation between the military and the president held prisoner with his wife and son in his residence. His goal was “the release of President Mohamed Bazoum and his restoration to office”.
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Reacting to rumors accusing him of manipulating the generals, even of being the mastermind of the putsch, the former Nigerien president said he felt “insulted, bruised in (s)on intelligence ». “Those who spread these kinds of rumors are the very people who from day one have sought to divide us, [Mohamed] Bazoum and me. But our friendship has always been stronger than that,” he added.
Those who attended the handover ceremony between the former and the new president in March 2021 in Niamey remember the warmth of their embrace, well beyond what the protocol requires. In a Nigerian political environment punctuated by betrayals, scarred by military coups, the two men have – until today – walked together. Mahamadou Issoufou, born in 1952, progressing, privilege of age, on the road to power one step ahead of his eight-year-old junior. “It was he who introduced me to trade unionism and politics”confided to us Mohamed Bazoum shortly following his election.
Respect for the Constitution
The two men were indeed built in the crucible of the trade union struggle before laying the foundations, together, in 1990, of the Nigerien Party for Democracy and Socialism (PNDS-Tarayya). This party will be the vector of the victory of Mahamadou Issoufou in the presidential election of 2011 then of his second term in 2016, and finally that of the success, five years later, of Mohamed Bazoum.
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