Heavy gunfire has been reported near Niger Republic Presidential Palace on Wednesday morning, signalling another coup ahead of President-Elect Mohamed Bazoum’s inauguration on Friday.
Media reports said the shooting lasted for about 20 minutes at Niger’s capital Niamey. The Constitutional Court last week confirmed Bazoum’s victory in the February 21 presidential run-off election with 55 per cent of the vote.
But his opponent, former President Mahamane Ousmanane, who received 45 per cent of the votes, had rejected the poll results and called for a peaceful protest.
Former Foreign Minister Bazoum is an ally of out-going President-Mahamadou Issouffou. Niger, one of the world’s poorest nations is scarred by insecurity with perennithal ethnic crisis, jihadist insurrections and political instability, characterized by several military successful and attempted coups. Persecondnews recalls that soldiers had staged coups in the country in 1974, 1996, 1999 and in 2010 respectively.
The president-elect was in Abuja about a week ago to confer with President Muhammadu Buhari.
