Mali: CSO tasks Buhari, ECOWAS leaders on stance on democratic return

The Executive Director, OJA Development Consult, Mr. Jide Ojo, has urged President Muhammadu Buhari and other leaders of Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS to insist on date when the Military junta in Mali will return the country to democratically elected leaders.

He told Daily Trust in Abuja that their promise to return democracy within a “reasonable” period should be rejected as it was not definite and should not have lasted for more than six months.

According to him, the coup that oust President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita of Mali didn’t come to many political observers as a surprise.

He recalled that he has been facing stiff opposition since he won a re-election in 2018.

According to him, the hotly disputed parliamentary election of March 2020 in which the Constitutional Court of Mali nullified 31 of the results which enabled the ousted President Keita’s party to have 10 more seats than the opposition political parties also ignited another round of protests.

“Aside this, the economy of Mali is in the doldrums, there are allegations of heightened corruption and insecurity especially in Northern and Central part of the country where the Islamic jihadists are holding sway. All these combined to make the June 5 movements to call for the resignation of the president.

“Though ECOWAS tried to mediate by asking former President Goodluck Jonathan to lead a team to mediate in the crisis while President Buhari and three other ECOWAS leaders also went to Mali to mediate after which an emergency ECOWAS head of states meeting was held virtually.

“All of these peace moves failed to resolve the impasse. Therefore, it not entirely surprising that the military decided to seize power and also forced the president to resign. All these is reminiscent of developments in Sudan and Zimbabwe which led to the ouster of strongman Oman Al-Bashir and ex-President Robert Muggabe,” Ojo said.

He added that it is good that the Mali mutineers have faced international condemnations and this has pressured them to promise to restore stability and oversee a transition to elections within a “reasonable” period.

He however, said that this is rather vague and they should be made to come up with a definite date and interim government of national unity should be put in place, and which should not last for more than six months.