Niger Coup : Multiple Efforts For Dialogue Afoot

More than a week after the expiration of the ultimatum for Niger’s military junta to hand power to the democratically-elected President, Mohamed Bazoum, the different stakeholders are crisscrossing the region to seek for an amicable solution to the prevailing crisis. After several fruitless attempts by a Nigerian delegation headed by former President Abdulsalami Abubakar, a joint AU-ECOWAS team, UN emissary and the acting US Deputy Secretary, Victoria Nuland to meet the coup leader, a delegation of religious leaders from Nigeria led by the head of an Islamic movement met over the weekend with members of the military junta in Niger in a bid to engage in dialogue.
Anadolu news agency reports that, Sheikh Abdullahi Bala Lau, a prominent Islamic scholar and the leader of the Izala Salafist Movement in Nigeria, met Saturday with coup leader Gen. Abdourahamane Tchiani and junta-appointed Prime Minister, Ali Lamine Zeine in the capital Niamey. Speaking to TRT Afrika media, PM Zeine said, after meeting with the delegation, Gen. Tchiani has expressed his readiness for dialogue with ECOWAS. ‘’We have agreed, and the leader of our country has given the green light for dialogue,” he said. He added that the delegation “will now go back and inform the Nigerian President what they have heard from us. We hope in the coming days, they (ECOWAS) will come here to meet us to discuss how the sanctions imposed against us will be lifted.” It also agreed, however, to exhaust diplomatic means to convince the junta to return the country to constitutional o...