Coup: Jonathan, other West African leaders to visit Mali

Former President, Goodluck Jonathan, will be going to Mali with other West African leaders on Saturday, in a bid to seek solutions to the crisis ravaging the country

Recall, Daily Times Nigeria reported that Mali’s elected President, Ibrahim Keita, was overthrown on Tuesday by military troops, who took him as well as Prime Minister Boubou Cisse and other senior officials into custody.

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According to reports, the coup came as a surprise round West Africa as they couldn’t believe that the front liners in the fight against jihadism, could collapse.

Meanwhile, earlier on Tuesday before the coup, Jonathan, while briefing President Buhari, said Mali’s main opposition group, M5, was adamant on its call for the resignation of Keita.

Keita, who later appeared in a state television broadcast on Wednesday, declared the dissolution of the government and National Assembly and said he had no choice but to resign with immediate effect.

“If it pleased certain elements of our military to decide this should end with their intervention, do I really have a choice? (I must) submit to it, because I don’t want any bloodshed,” the 75-year-old said.

The United Nations, African Union, Economic Community of West African States, amongst others, had since condemned the coup.

ECOWAS had on Thursday announced that it would dispatch a high-level delegation “to ensure the immediate return of constitutional order”. It also demanded that Keita be restored as president and warned the junta that it bore “responsibility for the safety and security” of the detainees.

But according to an AFP report on Friday, Jonathan, who is the ECOWAS Special Envoy to Mali, alongside 14 other leaders in the regional bloc, will be in the Malian capital of Bamako tomorrow for peace talks with the junta leaders including Assimi Goita who has declared himself head of the junta.

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Reacting to the request for a meeting with the leader, a junta official told AFP, “We will receive the ECOWAS delegation with pleasure… it is important to talk to our brothers.”

Meanwhile, the United Nations human rights officials visited Keita and the others on Thursday while the junta on Friday said it had released two prisoners, retaining 17.

(AFP)