Caroline Baudry, with AFP / Photo credit: KAREN BLEIER / AFP
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7:56 p.m., August 08, 2023
The soldiers responsible for the coup in Niger announced Monday evening the appointment of a Prime Minister, Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine, in a press release read on national television, at a time when the international community is seeking to restore constitutional order. “Mr. (Ali Mahaman) Lamine Zeine has been appointed Prime Minister,” reported Colonel-Major Amadou Abdramane. As soon as he came to power, former president Mamadou Tandja appointed Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine as chief of staff in 2001, then finance minister in 2002, to redress a chaotic economic and financial situation.
A context inherited from soldiers who came to power after the assassination in 1999 of General and President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara, in this country with a history marked by seizures of power by force. Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine had been Minister of Finance until the overthrow of Mamadou Tandja during a coup in 2010 by Commander Salou Djibo, before a presidential election won by Mahamadou Issoufou, predecessor of Mohamed Bazoum, ousted on July 26 last.
The hypothesis of a military intervention is moving further and further away
According to Antoine Glaser, journalist and writer specializing in Africa, this designation of Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine as Prime Minister of Niger is a sign of the gradual installation of the military junta in the country. And rule out a little more the hypothesis of a military intervention. “Especially if there is a civilian government and there are appointments of other ministers who are esteemed and have the confidence of the population,” he explains. And to add to the microphone of Europe 1: “We see that the more time passes, the more those who are in favor of military intervention risk being outvoted in relation to the decisions of Westerners”.
Economist by training
Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine, an economist by training, was also resident representative of the African Development Bank (AfDB) in Chad, Côte d’Ivoire and Gabon. Born in 1965 in Zinder (south), in the second most populous city in the country, he joined the Ministry of Economy and Finance in 1991 after studying at the National School of Administration (ENA) in Niamey. He is also a graduate of the Center for Financial, Economic and Banking Studies of Marseille and Paris-I.
“Lieutenant-Colonel Habibou Assoumane” was also “appointed commander of the presidential guard”, added Amadou Abdramane. These appointments come the day after the expiry of the ultimatum issued by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to the military in power, to restore President Mohamed Bazoum to his duties. The organization did not rule out the use of force in the event of non-compliance with this request.
Niger’s Western and African partners are divided over the question of a military intervention to return power to civilians, before ECOWAS meets again Thursday in Abuja, Nigeria. President Bazoum is still sequestered in his private residence since the day of the coup.