A coalition of 20 prominent West African statesmen, diplomats, academics, and civil society leaders, including former President of Cape Verde Pedro Pireshas, has called for the immediate release of the results of Guinea-Bissau’s 23 November presidential and legislative elections, amid military takeover in the West African country.
In a joint statement shared with PREMIUM TIMES on Thursday evening, titled ‘Restoring Constitutional Order and the Rule of Law in Guinea-Bissau,’ the group urged the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to take decisive steps to restore constitutional order.
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They demanded that the election outcomes be announced promptly and the rightful winner declared.
“ECOWAS must demand the truth (about the elections), protect the winner and request the freeing of the political actors being detained by the military junta,” the statement said.
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The call comes amid reports of a military coup in the country on 26 November, just before provisional results of national elections were due.
Soldiers announced they had taken “total control,” closed borders, and suspended the electoral process.
The National Electoral Commission (CNE) said armed men stormed its headquarters, seized tally sheets and computers, and destroyed servers containing election data, preventing the announcement of results.
“Under the threat of security services and the army, the National Electoral Commission was forced to declare its inability to continue the compilation of the election results and to announce them,” the group’s statement said.
The group cited the CNE’s account that “the military had destroyed and/or taken away the documents and data needed for releasing the election results recorded in Guinea-Bissau’s eight regions, in a desperate attempt to destroy the archives.”
The statement was issued ahead of the ECOWAS Summit scheduled for 14 December, appealing directly to West African leaders to address what the group described as a deepening constitutional crisis.
“Taking into account an opinion widely shared in West Africa and throughout the rest of the continent, we take the liberty to invite the ECOWAS Heads of State, who are meeting in a Summit on 14 December, to make a bold move towards solving the current crisis afflicting one of the most fragile states of the community,” it added.
PREMIUM TIMES had reported that former Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan, who was an election observer, also weighed in on the unfolding crisis, describing the events in Guinea-Bissau as a “ceremonial coup”.
He said he would not categorise the incident in the country as a conventional coup, alleging that the event was staged to derail the announcement of the election results.
Mr Jonathan noted that President Umaro Embaló’s swift declaration that he had been “arrested,” despite freely speaking to international media on his phone, cast doubt on the plausibility of the claim.
He said no military leader would allow the ousted president to communicate with the media while being held in custody.
‘Blatant violations’
The group of 20 personalities similarly described the events in Guinea-Bissau as “blatant violations” of democratic norms.
They condemned what they termed the “comic arrest” of President Embaló, who “rushed to inform the whole world, in a suspicious enthusiasm, that he had been deposed,” while soldiers seized election materials from the CNE and detained officials “close to the opposition camp.”
“We are shocked by this brutal intrusion of the army aiming to interrupt an electoral process to which citizens of Guinea-Bissau, Amilcar Cabral’s country, held high hopes to the last minute,” the statement said.
ECOWAS response
Guinea-Bissau, with a population of about 2.2 million, has experienced recurrent coups and attempted coups since gaining independence from Portugal more than 50 years ago.
The coalition praised ECOWAS for convening a virtual emergency summit after the 26 November putsch and for condemning what they described as a staged coup by officers aligned with outgoing President Embaló.
“We salute the convening of a virtual summit by the ECOWAS Heads of State and Government in the aftermath of the putsch, as well as its condemnation of the staged coup undertaken by key military officers closely linked to the outgoing president,” the statement said.
They welcomed the decision to send a fact-finding mission to Bissau led by ECOWAS chair and Sierra Leonean President Julius Bio and noted that ECOWAS has since suspended Guinea-Bissau from all its decision-making bodies.
The African Union also suspended the country until constitutional order is restored.
International observers had earlier assessed the vote as orderly and peaceful, noting impressive turnout and a professionally managed process until soldiers intervened during vote counting.
Both major candidates, President Embaló and challenger Fernando Costa, initially claimed victory, but no results were officially published.
Call for broader international pressure
The coalition urged the African Union, United Nations, and Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries (CPLP) to intervene to prevent a reversal of democratic gains.
“We also invite African public opinion and the rest of the world to express by all legal means their refusal of the undemocratic manoeuvres underway in Guinea-Bissau, while paying tribute to the maturity of its people,” the statement said.
The group rejected claims that it was impossible to conclude the electoral process, citing reports that original tally sheets had been preserved.
“It will only take coordinated international pressure to have them published,” they said.
Signatories to the joint statement include former President of Cape Verde Pedro Pires; former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Cape Verde José Brito; former Executive Secretary of ECOWAS, Abass Bundu; and former Secretary-General of Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP), Luis Fonseca.
Other prominent figures include former ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security and Finance, Halima Ahmed; former Executive Secretary of Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), Olukeshi Adebayo; Director of Policy Engagement at Centre for Democratic Development (CDD)-Ghana, Kojo Asante; and Senior Fellow at CDD-Nigeria, Jibrin Ibrahim.
The list also featured human rights activist and former Secretary-General of the West African Bar Association, Femi Falana, who is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN); former ECOWAS Communication Director, Adama Gaye; Chairman of Media Companies in Guinea-Conakry, Lamine Guirassy; Founder and former Executive Director of the Media Foundation for West Africa, Kwame Karikari; Takyiwaa Manuh of the University of Ghana; and Mahmoud Mamdani, based in New York, USA.
Other signatories are El Hadji Mboup from Senegal; a journalist from Congo-Brazzaville, Nicole Mikolo; human rights lawyer Fatou Jagne Senghore, founder of the Centre for Leadership and Women’s Rights in Gambia; economist from Cameroon, Jean-Pierre Tchanou; President of AfrikaJom Centre in Senegal, Alioune Tine; and founder of Wathi Think Tank in Benin, Gilles Yabi.
Movement of candidates
Following the coup, President Embaló fled to Dakar, Senegal, with assistance from President Bassirou Faye, after criticism from Senegal’s Prime Minister Ousmane Sonko, who dismissed the coup as a “sham.”
He later travelled to Congo-Brazzaville and reportedly moved to Morocco en route to Portugal.
In response to the situation, President Bola Tinubu approved the decision to place the opposition presidential candidate, Mr Costa, under protection within the Nigerian Embassy premises in Guinea-Bissau and subsequently granted him a Nigerian asylum.
