Mali coup leaders to hand over power
By Online Team
9th April 2012:
Mali’s coup leaders and their neighbours have reached a deal under which the two-week-old military junta will hand over power in return for the end of trade and diplomatic sanctions. Mali’s military junta and the West African bloc ECOWAS announced the deal on Malian state television late on Friday last week.
Under the plan, signed by mediators and junta leader Captain Amadou Sanogo, the military government will hand over power to parliament speaker Diouncounda Traore who will be sworn in as interim president with a mission to organise elections.
The deal also includes the lifting of sanctions clamped by ECOWAS on Mali and an amnesty for those involved in the coup. The embargo included the closing of all borders of ECOWAS states with Mali except for humanitarian reasons, closing to Mali access to ECOWAS ports, and the freezing of Malian bank accounts.
ECOWAS Chief Alassane Ouattara said the sanctions should be lifted “immediately”, Burkina Faso’s Djibrill Bassole told public television station ORTM. He also said President Amadou Toumani Toure, who was overthrown on March 22 and has since not been seen in public, should be able to live where he wants under army protection.
The five-page agreement provides a framework for a return to constitutional rule under the interim leader who will also handle the crisis in the north, where Islamists and Tuareg rebels have seized control.
The deal did not give a timetable for Sanogo to step down, but said the 15-state ECOWAS regional grouping would immediately prepare the end of tough sanctions including the closure of trade borders to the land-locked country.
The statement added that if elections were not possible within the 40 days set out by the constitution due to Tuaregs’ rebellion in the north, a transition structure would need to be created.
The announcement came on the day that the northern rebels declared independence of the territory they call Azawad, a call immediately rejected by African neighbours and foreign capitals from Paris to Washington. END. Please login to www.ugandacorrespondent.com every Monday to read our top stories and anytime mid-week for our news updates.
