A mental patient poses for a photograph in a sanitarium in Harbe, Afghanistan. Over 5 million Afghans suffer severe mental disorders resulting from decades of conflict and repression. Image by Getty Images via @daylife

Today — the 10th of October — is World Mental Health Day. Take a moment to look through these photos from Niger, where Mahamadoul-kafi Djibrilla spoke at a community discussion of mental illness and treatment in Tahoua Region. Some might think that the least of rural Niger’s worries would be mental illness. But they’d be wrong. Mental disorders, whether treated by families and communities or by medical professionals are a part of life everywhere, even as most cultures are fearful of even acknowledging their extent.

The World Health Organization chose today to release its “Mental Health Atlas“, a statistical and policy survey on the mental health and mental healthcare systems of 184 nations. Their conclusion was that “countries all over the world spend very little on the treatment of mental illness.” The UN Secretary General noted that, while mental illness makes up 13% of the world ‘disease burden,’ “Resources allocated for mental health by governments and civil society are habitually too little, both in human and financial terms.”

Global spending on mental health, in rich and poor nations alike, is less than US$3 per capita per year. The report goes on to note that “up to 50 percent of people suffering from mental disorders in Europe and North America do not receive treatment, and up to 85 percent of people in developing countries do not receive treatment…” This coincides with other recent studies that show a United States population, facing increased pressure from unemployment and other crises, has dramatically cut back on its mental healthcare spending, deeming it an unaffordable luxury. Meanwhile, those same pressures have both increased the need for mental healthcare, and cut back funding for such services.

More Common Than You Think

The World Health Organization this year estimates 450 million people worldwide are suffering right now from mental illness, but estimates of the percent of people who will suffer some mental illness in their lifetime vary from between 5% and 25%.

In the European Union, one quarter of people will experience a mental health problem in their lifetimes, 9% will suffer depression in any one year, and 2.6% a year will suffer more severe disorders.

We’re Still Not Doing Much

In the United States at least 10% of the population is suffering depression right now.
Yet it would take almost 7000 new mental health professionals to meet the needed ratio of just one for every 10,000 people. And that number of needed professionals has increased by almost 2000 in the last three years.

In the developing world, the disparity is much greater. In Nigeria the ratio of psychologists and social workers is 0.02 to 100,000 population. In Niger, there were 0.2 psychiatric beds per 100,000 population, and no mental hospital based beds at all. There were 0.4 psychiatric nurses per 100,000, and the same percentage of other mental health professionals. And West Africa is not unusual in this. In Azerbaijan there were 5 psychiatrists and 7.1 psych beds per 100,000. In Ecuador these numbers were 2.1 and 1.69 per 10,000. In Afghanistan they are 0.036 and 0.055 per 10,000. In most of these, as most developing nations, there is no or minimal and unquantifiably small government support to aid those suffering from acute mental illness, let alone the huge percentage suffering less obvious forms.

It is no better in rapidly industrializing nations. In China there is only one mental health bed per 10,000 population and less than one mental health professional per 100,000. In India, where one in six health related disorders are mental, there are just 0.25 mental health beds per 10,000 population.

Real, Inescapable Illnesses

We should distinguish between lifetime — probably genetic — chronic and severe mental illness and situational mental disorders, both of which can disable those suffering. Mental illness is more prevalent in times of high unemployment, rapid social change, people struck by food insecurity and poverty, and times of population movement. Around 400 million people are suffering from these sorts of mental illnesses right now, but with so few resources to help them, the real numbers may be much higher

In the the United States, like much of the developed world, less chronic forms are mental illness are now recognized as equally severe problems for the society. Depression is the leading cause of disability in the United States among adults. Suicide rates for those currently suffering depression are well above the general population and are highest in rural areas with the least access to care.

Mental illness strikes those more statistically likely to suffer societal discrimination and poverty. The depression rate among African American women is 50% higher than that of Caucasian women in the US, just like the unemployment rate. In fact, African Americans make up almost a quarter of all suffering from mental illness in the US, far above their ratio to total population. In a world of increasing disparity, unemployment, poverty, food insecurity, and population movement, mental illness rises as well. The legal systems, even in the richest nations, contribute to the numbers of mental illness rather than help treat those who enter suffering from illness. In the UK, Only 1 in 10 prisoners DO NOT suffer a diagnosable mental disorder.

On top of those suffering transitory illness there are millions suffering genetic predispositions to chronic — and incurable — severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia. While treatment is making it more an more possible to live a fuller, normal life even with severe mental illness, fewer people have access to even basic mental health care. While schizophrenia affects only around 0.3% to 0.7% of the population worldwide, that’s still 24 million people.

Fear Compounds Suffering

I know these things because I work for a charity that provides housing, among other services, to people in my community who suffer chronic mental illnesses. Where I live, we have under 1000 chronic mental illness care beds to a population of 250,000, enough to meet the needs of much less than %1 of population.

But it is next to impossible to build new homes for long term care of those suffering mental illness: neighbors, community groups, and the press react with vilification and hatred when new housing is planned.

People suffering from mental illness, according to long-term studies in Europe, New Zealand, and the United States have all concluded that “that the risks of violence by someone with mental health problems are no greater than those for the general population as a whole.”

People suffering from mental illnesses are no more to harm strangers in any fashion than any other population, but are 2.5 times more likely to be the victim of crime than others. Where the severely mentally ill are more likely to be involved in violence is within their home, as a symptom of lack of treatment. The likelihood of committing any form of armed violence once in their lifetime among people with serious mental illness was 16%, as compared with 7% among people without mental illness. This does not include most sufferers of less severe mental illness, nor those who are receiving appropriate treatment. In fact, the vast majority of those suffering from mental illness are not included in these statistics, as they suffer from depression or other disorders that present no danger to others. The severely mentally ill are more a danger to themselves than anyone else, yet they are feared as violent and dangerous far outside their actual danger. People with no mental disorder who abuse alcohol or drugs are seven times as likely as those without substance abuse to commit violence. And since the rates of substance abuse among the untreated severely mentally ill are very high, much of the statistical relevance may be down to this. In fact, among those severely mentally ill who did not have a history of substance abuse, having been a victim of violence themselves, or homelessness, the likelihood of them engaging in any violence over their lifetime was in line with the general population.

Despite this, the perception of the severely mentally ill as violent — at least in the United States — has doubled since the 1950s while more and more severely mentally ill have found treatment that allows them to function normally. Recent studies reveal a majority of respondents falsely believe people suffering from Schizophrenia were inherently dangerous.

What You Can Do

Where do we go with this? First, educate yourself and others. Learn more about what these illnesses are and how you can avoid them in your life or help those in your family or community. From Tahoua to communities around the world, we need to speak, learn, and demystify mental illness. I often tell people that I pass my agency’s clients regularly as I walk down to my neighborhood shops to buy a cup of coffee or a newspaper. No one looking at them would ever know these were people with severe and persistent mental illnesses. They look like — because they are — regular members of our community. Now imagine how hard it is to identify those who’ve suffered from episodic mental disorders due to depression or trauma. Look around you and realize one in every five people you pass is in that group.

But like so many things in this world, a large part of the problem must be tackled with funding. We actually know what we need to do. This year, the WHO published a survey of shortages in mental health care in 144 developing and poorer developed nations. They found these countries would need 1.18 million mental health professionals, almost half of whom would be psychosocial care providers, to care for those suffering and educate others about mental illness. The yearly cost to provide this workforce was estimated at about US$ 4.4 billion.

For comparison that would be less than 0.5% of the United States annual defense budget. So we’re actively choosing to spend money we have on other things. It does not have to be this way.

Look After Yourself and Help Look After Your Community

So for this World Mental Health day I’d hope you not only see to your own mental health, but think of the others suffering, whether they be on your street or across the world. They are your brother and sisters and, but for a bit of luck, could be you.

Related articles

• World Mental Health Day: Treatment Remains a Challenge Around the World (psychcentral.com)
• It’s World Mental Health Day (drvitelli.typepad.com)
• It’s World Mental Health Day, so stop stigmatising my pills. (thefword.org.uk)
• Blog Party: World Mental Health Day, October 10 (psychcentral.com)
• Health System Hide and Seek: “Mental Health” Never Gets Found (gph2110.wordpress.com)
• 50 Signs of Mental Illness: A Guide to Understanding Mental Health (Yale University Press Health & Wellness) (untreatableonline.com)
• Patients suffer when reimbursements for mental health care are reduced (skwillms.wordpress.com)
• Useful WHO First-Aid Guide for Mental Health in a Disaster (sociolingo.com)

Mahamadou Issoufou of the PNDS and Seyni Oumarou of the MNSD vote for themselves, presumably.

Saturday the 12th of March will see second round voting in Niger’s Presidential elections, marking a return to civilian rule and the beginning of the Seventh Republic.  It seems certain that front runner and PNDS-Tarayya candidate Mahamadou Issoufou will become the first President of the new republic on 8 April when the military junta that deposed Mamadou Tandja on 18 February 2010 formally cedes power.

From one of several opposition parties Issoufou and the PNDS stepped remarkably into the breach left by Tandja.  The party has gone out of their way throughout this campaign to present an image of a unified body of ideas and change.  Issoufou has engaged in unprecedented face to face campaign rallies across the nation, not relying on the Nigerien tradition of local notables cobbling together coalitions to turn out votes.  The PNDS has also presented slick campaign materials, and from early days released a detailed manifesto of the process by which they will raise and spend development funds, including plans to empower local subsistence farmers (not usually a focus, but one that effects a majority of Niger’s often politically silent population).  The PNDS is undoubtedly the most ideological — social democratic — of the major parties, but it too remains mired in the traditional games of regionalism (Tahoua and Illea being the base) and constantly shifting coalition building.

The MNSD HQ in Niamey: Don't rule out the Big Baobab.

No one should discount their major rival, the MNSD-Nassara.  While bruised and bloodied by their association with disgraced President  Tandja, the MNSD predates Tandja’s leadership from 1991 to last year.  It was formed in 1987 by the military dictatorship which ruled Niger from 1974 to 1991 as a single party built on a corporatist model. Local communities, traditional leaders, elders, youth groups, and professional organizations were channeled into the MNSD, for most as their first experience of mass politics.  The politics which had led to independence in 1960 devolved rapidly into a one party state under Hamani Diori, open only to the elite and generally uninterested in popular mobilization for even the most superficial purposes.  One aspect that the MNSD did carry on from the First Republic was the drafting of traditional rulers and notables into the unitary party.  The MNSD has thus become a traditionalist, conservative and non-ideological body with tremendous support from elites, the military, and many rural communities who remember the rule of Seyni Kountché (1974-87) and his successor Ali Saibou (1987-93) as a reaction against corruption and famine which dominated civilian rule. The MNSD, for all the purges and infighting which Tandja introduced from 2007, remains for many the “Grand Baobab”, the big tent party that welcomes all who profess love of country and traditional values.  Their relative success even in the wake of an extremely popular coup against Tandja’s corruption and misrule should demonstrate the deep roots that still feed the MNSD.

This is best seen in the aftermath of the first round of these elections.  Just days before the vote, almost every political party other than the favored PNDS met to form the Alliance for National Reconciliation.  This included all but two of Issoufou’s closest allies. The ARN promised to support whichever of their number could make it to the second round against the PNDS, tipped to be either the  MNSD-Nassara or the new personal party for former MNSD Prime Minister Hama Amadou, the MODEN-FA Lumana.  Two things were stunning here.  One was that so many parties that had led marches to oust and faced repression by Tandja’s MNSD-Nassara in 2009 were willing to reconcile so quickly with their former foes.   Perhaps more stunning: Hama Amadou, the former heir apparent to the MNSD signed on so enthusiastically.  Hama had been impeached on curiously timed corruption charges in 2007, just as he seemed ready to take the party’s leadership from Tandja, and then found himself imprisoned for over a year, his supporters ejected from their party and purged from the government.  At one point Hama claimed that prison had struck him so low with disease that he feared death.  On his temporary release he fled the country, saying that the government was planning to assassinate him should he stay. And yet he was willing just a year later to literally embrace the man who led the MNSD purge of his supporters, Seyni Oumarou. Nigerien politics is nothing if not dramatic.

The question on everyone’s lips leading up to the Parliamentary and first round Presidential elections was what support Hama’s untested MODEN-FA Lumana would have.  Taking with him elements of the vaunted MNSD machine in strongholds like Tillaberi, many thought he might cruise into the second round.  In the event, Hama’s new cadre was no match for the entrenched party system.  The PNDS scored %36 in the presidential vote and 39 of the 113 assembly seats.  The MNSD followed with %23 and 26 seats, while Hama’s supporters provided a reasonable showing of 23 seats but only %19 for his presidential bid.

The first round candidates, clockwise from top left: Hama Amadou, Mahamane Ousmane, Mahamadou Issoufou, Seyni Oumarou, Ousmane Issoufou Oubandawaki, (second row, right to left) Amadou Cheiffou, Abdoulaye Amadou Traoré, Amadou Cissé, Bayard Mariama Gamatié, Moussa Moumouni Djermakoye

The following 48 hours proved again the mercenary nature of Nigerien politics.  All but two of the sizable parties in the ARN coalition again defected, clearly demonstrating that the desire to side with a winner was more important than any ideology, personal loyalty, or even shame.  Hama led the charge back to the Issoufou camp, and speculation remains rife whether he has demanded the Prime Ministership or the Presidency of the Assembly as his price.

There are several sidelines here worth noting.  Former President Mahamane Ousmane and his CDS–Rahama, once the dominant party of the 3rd Republic and a powerhouse based in Zinder collapsed completely, with %8 of the Presidential vote and only 3 seats in the assembly.  The CDS had played a pivotal role in first opposing, then supporting Tandja, while becoming a linchpin of the opposition to the President’s 2009 power grab called the 6th Republic.  Whatever the basis, Ousmane has long been among the top vote traders in the Niamey political game.   Not content to crash and burn, the CDS seemingly ripped itself apart in the post election realignment.  Elements of the youth section and the central committee fought Ousmane to remain tied to MNSD-Nassara, when he seemed to jump ship.

Signs welcoming the 2010 military coup: the year long military rule has reinforced many Nigerien's view of the military as a more trustworthy than most civilian governments.

This is important because the CDS and Ousmane represent the quintessential personal party in Niger.  It has long been assumed that most parties — with the exception of the PNDS and the MNSD — are entirely vehicles of their leaders.  There certainly is little ideological content to Nigerien parties, and the regional bases, while relied upon for a foundation, do not make most of them strictly regionalist or ethnic parties.  Nigerien parties are invariably a constellation “big men” and more quiet local traditional notables with the backing of one or two regionally important business moguls.

While much of this definition remains, the utter destruction of the CDS was mirrored in several other smaller parties that had long provided vehicles for individual party heads and their backers to demand a cut of the benefits that come with governance.

Political fixture Amadou Cheiffou’s RSD-Gaskiya disappeared from the assembly, former PM Amadou Cissé’s UDR-Tabbat fell to six seats.  And while the RDP-Jama’a  and ANDP-Zaman-Lahiya retained 7 and 8 seats respectively, these two regional parties (Agadez and Dosso) lost their charismatic leaders, and seem to survive only as supports for larger parties.  Of the former loyal PNDS coalition partners throughout the last decade (PNA-Al’ouma, PPN-RDA, and UNI), only UNI managed to win a single seat.  Publishing magnate Sanoussi Jackou’s PNA-Al’ouma has hardly caused a ripple as the last of the 35 small parties to endorse Issoufou in the second round.

The pattern here is of political coalescence.  As in the days before the second round and grand total of 35 political parties lined up with the PNDS, Niger’s political ecosystem might appear varied, there is some reason to believe two major parties and three or four major political barons are emerging to dominate.

Rumors have challenged this reading, especially from within the CDS faction fight.  There are those who claim the MNSD, after signing parties onto their ARN coalition in the first round, passed out campaign materials in areas dominated by their new partners that advised supporters of smaller parties should vote on the MNSD line, and that vote would be then divided between the coalition partners at counting.  Honestly, I have not seen a explanation of this strategy that is coherent enough to have convinced many voters.  It’s likely that it is just recriminations on the part of ARN partners, whose obvious craven maneuvering — even by Nigerien politician’s standards — drove their voters to other parties, or to abstain.

The actual institutions of the Seventh Republic are worth noting as well.  Niger has now seen three cycles of democratic rule, political deadlock, and military coup since the protests and National Convention in 1991.  Every time the new constitution has been rewritten to avoid the failure of the last.  Niger’s recent political history has been an oft-ignored constitutional laboratory unlike few others in history.  A too weak and divided semi-presidential Third Republic was revised into a more strongly Presidential Fifth.  The power grab that resulted when it was time for the President to leave has led to a more divided governing model for the Seventh Republic.  Among the more interesting innovations, the Leader of the Opposition is given formal powers, and must play a part in successful legislation.  The Prime Minister and the President of the National Assembly share powers given to the Prime Minister in a Parliamentary system, and both check the President.  Is this a recipe for gridlock? Or is this a system designed to function despite gridlock?  This last might be a healthy innovation, where no office is expected to do much alone, and therefore doesn’t feel they are being prevented.  Sadly, the success or failure of this system will once again come down to the relative personalities of a handful of political leaders, notorious for their outsized egos, and frequently the subject of whispers about personal enrichment.

It should be noted as well, that for all the talk of change, the same men (and they are almost entirely men) of the Nigerien political class were players from the beginning of Niger’s multiparty experiment in 1992-3. If Issoufou us to make good on his rhetoric of principled governance, opening the doors to every political operative with a party office is not a promising start.

Any discussion of Niger’s political future, even on a purely formal basis, would be remiss if it did not mention the majority of Nigeriens to whom politics means very little.  Three million voters came out for the first round in a nation of over fourteen million people.  The seventy or eighty percent of the population who are engaged in subsistence farming and seasonal labor abroad have no time for politics, and are rarely included in the discussion.  The PNDS has pointed out ways in which it will tackle the chronic malnutrition which has been a fact of life for many rural communities since the 1970s.  But those struggling in rural areas are more acted upon than actors.  Were they to be given real power themselves, we might see the depth of changes Niger needs.

Some background:

• NIGER: First Steps Towards the Restoration of Democracy? – IPS, Ousseini Issa: (Feb 28, 2010)
• Niger: New Constitution First Step Towards Democracy « Politics Africa: The Seventh Republic is Approved (2010)
• Sebastian Elischer: Democratization in Desperate Places: Niger’s Seventh Attempt Center for Strategic and International Studies (Jan 28, 2011)
• Niger civilians, armed forces sign stability pact: The Military goes out on a high note, signing a pact with political parties that it will not intervene in constitutional politics (2011)
• Niger Government To Feed One Million For Free « Politics Africa: The Military’s role as saviors from corrupt civilian rule is again reinforced (2010)
• Kimba & Idrissa’s recent collection: Armee et politique au Niger (9782869782167) a great collection of essays on the military’s involvement in Nigerien politics, published just before the 2010 coup.
• Jibrin Ibrahim, Abdoulaye Niandou Souley: “The rise to power of an opposition party the MNSD in Niger Republic” a fairly definitive look at the strength, and failing, of the Third Republic (1992-1995)
• Niger’s Tandja dissolves parliament (Reuters, 2009)
• CDS Rahama Breaks with Tandja, deeping his isolation (2009)
• “Constitution de la 7ème République” full text, PDF, in French, from the website of the Consultative Council which drafted it

Related articles

• UPDATE 1-Tandja ally heads into Niger presidential run-off (af.reuters.com)
• Tandja ally heads into Niger presidential run-off (af.reuters.com)
• Niger Elections: Has Mahamadou Issoufou Clenched It? (sahelblog.wordpress.com)
• CORRECTED – Niger top court validates poll, run-off March 12 (af.reuters.com)
• PREVIEW-Niger races to secure poll for civilian rule | Agricultural Commodities | Reuters (af.reuters.com)
• TIMELINE-Niger holds presidential elections (af.reuters.com)
• Niger Elections Head to Run-Off (sahelblog.wordpress.com)
• Countdown to Niger’s Elections (sahelblog.wordpress.com)
• Niger Elections: So Far, So Good? (sahelblog.wordpress.com)

The PNDS Campaign headquarters in Niamey, photo from Niger Elections.

The 31st of January saw Niger’s Legislative elections, combined with the first round of the Presidential elections. Results are not yet known, and the top two in the Presidential race will re-run on 14 March. Here’s some tools to follow it.

The best immediate updates on the polls and count can be found at the African Elections observer site’s @NigerElections Twitter feed as well as their news site at africanelections.org/niger. Their photo gallery is also wonderful (and the source for the image above).

[UPDATE 2:40 GMT Feb 2 : There are no official results yet announced. Rumored provisional results are being passed around -- an example is here -- but their simple repetition of the urban conventional wisdom makes them either suspect or expected.

Mahamadou Issoufou (PNDS-Tarayya) in the upper 20s, followed by either Seyni Oumarou (MNSD-Nassara) and/or Hama Amadou (MODEN/FA LUMANA) from 20% to 24%.  This would match both the aggregate Municipal/Departmental election results of  January and the relative profile of the parties.  While Issoufou is the favorite, there is no accounting for tactical endorsements for the second round.  Note that an RFI reported telephone survey (seen via Sahelblog) reporting Issoufou with over 40% support seems a possible result of sample bias towards urban educated voters.  A run off is almost certain, and the questions will be how Legislative results set the stage for the new government, and whether the PNDS faces the new MODEN LUMANA or the MNDS, reversed in last years coup.  Each could color the results -- and the mandatory backroom deals -- very differently.

The reports of attacks by PNDS militants in their heartland of Tahoua, as well as unconfirmed charges by Hama of fraud and intimidation against his party in Tillaberi and Niamey, are not evidence of some general breakdown in law or a pattern of vote-rigging. Apart from 17 polling stations in Tassara (which seem to have been foiled by some local communal conflict), and reports of chronic petty delays and procedural fumbling, the poll seems to have proceeded in peace and openness.  While turnout (30%-50%) is low, it is the historical norm, and some rural areas reported record-breaking numbers of women voters.  ECOWAS observers, among 250 official NGO or foreign poll monitors, have seconded this impression.

Rather they may be a prescient image of petty  parliamentary conflict in the 7th Republic, not unlike that between the CDS and the MNSD of the early 1990s which drove the 3rd Republic into gridlock.

Regardless, it will likely be several days before we get any real numbers, and several more before more distant of the more than 2000 polling offices report. ]

You can also follow the #Niger2011 Twitter channel for updates and links to news, including some of my translations. [Update: Amadou Djibril is collecting these links in a Daily Digest here. ]

Alex Thurston’s Sahel Blog has the usual informed coverage and discussion here and here.

And of course, the best Nigerien news coverage is always collected on http://nigerdiaspora.com and http://tamtaminfo.com .

UPDATE, INTERNET CAMPAIGNING: Nigerien politics has begun to capture the social media bug, especially in the sizable diaspora community.  You can follow announcements from the two Facebook pages (here and here) of  Hama Amadou’s Mouvement Démocratique Nigérien Pour une Fédération Africaine MODEN-FA Lumana (as well as their website), the two Facebook pages for Mamadou Issoufou’s PNDS (here and here and their French section here) and their official website (a French section also has a web presence).  The MNSD, perhaps tellingly, has no Facebook presence apart from this “Free Mamadou Tandja” page.  I might also note that the official MNSD website was never updated after Hama and his supporters split form the party in 2009.

Nigerien parties and their supporters have made use of internet video in this campaign as never before.  Highly produced videos of MODEN FA LUMANA events, videos of Mahamadou Issoufou’s PNDS campaign — including scenes from his recent appearances in all corners the country (not a normal feature of campaigns) –  and MNDS rallies have appeared on You Tube and DailyMotion.  There’s even several MNSD Nassara – Seini Omarou music videos.  Wherever you come down politically, they’ll have you taping your toes. ]

Here are some of the latest news stories that caught my eye:

*AFP: 50 percent turnout in Niger polls: electoral panel

*Une élection présidentielle un peu trop calme(France24:The Observers): includes an inside look at the polling process and photo gallery.

*Democracy in action in Niger; 7 million vote in general election (Wire via India Express)

*Niger:Le pouvoir civil va reprendre la main( Courrier international)

*Niger junta says poll went on without a hitch (Africa Review)

*Le Sahel’s official statement:
“Le Président du Conseil Suprême pour la Restauration de la Démocratie, Chef de l’Etat, le Général de Corps d’Armée Djibo Salou, a procédé au lancement des opérations de vote : sous le signe de l’espoir…”

*Présidentielle au Niger : taux de participation faible à Niamey (Afrik.com)

*Niger : Mêmes hommes, mêmes intrigues ? (radio analysis from RFI): Probably, would be my answer.

Related articles

• UPDATE 1-Fraud worries overshadow peaceful Niger vote (af.reuters.com)
• allAfrica.com: Niger: Opposition Asks for Postponement of Elections (allafrica.com)
• PREVIEW-Niger races to secure poll for civilian rule | Agricultural Commodities | Reuters (af.reuters.com)
• Candidates seek new election body for Niger poll (reuters.com)
• TIMELINE-Niger holds presidential elections (af.reuters.com)
• Niger grants uranium permits to Russian Gazprombank | Reuters (af.reuters.com)

It’s beautiful in New York, and the world if full of things to argue about. Here are three important issues I’ll have to get back to you on.

While the world goes to hell in a handbasket, I have been trying to maintain my sanity with light reading, and sunny days on the back patio. This largely precludes the production of good (or even mediocre) writing. Further political catastrophes and World Cup drama could completely rule it out.

Despite that, there are several things which should appear here soon, plus a reading recommendation.  Advice for further reading and different perspectives is always very welcome.

First, I’m working on a close reading of the latest US / West African drug arrests, this time focused on Liberia. Not to sound too paranoid, but these things never seem to hang together well when examined closely, and I’ve come to believe over the last few years that there is a commonality of interests between several right wing think tanks, a clutch of journalists and “terrorism experts”, UN Anti-Drug authorities, foreign governments, military, and local governments which play up the need for military and legal spectacle at the expense of actual work on development or ending corruption. While there is likely some real criminality going on in this case, I’m prepared to argue that this Liberian sting of aspiring West African drug runners serves more to allow these interests to further very specific political agendas.

Next, there are updates on the Nigerien political transition, with a new electoral law that has generated some controversy, while we wait for several party political and constitutional shoes to drop in Niamey (party leadership, coalitions, charges against Tandja supporters, not to mention and entirely new Constitution of the Seventh Republic that has to be written and voted on by the end of the year).

Most important to me, I’ve finally thoroughly read Dutch historian Baz Lecocq‘s 2002 dissertation, “That Desert is Our Country’: Tuareg rebellions and Competing Nationalisms in Contemporary Mali (1946-1996).“  As it is available online, I had read later chapters when I’d seen it cited some time ago.  But having stormed through from the start, I must say that it is the best thing written on the Malian Tuareg in English (easily) and arguably better than anything in French (to be fair, I’m thinking only of articles I’ve read by Georg Klute, the Bernuses, Claudot-Hawad, and Bourgeot.  I haven’t read Pierre Boilley’s “Touaregs Kel Adagh”, let alone Georg Klute’s ”Die Rebellionen der Tuareg in Mali und Niger”, which I’ve only ever seen in German). With very few changes it could be produced as a very valuable book.

Lecocq’s basic premise – which he candidly admits was not the one he began with – is that French colonialism and the process of independence heightened a pre-existing “racial” prejudice between northern and southern communities in what is today Mali, even when outsiders might be unable to easily distinguish between these groups. Independence, as well as French and upper class Tuareg resistance to the form this independence, only deepened these divisions, reinforcing mistrust on all sides, keeping these communities at daggers drawn. This has played out through profound reordering in the structures and meanings of the notoriously complex and shifting Tuareg social/political order on one side. On the other, the brutality and hamfistedness of southern politicians and military has often exacerbated conflict, frustrating Malian society.  Nine of ten Malian live in the south, and these communities, having paid dearly to create the imperfect economic development and political liberties they now enjoy, have little sympathy with Tuareg demands.

If you’re anglophone and interested in French colonialism in the Sahara, Mali’s first decades of independence, the current “Tuareg problem”, or even the more general history of cultural conflict along the interface of the Sahel, there’s tremendous value in this work.  Admittedly, Lecocq really focuses on the history of “free” clans of Tuareg in (what is now) Kidal Region’s Adagh des Ifoughas, who make up only a portion of the population of even this limited area.  But their politics and culture are central to the 1963, 1990, and 2006/7 rebellions, and all north south relations in Mali.  Without understanding this, I’ve always found the causes of fighting there hard to understand, even in relation to the Nigerien Tuareg rebellions, which seem much more enmeshed in Niger’s politics and culture.

• Current preferred time waster: tommymiles on Twitter

A herd, starved to death, in North Mali. These animals represent many years of saved wealth and future investment for Malian pastoralists.

Hopefully by now everyone knows that parts of West Africa, especially pockets of Chad and Niger, are struggling with the worst food shortages since 2005. Alex Thurston reports that international humanitarian agencies, as well as increasingly concerned governments, are now worried that this crisis is more generalized than first reported (last September), striking areas of Mauritania and Mali.

In Mali, there is a crisis in the north (mostly Kidal Region) right now, with press reports of huge numbers of animals lost to the mostly pastoralist residents. As in Niger, prices for forage have skyrocketed, prices for animals have plummeted, so that recent reports have talked of Malians trading female goats – the future of their herds – for a single bag of rice in Algerian border markets. Malian press reports talk of traveling through rural Kidal last week, counting corpse after corpse of starved livestock, the very source of pastoralist livelihoods. Those that can have moved south, increasing the pressure on pasture and farm land, surely also risking more communal tension. Kidal Region is already rife with armed unemployed men, competing smuggling rings, and simmering tribal vendettas. The overflow from this must add sparks to the already smoldering Tombuctu and Gao Regions, not to mention the areas south of the Niger where pastoralists head during the dry season. The tragic destruction of Gao market, north Mali’s largest commercial center, by fire last week has got to be a final nail in the coffin for some people, even if the rains have now started there.

There are also reports that Bamako is hoarding food aid, sending only the old supplies stashed at Mopti north and keeping the rest in the south, where the crops were good last year. True or not, people report it as such in Kidal.  On the other side, some southerners accuse Kidal politicians of profiting from the misery of their own people.   Other reports again, more neutral, document intense efforts on all sides, facing nearly insurmountable shortages and logistic impossibilities.

So things in Mali, if they receive the international focus or not, are as bad as in areas of Niger.

In Niger many more farming communities were stricken by the start-stop rains of June 2009, and the pockets of Tillaberi, Tahoua, and Maradi Regions (mostly) have long reverted to crisis mode. Men are on extended “exode”, the dry season trips abroad for wage labor. Other communities have picked up en masse, fleeing to towns, other regions, or even to Hausa northern Nigeria, where some have trade or family contacts. Others still remain, depleting the last of their food stocks, and somehow making it on less and less each day.

It’s important to differentiate between drought and famine (one may cause the other, or may not), and recognize that some places like parts of central Niger have suffered chronic seasonal malnutrition since the 1990s, and recurring drought caused famines since 1968. The causes are debated, and while climate change no doubt is happening, one should not discount the structural changes we have seen over the last 30 years. The IMF’s austerity policies which did such obvious damage to urban West Africa in the 1980s, and triggered much of the 1990-2 democratization wave thereafter, also had pernicious effects on rural areas. The “free trade” treaties of the 1990s — as Bill Clinton recently admitted in the case of Haitian farming — drove world commodity market forces into even the most protected rural communities. Subsidized western industrial agriculture can produce food and cash crops cheaper than most smallholders in the Sahel, but can also cause basic food prices to swing wildly on the back of market speculation, as we saw in 2008. As Marx famously said, in the face of commodification, structures, forms of productions, and traditions have no recourse. “All that is solid melts into air…”, and much of the rural economic structure of the developing worlds has so disintegrated in the last decades. Some areas might survive, sending farmers flooding into urban export driven production. For whatever reasons, Niger, like Haiti, never saw enough of this to absorb the mass of small farming which supports %80 of its people. They continue to literally scratch a living out of dusty millet fields, with less and less ability to turn to either community or markets when things go wrong.

Some pastoralists in North Mali and Niger never really recovered from the loss of herds in the early 1970s. They starved in 1984 because of this, and (arguably) supported armed struggle in the 1990s in part because of this. [It's more complicated that this, with longstanding communities of grievance, and militants trained abroad, but the 72-74 drought can't be discounted]. These are as much political and economic/structural problems as environmental, and they need to be treated once this hungry season passes in September.

In Niger, as grim as this is, some things have improved. Then President Tandja (and current opposition leader Hama Amadou, as well as some “progressive” westerners, for the record) purposefully denied the food shortages and deaths in 2005 were “famine”. They were seeing severe seasonal malnutrition in limited areas, and most children were dying of malnutrition related disease rather than starvation. This is how people die in famines, but the “f” word has political connotations which were painful, and so it is better to try and trivialize the suffering of the rural poor, apparently. I hope there is a special ring of hell for such people. We are not hearing that this time, in part thanks to the Nigerien Junta. Salou Djibo can play on an oft repeated trope in Niger (1974 being the model) of military rule justified by food emergencies mishandled by corrupt civilians. I would hope those in Niamey recognizing this as famine would do the same if they had been in power last year. I also hope they target the structural causes that allow this to happen, after they face the monumentally complicated distribution of food aid.

Aid Agencies (links to give, and learn more)

• Save the Children: Blog from Aid project in Niger
• Oxfam: 2010 West Africa Food Crisis
• Make a one time donation to Oxfam

Related  news articles

• Les touaregs victimes de la sécheresse… et du gouvernement? (France 24, 21/05/2010)
• Témoignages sur la crise alimentaire les zones de Kidal et Ménaka (L’Observateur, 17/05/2010)
• ReliefWeb » Document » Bulletin hebdomadaire de morbidité, de mortalité et de surveillance nutritionelle au Niger – Semaine epidémiologique no 19: du 10 au 16 mai 2010
• ReliefWeb » Document » ENQUETE SUR LA SECURITE ALIMENTAIRE DES MENAGES AU NIGER (avril 2010): RESUME EXECUTIF (mai 2010)
• ReliefWeb » Document » SAHEL ET AFRIQUE DE L’OUEST Perspectives sur la sécurité alimentaire, Avril à Septembre 2010
• Chad hunger overshadowed by Niger food crisis – UN (af.reuters.com)
• Niger junta to provide free food to one million (af.reuters.com)
• Hunger in Niger (undispatch.com)
• CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-U.N. aid agencies sound alarm on Niger food (af.reuters.com)
• Farmers, Aid Groups Call Attention To Drought, Food Shortages In West Africa (medicalnewstoday.com)
• Famine in Niger (one.org)
• Niger facing famine, millions at risk — president (af.reuters.com)
• Famine Persists in Niger, but Denial Seems in the Past (nytimes.com)
• Hunger in Niger (sahelblog.wordpress.com)
• ANALYSIS-Niger junta’s hunger alarm is break with past (af.reuters.com)

An unsigned editorial from Le Pays (Ouagadougou): A quite good reflection on the educational and other restrictions coming for future governments in Niger, but tying the famine. The papers in Niamey have little mention of the small farmers and herders Tahoua, Tillaberi, Diffa, and the north, who are long out of food and fleeing their homes. It’s evidence both that patches of famine sit beside areas which had passable crops last year, and that Nigerien politics is often quite distant from the realities of most Nigeriens. The Burkinabe writer ascribes blame for the chronic malnutrition of Niger’s citizens to both past policies and horrible governance (which is only partly the case), while leaving us with the distinctly uncomfortable vision of Niamey debating constitutional clauses while elsewhere in Niger people are dying.

Related News Links

• Niger leaders ‘must have degrees’ (news.bbc.co.uk)
• Hunger in Niger (undispatch.com)
• Niger junta to provide free food to one million (af.reuters.com)
• Famine in Niger (one.org)
• CORRECTED-UPDATE 1-U.N. aid agencies sound alarm on Niger food (af.reuters.com)
• Famine Persists in Niger, but Denial Seems in the Past (nytimes.com)
• Niger and China (sahelblog.wordpress.com)
• Niger facing famine, millions at risk — president (af.reuters.com)
• Niger calls for $123 million in food aid (af.reuters.com)
• ANALYSIS-Niger junta’s hunger alarm is break with past (af.reuters.com)

I’ve warned that, given the poor harvests and pastures, we can expect many incidents of communal and ethnic tension across the Sahel this year. The end of the formal insurgencies in both Niger and Mali last year also leaves a residue of unemployed armed men and grudges between communities.

One example of these risks is reported in Agadez‘s “Aïr Info journal” n°108 dated this week. On page 5 is the story of an attack by armed youth from Tchi-n-Tiguit (“Tchitintagatte”, about 50km south of Arlit, coincidentally in the middle of the new AREVA Imouraren mining concession) on their neighbors at Sekkiret (“Sikirat”, about 30km west of the famous Dabous Giraffe carvings).

Earlier this week, armed young men arrived at Sekkiret, firing in the air and chasing women and children out of their homes, but left before anyone was hurt. Sekkiret youths having returned home to frightened families, set off for revenge. The paper reports it was only the intervention of two former ministers (one from each community) and the local chieftaincy which ensured security forces were quickly dispatched to calm the situation.

The cause: Sekkiret youths had reputedly harassed Tchi-n-Tiguit two years ago during the insurgency. There is no indication here of ethnicity, but that history, and the name Tchi-n-Tiguit, suggests a community of Tamasheq speakers some Tuareg caste, subgroup, or related community). Some towns in the area – like Ingall – are populated by Songhai speakers, dating back to the time when they were outposts of the Malian and Songhay Empires. Others are made up of former Tamasheq bonded communities who still bear grudges against some higher caste communities. These groups are normally peacefully intermixed, along with other groups, tribes, caste communities, and Tuareg confederations. But in times of stress, as we’ve seen from Sarajevo to Jos, people do find enemies even among neighbors.

Aïr Info concludes: “The inhabitants of these villages, brothers since time immemorial, have now become two blocs that risk, if we do not take care, of turning on each other! The state must quickly find a solution to this problem which has already gone on too long!”

Junta head Salou Djibo, beside the flag of the presidency in the Presidential Palace.

As I noted on the 10th of March, the CSRD junta in Niger has replaced all the civilian Region Governors with military men to administer local affairs during the transition. We now have the full list, and while I for one hate to see any military governing, a look at the men (all men) coming and going in Niger’s Regions gives us an opportunity to examine what’s going on behind the scenes, and what it augurs for the future.

There have been several misreports — domestically and western — about these appointments. I noted that the eight military Zone Commanders had already taken on public duties of the eight indirectly elected Regional Governors. Their chiefs of administration seemed to have already taken up the practical duties, at least they behave as such in press reports.

I have hammered on about the ecumenical nature and continuity represented in the Niger Junta so far, evidence that they may well live up to their word and leave politics after a quick transition. They clearly wish to project an image as a “national” institution “above” politics. What they believe in their hearts, I can’t pretend to know, but a close look at the replacement of rater venial Regional Governors with a broad group of officers shows that the junta is at least consistently “on message”.

First, one point the press maybe getting wrong. “Contrôleur Général” Issoufou Yacouba is made Governor of Dosso Region. He’s been reported as a civilian, but given that “Contrôleur Général” is the honorific held by chief of the National Police Issoufou Yacouba, and the only other two high-ranking officials I could find with that rather common name were mid level magistrates in Niamey and Birni N’Konni, I’ll put my money of the head of the Police. Regardless, he replaces a man very associated with former President Tandja personally, Governor Issoufou Oumarou. Oumarou was an early supporter on Tandja’s dumping of the constitution and replacement of the 5th Republic with new more malleable institutions. You may remember the violence that accompanied Governor Oumarou’s decision to hold a gala gathering of the ruling party’s Dosso members in front of the Governors Palace in the middle of Dosso town. The guests had to move inside as opposition youths took to the streets, burning tyres and overturning official vehicles amid tear gas and gendarmes trying to restore order.

The eight regions of Niger, which roughly correspond to the Military's "Zones de Defense"

I earlier reported Colonel Yayé Garba was made Governor of the Niamey Capitol Region (CUN), per the press. He was actually named to head Agadez Region. He replaces Abba Malam Boukar, elected as an opposition CDS-Rahama member who was wooed into Tandja’s camp and expelled from his party in 2009. I can’t imagine he has a great political future now. The Zone Commander in Agadez, Colonel Salifou Modi was an influential military leader, member of the 99 junta (the CRN), and now is a high ranking member of the CSRD. Modi is personally close to Col. Hima Pele Hamidou one of the two of three top Junta leaders, and veteran of the 99 coup. Col. Yayé Garba was a member of the 96 coup junta whose head (President Bare Mainassara) was killed by the 99 junta, splitting some elements of the army since.

This too describes the trajectory of Col. Mahamadou Barazé, made Governor of Zinder Region, who was in the 96 junta and a Gendarmerie officer then, now he’s Army. Barazé replaces in Zinder the informal duties of Zone Commander Colonel Sidikou Issa, who was last week kicked up to head the powerful Interior Ministry paramilitary force, the FNIS. That two presumed Bare partisans are representative of a camp alienated in the military since 1999 by the man we can now safely call Tandja’s main sponsor, former Chief of Staff General Moumouni Boureïma (now still under house arrest). To have place three such men powerful posts – along with Bare Maïnassara’s former Chief of Staff who has been made Junta president Salou Djibo’s aide de camp, must be intended to heal these wounds.

Col. Mahamadou Barazé replaces in Zinder one of the most influential political barons of the MNSD-Nassara, (former) Governor Yahaya Yandaka. Yahaya Yandaka was involved in a high profile battle for influence in early 2009 with a certain villain of the Tandja drama Dan Dubai, the financial backer of Tandja’s campaign, and opposition hate figure. Yahaya Yandaka won, but he loses now. His powerful business connections in Zinder will likely see him reappear.

As an aside, Niamey papers reported last week the return to the capitol of former Commander Kindo Zada. He had reputedly been involved in the June 2000 kidnap of the Capt. Hima Hamidou, and in 2007, ran off to the Air mountains to join the mostly Tuareg insurgents of the MNJ, becoming leader of one of their two very effective TIR units. He’s likely one of the reasons the MNJ sported a picture of Bare Maïnassara on their website: Kindo Zada was a loyalist, like the troops engaged in periodic unrest in 1999 – 2002, especially the large mutiny in Diffa. His return to Niamey marks a symbolic success of the CSRD’s reconciliation strategy.

Colonel Soumana Djibo, was made Governor of Niamey (the CUN), obviously a plum job. This is especially interesting as the head of Military Intelligence Col. Soumana Djibo was without explanation arrested on the orders of the top brass in March 2009. He was released within a few weeks, but no adequate reasons for eater action were given. One rumor had it that he had attempted to uncover — or blackmail — General Boureïma over army complicity in smuggling or other crimes. The Issikta article at the time suggests this might be involved with transit of goods via AQIM. Chew on that, given the last year of events.

Colonel Sani Issa Kaché, is made Governor of Tahoua. He was military Governor of Dosso Region under the 1999 CRN junta. He replaces a pillar of both the elected Tandja governments and his 2009 “Tazartché”, Mahamadou Zéty Maïga, who had been MNSD-Nassara Governor of Tahoua Region for ten years.

Col. Sidikou Issa presides over the "Lutte" winner's award in Zinder. Just days after the coup, officers replaced regional governors.

Lt. Col. Ibrahim Bagadoma is made Governor of Tillabéri Region, replacing a member of the Baré Maïnassara party (the RDP-Jama’a) Idder Adamou. The RDP, after prevarications I have mentioned before, rallied to Tandja in 2009. Lt. Col. Bagadoma was a high ranking Gendarmerie Nationale commander under Tandja, but was an early supporter of the CSRD, traveling with their delegation to meet Algeria’s leaders in the days after the 18 February coup. Interestingly, he was named by Tandja to one of four security forces seats of the “Independent” Electoral Commission (CENI) in March 2009, after the President ejected all opposition members and packed the body with his supporters. One of the three others so named is also being named Governor today, Colonel Mohamadou Barazé. Another of the four, Colonel Soumaïla Garba, was named head of the post-coup Presidential Guard. The last, Chef d’Escadron Garba Issoufou of the Gendarmerie Nationale? I’m sure we’ll hear from soon. This demonstrates either the weakness of Tandja’s support in the Military, or the readiness they have to join the winning side.

Colonel Fodé Camara, of whom I know nothing, is made Governor of Diffa. He replaces another man who made what is now obviously a poor choice to leave an opposition party so he might retain his seat as governor under the Tandja regime, Oumarou Yacouba of the ANDP-Zaman Lahiya.

And finally we come to Colonel Garba Maïkido, made governor of the Hausa Maradi Region, at the epicenter of the 2005 famine and threatened again this year. Garba is a bit of an Army folk hero. Already a popular officer, it was said amongst the troops that in August 2008 he refused to be ‘bought in’ to Tandja’s close military supporters. When offered bribes it was reported he just walked away, a rare thing. He replaces another CDS opposition Governor who switched sides to retain his office under Tandja, Chaïbou Ali Maâzou.

I said on the evening of the coup, after seeing Pele and other high powered military men in the Junta:

I would not now be surprised to see military “insiders” like Colonel Garba Maikido, Maj [sic] Soumaila Garba, and Colonel Salifou Mody among the new junta.

As detailed earlier, Salifou Mody is head of the FNIS now, and Col. Soumaila Garba is head of the President’s Guard.

These men are truly institutional insiders. They cut across ideological, and to the degree possible on the western ethnic leaning military, all cultural differences within that institution. The naming of several men I am presuming to have been Bare Maïnassara loyalists goes some way to heal the largest split in that institution. If, as we all expect, the junta keeps to its word of recusing itself from future elections, these men will continue to be part of a more unified, likely more influential, but likely less politically partisan Nigerien institution following the return of democracy.

Junta leader Salou Djibo is warmly welcomed by ECOWAS chief Ibn Chambas.

In the two weeks that have passed since Niger’s Mamadou Tandja was overthrown by the army, there has been an explosion of joy an relief from Nigeriens, countered by a few, very specific, criticisms. A wire story by AFP and an analysis by Alex Thurston at SahelBlog are the two best English language assessments I’ve seen of the complexity of popular mood, now so positive but with huge expectations of the CSRD junta. This is what other journalists, apparently surprised that coups are not always seen as naked power grabs, have called “the Good Coup.”

And good it most certainly was. African commentators have reminded us that President Tandja had staged a coup of his own last June, dismissing all checks on Presidential power and ending the 1999 constitution of the 5th Republic. Tandja settled with Tuareg rebels and the French government’s uranium mine (Niger’s major source of income), pocketed 1.2 Billion Euros, and set about rebuilding the state around a small power base of leaders loyal only to him.

As we know, this worked out poorly for all involved, except perhaps France’s Areva uranium. While foreign criticism of the February 18 coup has been diplomatically correct, there is an implied wink, best exemplified by outgoing ECOWAS President Mohamed Ibn Chambas’ grin at his first meeting with junta head Cmdt. Salou Djibo.

Nigerien popular reaction, it is not to much to say, was jubilant. So much so that on March 3rd, the junta’s nightly press release included a demand that people stop having spontaneous rallies support the junta, as they were blocking too much traffic in the capital. But there has been criticism from Niger, and as differences will likely grow and not lessen during the transition, it is worth taking these few voices seriously. These complaints come from three different groups, representing different groups with different trajectories over the next six to nine months of transition. None rise to the level of righteous indignation which the pitiable citizens of Guinee turned on their junta tormentors after a year of criminality and massacre. Nigeriens will be better off with all likely outcomes of this transition than they would have been under the personal rule of Tandja and his corrupt cronies. But there are, even now, voices questioning if this is good enough.

The Losers

The most strident criticisms come  from the overthrown. Tandja and his closest partisans for now remain mum, as until 5 March, five of the most powerful minister were under arrest, and the rest know that their arrests would be a popular move by the junta. Two who have spoken out are former PM Seini Oumarou as the leader of the MNSD, and his party VP Ali Sabo. Oumarou’s statement in the week after the coup, delivered in the name of the MNSD, has made him the highest profile leader to openly oppose the coup.  Sabo’s statements to the press, more measured, project a party united against and illegal change of power.  Both men were handpicked by Tandja to run the party, after driving out former PM and party chief Hama Amadou, and splitting many locals. Court cases about the legality of this move were still ongoing as recently as January, and it is unclear if Hama — one of the most likely post coup leaders — will now recapture the party or stick with his newly created MODEN-Lumana organization. While MNSD cadre were mixed in their reaction to the 6th Republic, Sabo and Oumarou’s statements since the coup, along with statements by crony groups like the MPDNP of Nouhou Arzika, are of a category of their own: outright rejection of the coup.

This is shared, publicly at least, only by those leaders who most closely tied their futures to Tandja. Members of four Tandja allied minor parties, who will likely be blacklisted for the time being, released statements calling the coup everything from an illegal plot by the opposition to a neo-colonial ploy by imperialists.  This is not a large number of individuals, and the junta can feel safe to ignore them. But even these disparate and serially unsuccessful party leaders -  Abdoulkarim Mamalo, president of PMT-Albarka, Ali “Max” Djibo of UNI – append their damnation with a call for a peaceful transition.

The loyal opposition

Cpt. Djirilla Harouna, who led the coup assault (center), is offered a RDP-Jama'a umbrella by supporters, Feb. 20, Niamey. The RDP was one of the parties whose government the coup had overthrown.

Nigerien politics are very good at providing second chances, and even those who tried to ride Tandja’s coattails know they will live to fight again.  The 1999 5th Republic was even able to find space for the party of President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara, upon who’s murder that regime was based. Baré’s loyalists (his family and those who’d burned their bridges by defying the boycott of existing parties to join the coup), regrouped under the RDP-Jama’a served in Tandja’s governments, and portions supported his June 2009 coup. The RDP leadership joined Tandja’s new government, took part in his boycotted elections, and supported his 6th Republic even when Tandja made clear that the RDP’s core issue – the repeal of the amnesty for the soldiers who killed Baré – was not on the table.  But within days of the coup RDP-Jama’a members were visible at rallies supporting the February 18 coup. MNSD members, whomever they supported in the split, will find a modus vivendi with whatever regime appears.

The second set of criticism, the mildest, are from the the leaders of the opposition.  In this group are the inheritors of the coming political order: Marou Amadou (a civil society leader catapulted to prominence as the organizer of the broad opposition front), Hama, Mahamadou Issoufou (of the PNDS party), and the others who are girding for expected presidential elections. [To my knowledge the exiled leader of the third opposition party the CDS-Rahama, former President Mahamane Ousmane, has not given an interview since the coup].  They are publicly grateful, but insist that this be done quickly. They are the firmest backers of the coup who have expressed any criticism. It matches the foreign criticism in its proforma wording, but it is also the category most likely to grow, based as it is in impatience.

A pox on all houses

Third, and I think the most interesting, are some from the intelligentsia and civil society groups. L’Eventment’s editor saying “these are the same crooks being again chose to serve the interim administration” is a notion which may have legs in the long term.  Issoufou Sidibe of the influential CDTN trade union confederation may, after his initial critique of the “quality” of the junta ministers, come to that conclusion as well. From the leaders of the political class, this last criticism is that “we wanted all Tandja’s people to pay for what they did” position. From people on the street it is the much more revolutionary desire to purge the entire, failed, political leadership of the nation. That same desire was tapped by Tandja’s supporters, who argued that a Tandja dictatorship would save the nation from all the “politicians”. To completely ignore this line of criticism would be foolish.

A variation on this critique of the transition is a critique of the need for a interim government at all. The head of the University Teachers union, which was paralyzed by divisions in the 6th republic, released a strong statement saying essentially “there needs to be another National Conference” as in the 1991 transition from military dictatorship to democracy: such changes need to be decided beyond the political class’s leadership. Other opposition supporters have complained that they were fighting for the return to the 5th Republic, not for an elite to create a whole new one.

While the crux of the 2009 political crisis was the greed of one small group around the President, the entire Nigerien political class has time and again shown itself unable to work together on any national development, and equally guilty of looting the treasury when they come to office. This is the most potentially potent critique of the new Junta’s plans. But a thorough housecleaning is unlikely to be in the cards, and most everyone knows that.

The Military and the opposition leadership are seemingly agreed that the 1999 constitution was in part to blame for Tandja’s ability to take power, with approbation of unilateral actions by the executive, but no means for enforcement against the executive. This, they say, needs to be reworked in a 7th Republic. The model for doing so exists from 1999, where leaders of all the parties sat down to rewrite the basic structure of government, then approved by referendum.

Every sign so far is that today’s junta is modeled closely upon Wanke’s 1999 CRN junta and transition. The knock on 1999 is threefold. They returned the same corrupt political class to power. An improvement from Bare, but not great for the masses. They were entirely undemocratic during the transition. They set up a cycle of the Army as guarantor of political peace. We have begun to hear the first and last complaints already. We will likely hear more of all three.

Is there still a 1991 option?

One caveat: Junta leader Cmdt. Salou Djibo and Prime Minister Danda have both pulled in a lot of people with ties to the Ali Saibou regime of the late 1980s. This was, in fact, where Danda had his first political appointment. They both made high profile visits to General Saibou’s home, something unseen for many years. This may be that he is the latest icon of the “good soldier” in an army still divided by April 1999 assassination of General Baré. Or it may be that he’s the only living head of state not involved in the current crisis.

Or, one might hope, it is a willingness to diverge from 1999 script, and open the process to the popular forces seen in the 1991 National Conference. This was a transition to democracy controlled not by the government, but by civil society and a wide range of political and union groups, where the army was willing to take a backseat to more popular forces. The prospect of such a transition in 2010 may be idealistic, but it remains a home.

In a scrum of reporters Saturday, Col. Djibrilla “Pele” Hima Hamidou found himself on familiar ground. The voice of the 1999 coup leaders, Hima Hamidou read out all the statements in the days following 9 April 1999, appealing for calm and promising a speedy return to civilian rule. Last Saturday, following a meeting the leaders of the military “Conseil Suprême pour la Restauration de la Démocratie” with ECOWAS and UN officials, the armor commander and sometime football federation president again appealed for the world to trust the Nigerien military. “In 1999 we had a similar situation and we gave power back and we had 10 years of stability. We are going to do the same thing.”

The first extensive communique from the new CSRD junta in Niger was read out on local radio Monday night, and is now available in the state controlled newspaper, Le Sahel. It lays out in some detail the structure of Niger’s government during the period of military rule. If the junta is to be believed, and most Nigeriens do seem to believe them, the transition will be short. It explicitly takes as its model the Council for National Reconciliation (Conseil de Réconciliation Nationale CRN) of the 1999 coup against Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara, himself a coup leader who ended a constitutional crisis, but then decided to name himself President. After almost three years of protest, boycott, strike, and crisis, Nigerien armed forces took power on 9 April 1999. They quickly called a constitutional council and referendum which produced the 18 August 1999 Constitution of the Fifth Republic, and handed over to elected President Mamadou Tandja in December 1999.

Cmd. Daouda Mallam Wanke led the fourteen member CRN, which included several members from the current junta. The number two (or three, depending on your view) in the CSRD Col. Abdoulye Adamou Harouna was Wanke’s Aide-de-camp during the process. He’s now head of the elite ECOWAS fast reaction force, and was one of the most senior officers in the pre-coup army. One of his two brothers, all sons of a leader of the 1974 coup, is the senior paratroop officer who we saw hailed by crowds this Saturday. Appearing at an opposition rally at the Rond Point de Concentration in front of the National Assembly building on Saturday, Capt. Djibrilla Adamou Harouna promised a speedy end to military involvement. Captain Hima Hamidou from the CRN rose under Tandja to become a Colonel of the elite armored brigade and head of both the Army Football club (ASFAN), the Nigerien Football Federation, and now is near the summit of the CSRD. The heads of the eight “Zones de defense nationale”, the operational commanders of the military, all appear to be on board with the junta: Pele was head of the Niamey zone, the most important for obvious reasons. In the cases of Zinder and Agadez the Zone chiefs — invariably Colonels in a military with few Generals — seem to have directly supplanted the powerful regional governors of the former ruling party, the MNSD-Nassara. Although there is as yet to official list, other junta leaders include Colonel Ibrahim Wali Karingama, a former Fenifoot associate of Pele’s and a former head of the President’s security; General Abdou Kaza who until Thursday the Defense Adviser to President Tandja until yesterday. While the President of the CSRD, Cmdt.. Salou Djibo was a low profile officer in charge of the supply units in Niamey (and the heavy weapons store), Daouda Mallam Wanke was of the same rank on 8 April 1999. So some media reports that the junta is made up of “unknown” or “minor” officers are woefully inaccurate.

The second dubious assumption being made is that Niger, having had four coups in its history, is just experiencing its inevitable return to military “strongmen”. Niger has had more than its share of authoritarian rulers, both in and out of uniform. But in its more recent history, the military has shown an increasing reluctance to rule. Individual military men such as deposed chief of staff General Boureima spent much of the last ten years exercising considerable influence over the Nigerien government, but they did so behind the scenes, as part of patronage networks which led to the apex of the civilian state. The example of Baré Maïnassara, whose reign ended on 8 April in his brutal death, probably concentrated minds as well.

President Tandja, himself a Colonel who rose to State Security minister under the 1974 coup, reached his highest summit as one of the handful of political princes only after he retired. With him were a host of ex-military officers whose connections clearly paid off better out of uniform. Tandja’s eight month “Sixth Republic” might be best seen as the culmination of this politics, with elites personally tied to the head of state pushing out all other members of the political class. Any institutions which did not lead back to the President, in classic authoritarian form, were modified to do so after Tandja dismissed the opposition last June and wrote his own constitution last August. The fate former PM Hama Amadou, pushed out by his former mentor Tandja in 2007, can be seen as one more step in this process which had been going on for some time: the removal of networks of patronage other than those which culminated in President and his family (I’m thinking especially of Tandja’s wife Hadjia Laraba Tandja, whose activities we may hear much more about should her husband come to trial).

Cmd. Daouda Malam Wanké, 1999 as President of the CRN

In contrast to the muddle and confusion of the last year of civilian political crisis, the CRN junta’s coup of April 1999 was remarkable for its speed and continuity. I want to be careful here. Some observers, especially in Niger, have all but sainted Daouda Mallam Wanke as a selfless savior of democracy. The CRN had no qualms about suppressing dissent, closing down the press, and making sure they had a piece of the coming government. Junta number two General Boureima’s great power in the Tandja government dates from this period. But the most obvious example is the CRN’s non-negotiable demand that the 1999 constitution contain a clause granting blanket amnesty to the military for the events of the coup.

It is this provision, incidentally, which doomed the constitutional extension of Tandja’s mandate after the accepted two terms. A provision placed the basic structure of the executive, along with the military amnesty, under a clause which prevented any revision by any means. Hence Tandja did not, as reported by some, “revise” the constitution. He was not able to. He unilaterally terminated the constitution under powers which allowed the President to suspend it temporarily in times of emergencies such as invasions or civil wars, and then started a new one which better suited him.

But for all their faults, the CRN was never a naked grab for power. The former PM, Ibrahim Hassane Mayaki, was retained by the CRN throughout the transition, as were most ministers. In May, a month after the coup, the CRN had appointed a broad group of politicians and civil society leaders as a Technical Committee to sketch the outlines of a new constitution. The next month, they formed an 80 member civilian Constitutional Committee to write an actual text. When infighting ensued after the committee recommended the creation of hundreds of posts for politically connected individuals, the CRN stepped in and endorsed a draft that was closest to the Third Republic Constitution. The 1992 Constitution of the Third Republic was the result of the most democratic and open process in Niger’s modern history, the year long National Conference which followed a popular revolt against military rule. With this decided, a referendum approved the Constitution of the Fifth Republic in July and it was promulgated in August. The CRN had also re-formed the Independent Electoral Commission (CENI), a bedrock institution of the 1991-92 National Conference which had been fatally compromised by Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara following his 1996 coup. The 60 member CENI had members of all the political parties, including very small ones, and including those of the regime the CRN had just overthrown. In August, the CRN and the major candidates agreed to postpone the elections a month as parties reformed and wrangled over leadership. The presidential elections took place in two rounds on 17 October and 24 November, with parliamentary elections simultaneous with the second round. After Tandja’s victory in the second round, Wanke handed over the government on 23 December 1999.

So the 1999 experience, which the 2010 leaders say they wish to replicate, is one marked by continuity and reconciliation amongst the class of the the political elite. Nigeriens are watching today’s events with that template, and those expectations, in mind.

The contents of the first long communique on government structure, Monday’s “Communiqué du Secrétariat Général du gouvernement”, and the nominations of officials to go with it, conform to the 1999 model and flesh out the specifics of the CSRD regime. First the appointments.

The communique is not signed by a military officer, but by Larwana Ibrahim, as “Secrétaire Général du gouvernement”. Larwana was Adjunct Secretary General of Government — essentially the administrative director for the head of government — from 2000, and was moved into the top spot after the previous head, Lawal Kader, left office on the heels of deposed Prime Minister Hama Amadou in July 2007. Larwana Ibrahim, incidentally, signed the decree by Tandja Mamadou which dissolved the Parliament last June, setting off this crisis. Osmane Mahaman, named Director of the Cabinet of the President of the CSRD, was Administrative director of the last three PM’s of the Tandja regime: from the lukewarm Tandja-ist Seyni Oumarou, to the fiery loyalist (if temporary) PM Albadé Abouba, to the technocratic if corrupt Ali Badjo Gamatié.

Alkaly Alhassane is named as Assistant Director of the Cabinet of the President of the CSRD. Described in the release as a sociologist, he might be better know for having been “Conseiller spécial du Premier Ministre” under PM Hama Amadou in 2000 and having been DG of Niamey’s transit system (what there is of it), the Société des transports urbains Niamey, last year.

The actual communique sets out the government which will rule the nation during the as yet undefined transition period, in much the same terms as a constitutional document. Like the CRN, the CSRD is no democratic institution. It is formally run by the President of the CSRD, whose word is absolute, and whose right to appointment and rule is presumed. Perhaps troubling, the high courts, which Tandja dissolved and reconstituted as puppet institutions after June 2009, are again dissolved and named by the CSRD President. The junta acknowledges no check on its power. But this too is identical to 1999.

The reviled press board, the CSC, is also dissolved and replaced with the National Observatory of Communication (ONC), a name last used when the body was dissolved and reformed during the 1999 rule of the CRN. A once independent body with members chosen by press and civil society groups, the CSC has been transformed by Tandja into a press censorship board, as it had been under Baré Maïnassara. The names of the courts, and all the other institutions created in this decree are identical to those created by the CRN.

Finally, a body is created to draft a new constitution, as yet unnamed, which will then be approved or rejected by referendum. Again, identical to the 1999 process.

All this is not to say the the CSRD will actually abide by the process established in 1999. They have nearly absolute power and great popularity. But the opposition bodies that came out to celebrate this past Saturday in front of the National Assembly have released their own statements in the past days. The opposition front Coordination des Forces pour la Démocratie et la République (CFDR), as well as the civil society groups and trades unions within it, and the large and activist NGO coalition “RODADDHD”, have all made statements with the same theme. They thank and celebrate the CSRD, but demand that democratic rule must return quickly, completely, and transparently.

The junta says they share this vision, and if recent history is a guide, there will be a democratic government in Niger on 1 January 2011. But no one should yet take their eyes of what may be a difficult process for which the past may not fully prepare the people of Niger.

Notice of the General Secretariat of Government: President of CSRD signs two decrees.

The President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy, Chef d’Escaudron SALOU DJIBO, yesterday signed two decrees making appointments. Thus, under the first decree, Mr. Ousmane Mahaman, Administrative Director, was appointed Chief of Staff to the President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

- Finally, under the second decree, Mr. Alkaly Alhassane, sociologist, was appointed Chief of Staff Deputy Chairman of Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

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COMMUNIQUE OF THE SECRETARIAT GENERAL OF GOVERNMENT
22 February 2010

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The Head of State has signed a decree on the organization of government during the transition period

The President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy, Chef d’Escaudron SALOU DJIBO, signed Monday, February 22, 2010, an order on the organization of government during the transition period.

Under this order:

The government of Niger is a republic. Being so, it reaffirms its commitment to the principles of the rule of law and pluralist democracy.

Recognizing its responsibility to the people of Niger, the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy ensures the preservation of national unity and social cohesion.

It assures everyone equal before the law irrespective of sex, social origin, racial, ethnic or religious background.

It also guarantees the rights and freedoms of the individual and the citizen as defined by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 and the African Charter on Human Rights and Societies of 1981.

It guarantees the restoration of the democratic process operated by the Nigerien people.

All rights and duties are retained conforming to the above the laws and regulations.

The government of Niger is and remains bound by international treaties and agreements previously signed and duly ratified.

The Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (CSRD) is vested with legislative and executive powers until the establishment of new democratic institutions.

The Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (CSRD) is the supreme arbiter of policy and direction of the nation.

It is headed by a President who serves as Head of State and Head of Government.

The President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (CSRD) by order appoints a Prime Minister and other members of the transitional government.

The President may end to their functions in the same manner.

The President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy is the Chairman of the Council of Ministers.

He signs all orders and decrees.

He makes all civil and military appointments.

The President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy may delegate certain powers to the Prime Minister.

The Prime Minister leads and coordinates government action in accordance with guidelines established by the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

There shall be created, in place of the dissolved Supreme Court [Dissolved by Tandja after ruling against him last May, reconfigured as a Presidential appointed court], a State Court [Cour D'Etat] whose composition, powers and functions shall be determined by order of President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

There shall be created, in place of the dissolved Constitutional Court [under the 5th Republic, an ad hoc body of senior legislators, reformed into a presidential appointed court last August], a Constitutional Committee whose composition, powers and functions shall be determined by order of President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

There shall be created, in place of the dissolved High Council for Communication (CSC) [a once independent body, transformed by Tandja into a press censorship board], a National Observatory of Communication (ONC), whose composition, powers and functions shall be determined by order of President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

There shall be created, under the authority of the President of the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy, a body responsible for preparing the basic texts of the Republic, including the Constitution and the Electoral Code. The name, composition and powers of this body will be established by ordinance.

The above mentioned draft Constitution will be adopted by the Nigerien people by referendum.

Following a period to be determined by the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy, this and other transitional institutions will establish new [permanant] democratic institutions.

A schedule of the various political deadlines will be made public by the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy (CSRD).

Niamey, February 22, 2010

The Secretary General of Government

LARWANA IBRAHIM

"Cri inacheve?": Adamou Idé's first book of poetry from 1984.

Adamou Idé is no slouch. An acclaimed poet and novelist, Adamou left his Niamey home to study in the Sorbonne and return to Africa as a government official and to work internationally for La Francophonie. A progressive, he authored the Labor Code used under the Third Republic which followed the overthrow of the military dictatorship in 1991. But since winning the nation’s highest poetry prize in 1981, he is best known for writing less dry documents. His poetry, both in French and Zarma, was first collected in published form in 1984, and he has written several volumes of poems, three novels, adapted writing for screenplays, and even penned politically satirical short stories in Zerma that are used in Niger’s schools.  Its title “Wa sappe ay se!” is Zarma for “Vote for Me!”

There’s little in English about or by him, but his 2005 appearance at the Medellin Festival of Literature brings us one of his poems, translated into English. The poem, “J’ai Peur” (“I’m Scared”) is a sparse, hard indictment of the general, the dictator, and the presidents everywhere in this world today, who crush the joy from our lives because of their own fear of our power. One of the festival’s amazing collection of African poets reading their works, shows Adamou reading this.

I’m Scared!

I’m scared!
 Yes, I do not conceal it from you
 I say it: I’m scared!
 I’m scared
 Of all anthems you sing
 Elixirs vomited noisily
 Brought forward
 I’m scared of your flags
 cracking in the wind of your madness
 I’m scared!
 To you I confess my fear
 I’m scared of your erected tents
 Sparse in the flowered gardens
 I’m scared of your adult games
 In the pedestrian corridors
 I know that one day
 You will shoot me!
 I’m scared
 Yes, I confess my fear
 I’m scared of your gloved hands
 Hiding numerous cactus
 I’m scared when a child
 Claims for life in his cold cradle
 I’m scared when he shows ecstasy
 I know that one day
 You will shoot him!

Adamou Idé writes: “…From my very inside, an acute feeling of injustice and bitter revolt emerged. I think I have not tried to understand… and I have cried: it was the voice of poetry! It became a weapon and a tribune for protest and denunciation. I claim for liberty, solidarity, brotherhood among men and I think that in every man there is a poet: But I also feel that poets are feared by those in power that use violence, who are prosperous at the expense of the collective suffering. When they are denounced, some poets are imprisoned, tortured, killed or exiled as if this was enough to kill the power of the word in them. The poets continue paying a harsh tribute for their liberty of thought. Again, poetry appears as the last bastion for the struggle for liberty! In these times, some powerful men of this world believe they are able to enslave others by means of unilateral thought, unfair economical laws, unjust wars and they want poets to speak in one way or another. Now, more than ever, we need poetry and poets committed to the struggle for peace, justice and tolerance! Lullaby poetry is intended for making children sleep, meanwhile bombs fall and destroy their legs: I have never believed in this kind of “colorless” and “odorless” poetry. I believe in words that name suffering and that wake up hope in open furrows by misery and tears. The poetic writing has allowed me to live an incredible adventure. An always-new adventure in a mysterious world of words. In the poem one feels that the agitated life of the words is being written, that they heap together to find a place in the verse, they hug each other to create rhythm, to provoke or stimulate the reader’s senses, and one never knows when the poem is finished or if it’s the poet that being tired has put down the weapons. But what is the matter if the poem is there and sings before you the real love and liberty!… “

"Baba Tandja" looms over the MNSD-Nassara leadership.

No end is yet in sight for the Nigerien political crisis, begun when President Tandja Mamadou, facing the end of his term-limited mandate on 22 December, decided to scrap the constitution of the 5th Republic, and grant himself three years grace period in which to create a 6th Republic. The alienation of most of the political class was expected, but the severity of ECOWAS rhetoric was likely not. Niger’s rulers would have expected this to be wrapped up by now, with the previous legal deadline for a new president to pass with a shrug. But the personal interest of current ECOWAS chair Nigeria — Niger’s massive neighbor and largest African trade partner — has meant that President Tandja has been excluded from the body, branded as a coup leader, and placed alongside Capt. Moussa Dadis Camara as a poster child for what’s wrong with West African governance.

And while Blaise Compaore, assigned mediation duties in Guinea, seems intent on finding a way for Dadis to stay in power despite his wholesale slaughter of his own people, Yar’Adua’s government has kept an unusual concentration of pressure on Niamey. [see Niger:Piling on the Pressure for details] Sadly, this has far exceeded any pressure the remarkably unified internal opposition has been able to bring to bear internally.

Should effective ECOWAS pressure escalate as they promise, seconded by sanctions by crucial donors like France, the EU, and the US, Niger’s new 6th Republic can’t carry on indefinitely. Current Chinese projects don’t fill the gap with direct payments. While uranium and oil revenue continue to flood in, too much of that has gone to support a small group of businessmen around Tandja to enable the government to balance the budget with it. Wages will not be paid, loans will not be forthcoming, the military will miss their trips to Fréjus, and there will be trouble.

But if Tandja is toppled or forced to give way in this manner, it will be an inside job by the political and military leadership who aided his new constitutional order.

–

Niger has had a lot of constitutions, and they tend to be none too creative rehashes of previous documents. The 6th was generated in less than a week, and declared “in effect” within days of the August referendum. It recycles much of the 5th Republic (semi-presidential 1999), with elements of the failed 4th Republic (General Baré Maïnassara’s strong presidency and ceremonial legislature). To give you a feel for the slapdash nature of current Nigerien jurisprudence, the constitution calls for a strong presidency which appoints all ministers — including the PM — and most of the judiciary and “independent” governing bodies. In most every public power carried over from the last constitution, there is simply a clause added which gives either the President or a body he appoints the power to suspend or override its function “when needed”. For new bodies, their description is invariably followed by something like “..whose functions and composition will be determined by law.” Later.

The “new” Legislature includes a National Assembly, whose law-making functions can be largely replaced by the President and his Council of Ministers. Their primary task, the annual budget legislation, must also be passed by a new second house, the Senate, which has not yet been created. The constitution says that the President will appoint a third of this Senate’s members, while bodies such a the council of Chieftancies and other government commissions will “indirectly elect” the remainder. I have yet to find any serious discussion of this body in the government’s daily mouthpiece, Le Sahel, let alone a schedule for it’s appearance.

The Nigerien National Assembly has historically sat in two short sessions each year. The first Hemicycle of the new Assembly has just wrapped up, but its hard to see what they accomplished. Committee rules were written up by a group led by former Communications Minister and close Tandja loyalist Mohammad Ben Omar, former PM and current MNSD party chief Seyni Oumarou was named President of the Assembly, and heads of each of the minor parties was given an important sounding office. because of the opposition boycott, there is no opposition in the Assembly. A budget for 2010 was announced in the President’s Council of Ministers and adopted by the National Assembly, calling for an increase in direct budget supports from foreign donors, which the government relies upon to pay the bills. That these will soon be cut by many donors seems to have eluded normally erudite Finance Minister Zeine. The leadership then wrapped up by chartering a junket to Angola for the 18th Joint Parliamentary Assembly of Africa, Caribbean and Pacific plus European Union (ACP/EU). All interested members were offered a large stipend to fly down and look like a real parliament. At least one member reportedly took the stipend but chose to stay in Niamey. And then the gavel fell of the first Assembly session of Niger’s 6th Republic.

And while the domestic and foreign press is rife with speculation, there seems little movement to resolve the crisis. The opposition, including two former Prime Ministers, one former President, and a large split from Tandja’s ruling MNSD, vows to eject the current President from power, and mark the 22nd with a final repudiation of his holding any legal office. Expect demonstrations and some violence in major cities.

Violence has flared in Niamey in August (bottom) and September (top).

Niger is an overwhelmingly rural society, in which the vast majority of the population do not participate in politics, intent as they are with meager rain-fed substance agriculture in the strip of Sahel along the south and west of the nation. The time leading up to harvest, taking place now or in the last month, is “the hungry season” in which rural people work much and eat little. Even many urban Nigeriens return to farms to help with the crop and pad their food supply. Rains in some areas of the west stopped for a crucial period in June this year, causing farmers there to replant, and millet crops to be less than expected. As if that were not preoccupation enough, the time after Tabaski and harvest begins the “exodé” when as many as a third of rural men (and a few women) travel as far afield as Ghana, coastal Nigeria, Benin or Côte d’Ivoire to work odd jobs, coming home in several months with clothes, supplies, and a little cash. Short of ECOWAS closing the borders, Nigeriens are unlikely to be roused to large scale political action in the next few months.

ECOWAS negotiator Abdulsalami Abubakar, the former Nigerian general and interim president who led his nation out of military rule, has continued his negotiations with opposition and government, demanding a directly negotiated solution between the parties. Nigerien PM Ali Badjo Gamatié, jetting from one West African capital to another has recently acceded — in theory — to such negotiations. Several recent opposition press stories have postulated that Gamatié

A recent cover of the state paper, Le Sahel, focuses on the PM's meetings abroad, and the business as usual at home.

is eager to split off the hard core Tazarché (pro-Tandja) forces who have become a political force parallel to the ruling MNSD. The Assembly elections of October were already read as such a movement, with the return of MNSD apparatchiks at the expense of an influx of “independent” business men close to the president and his sons. Yet Gamatié is technically himself an Independent, not a MNSD minister, and brought in for that reason.

The rumored “solution” to this crisis, the creation of a 7th Republic with Tandja as a figure head and his bête noire former ally Hama Amadou as head of a transitional authority, remains just rumor. The re-assertion of the old line MNSD over the pure Tazarchistes may make the political bloodletting easier to take, but many powerful men have publicly hitched their stars to the 6th Republic and the President himself.

Creeping personalization of rule is after all par for the course in such regimes, but a sudden and unexpected transition from one government to another is not a new phenomena in Niger. The genius of the Nigerien political class is, arguably, their ability to not only change political sides, but to successfully hit the “reset button” after dramatic change. Very few of the high ranking members of Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara’s 4th Republic saw their political careers — or access to the state — end following his death at the hands of his own former coup leaders in April 1999.

Tandja, whose government has been supported from the outset by the group of officers surrounding Chief of Staff General Moumouni Boureima, has since 2004 relied on the unwavering support of the RDP-Jama’a, Baré Maïnassara’s old party. Their only identifiable founding principle is the rollback of the 1999 immunity against those who carried out the April coup, including Moumouni Boureima. It’s current leader, Hamid Algabid flew to Abudja in November to plead with ECOWAS to support Tandja’s new regime. Still, the constitution of the 6th Republic maintains a blanket immunity for officers like Boureima.

Algabid is a good illustration of how reinvention is easy for the Nigerien elite. A Tuareg from Tanout, Algabid rose to the office of Secretary General of Finance in

Hamid Algabid

Hamani Diori’s First Republic. When Seyni Kountché led a coup in 1974 and imposed almost a decade of extra-constitutional government, Algabid flourished, being appointed to several international posts and becoming Minister of Finance. When a token civilian government was named in 1983, Algabid became its second Prime Minister. When the gray formless General Ali Saïbou succeeded to power on Kountché’s death, Algabid served him for a year, before being kicked up to head the Organisation of the Islamic Conference throughout both the authoritarian Second Republic and the post-revolutionary Third Republic. When Baré Maïnassara took power, Algabid failed in a bid to become Secretary General of the UN (!), and agreed instead to head the General-President’s new party, made up almost entirely of defectors from the boycotting civilian parties. After 1999, Algabid led RDP-Jama’a into a coalition with the social democratic PNDS (a leader in the opposition to Baré Maïnassara, and now Tandja) before changing their minds in 2004 and supporting the president.

So while a few diehards newly lifted to great heights will fall should Tandja go, most of the political class will just change seats. Look for that jockeying with an eye to a post-Tandja future at every meeting of Nigerien officials with ECOWAS. The final key is where it always was, with Moumouni Boureima and a group of several officers who are all veterans of the 1999 CRN coup government. [more on them in a forthcoming article]  Jeune Afrique’s recent report of coup talk amongst some younger officers strikes at the very foundations of Tandja’s continued rule.

Even if nothing comes of that, the moment a 7th Republic looks more likely to those currently in government than the stumbling on of the 6th, Tandja will be carried out on his throne. Pressure is important, then, but unless either ECOWAS or the opposition exhibit to heretofore unseen ability to generate outside force or popular unrest, Tandja will exit thanks to an inside job.

ECOWAS and it's Nigerian representatives are playing rough.

On the 11th of November, the government of Niger confirmed the elections for it’s new parliament, boycotted by opposition and assailed as undemocratic from abroad. Two days before Finance Minister Zeine, who now serves at the will of the first President of the Sixth Republic, Tandja Mamadou, also announced the government budget for 2010. Like the August 18th unilateral transition from the semi-presidential Fifth Republic, this first budget of the Sixth Republic is a mixture of unchecked opacity and optimistic bluster.

Niger’s government announced it would spend some 735 billion CFA Francs (1.1 Billion Euros), up from 730 Billion FCFA the year before. Of course, 2009 saw hundreds of millions — no one is quite sure how much — being paid to the government of Niger for new foreign mining and oil contracts. Still, Niger says that they expect their internal tax revenue to increase to record levels and and their foreign supports budget to increase almost nine and a half percent, to 330 billion FCFA (505 million Euros). With projected internal tax and and contract revenue, of around 614 million Euros, the government has confidently promised to exactly cover their expenditures. These figures, with a projection of a %4.3 economic growth for the coming year — almost entirely based on exports of uranium — sound good enough.

Venture capitalists reading the regurgitation of such projections in outlets like Bloomberg News, might be fooled. Except that these figures are largely meant as propaganda. The independent Niamey Canard Dechaine paper asked the obvious question in response: “who are these foreign sources of income” who will make up half of the revenue in direct payments, and much of the contract revenue?

The constitutional coup of President Tandja has ground these foreign payments to a halt. The EU has frozen 180 billion Euros in direct payments for this year, and given a 30 day ultimatum for a return to constitutional government, before they cut off further funds. IMF organized funding for infrastructure projects, including support for the African Development Bank managed Kandadji Hydroelectric  Dam project, as well as for the Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility (PRGF) fund, has not been reviewed since the beginning of September, and will likely be effected, especially as Kandadji funding was funneled through ECOWAS, an organization which has suspended all work with the government of Niger. Add the suspension of US and French non-humanitarian programs, and Niger has a rather large hole in its pocket, even if France continues to buy their uranium and China keeps investing in oil, mining, and infrastructure.

If more bad news were needed, the agricultural season was poor in parts of Niger, a nation where over eighty prevent of the population rely on agriculture for their livelihoods. While not a disaster, a June dry gap following the first rains caused some areas to have to replant, and millet yields are low. Couple that with the knife edge politically, Niger is in even worse shape.

Goods being confiscated at the Nigerian border with Niger

ECOWAS president Nigeria seems to be taking a hard line, regardless — or perhaps because of — that nation’s less than transparent 2007 presidential elections. President Yar’Adua has placed former General and President Abdulsalami Abubakar in the lead for the so called “Abuja I” consultations beginning this week. On the eve of these meetings, Nigeria arranged for a small demonstration of its strength. Border guards at the three main crossings south of Maradi, Zinder and Tahoua stopped all commercial transport for at least a day. Travelers were searched, and goods were impounded. The border between these neighbors cuts through the midst of Hausaland, and the major markets for goods from Niger — apart from those big exports by the government — are sold in the markets of Kano and Katsina. A flurry of denials as to who ordered such a closure followed, but the point was surely made.

The government delegation to Abuja, made up of PM Ali Badjo Gamatié and other high Nigerien officials who have been jetting around the ECOWAS states to plead their case for several weeks, arrived in Nigeria on the 10th. According to the Niamey press, the party which included three former Prime Ministers and several other high level minister, were met at the airport by no Nigerian delegation, and had to rent their own cars.  All experienced officials, the Nigerien  delegation included former Prime Ministers Mamane Oumarou, Cheiffou Amadou, Hamid Algabid, Seini Oumarou, current Press Minister Kassoum Moktar, former Press Minister Mohamed Ben Omar, longtime party leader Sanoussi Tambari Jackou,  and current Foreign Minister Aïchatou Mindaoudou.

At the Abuja Sheraton, they were made to sit a wait several hours by the Nigerians, and then General Abdulsalami refused to meet with the entire illustrious delegation, and insisted that the current Niger PM and Foreign minister be the only officials interviewed. The Foreign Minister’s meeting with the Nigerian Ambassador to Niger was reportedly repeated  halted while the Nigerian took calls on his mobile. Meanwhile a forty member Nigerien opposition delegation has arrived in Abuja as well, and both the EU and ECOWAS are demanding a compromise deal be done directly with the Nigerien anti-Tandja activists.

So here’s the big question: which side will be forced into a deal? On the surface there is no squaring the circle. The opposition will not accept the transition to the 6th Republic as legal, and the 5th Republic’s constitution was very clear that Tandja must leave power on 22 December.

The Nigerien opposition press has begun floating the answer: the 7th Republic. In this scenario, Tandja would become a figurehead President during an 18 month transition while an assembly of all stakeholders would be called to draft a new constitution, overseen by former President Mahamane Ousmane. Meanwhile opposition leader Mahamadou Issoufou would become head of government. If you think you’ve heard this before, you may be right. Military dictator Ali Saibou‘s failed 2nd Republic was edged out of power in much the same way, with him as figurehead, while a National Convention wrote a new constitution.

Ali Saibou

Will Tandja agree? I would be surprised. He’s shown a remarkable unwavering drive to remain in power at all costs, and there are clearly now powerful family and military cliques who are using Tandja as cover for their enrichment — or to simply stave off prosecutions which might follow a change of government.

The last Nigerien strongman, Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara, was overthrown in similar circumstances.

On the other hand, Tandja might be wise to follow in the footsteps of Ali Saibou. Saibou retired to his home village in 1993, and to the best of my knowledge is still there. The next Nigerien strongman to be removed from power, Colonel / General / President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara left the presidency in two body bags following a 1999 coup. Tandja might be reminded that the murder of that president took place only days after a then Nigerian President, Abubacar Abdulsalami, led ECOWAS negotiators in meetings with Baré Maïnassara over his annulment of promised elections. And the coup leaders who put Baré Maïnassara in power and took him out remain in places of influence in Tandja’s clique as well.

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UPDATE 24 August: Nigerien Civil society activist Marou Amadou remains in arbitrary detention.  According to the BBC he has been beaten in custody.  Several other opposition activists arrested for protesting the coup remain in custody.  Police have attacked peaceful protests, most recently on 22 August in Niamey, at which several opposition leaders were arrested.  Also on 22 August Wada Maman, Secretary General of the “Front Uni pour la Sauvegarde des Acquis Démocratiques” (FUSAD), Board Member and Secretary General of the “Association Nigérienne de Lutte contre la Corruption” (ANLC), was detained by the military while waiting for a Niamey bus.  He is being held without charge or representation.

Please demand the release of these activists.
A sample letter, addresses, and statements by Nigerien and international rights groups are below.
Further links to background material follows sample letter and statements.

==Independent statement=====
PLEASE COPY, SIGN, AND EMAIL, PRINT OR FAX TO THE ADDRESSES BELOW. EMAILS ARE EASY BUT PAPER LETTERS AND FAXES MAKE A STRONGER IMPACT.

cc: missionduniger@gmail.com, webmestre@assemblee.ne, pneniger@gmail.com, ambanigeracanada@rogers.com, embassyofniger@ioip.com, ambassadeniger@hotmail.com
——sample letter——–

24 August 2009

To the honorable representatives of the Republic of Niger,

We deplore the recent wave of arrests by the government of Niger and the use of force to disperse peaceful protests.  We demand the immediate release of all political prisoners, an end to political prosecutions, and a return to the rule of law and respect for human rights.

Nigerien authorities must respect dissent and their own constitution.  The people of Niger have suffered too much since the struggle for democracy in 1991 to allow a handful of the powerful to return their nation to autocracy.

We support the rights of civil society and opposition groups to protest and assemble, and we support the general strike of the Nigerien labour confederations, the CDTN, CGSL-N, CNT, UGTN, UGSEIN, USPT, and the USTN.

We condemn the arrest of dissident journalists and the arbitrary closure of opposition press;

We condemn the arrests and use of force against peaceful protesters in on the day of the 4 August referendum, and in Niamey and elsewhere both before and after 4 August;

We condemn the use of force against those using peaceful civil disobedience on the day of the 4 August referendum in Illea and elsewhere on 4 August;

We condemn the arrests of opposition activists between 1 and 5 August, including:
*Zakari Oumarou, opposition leader, arrested and arbitrarily detained at Konni;
*Amadou Nomao, Deputy of the National Assembly, arrested and arbitrarily detained at Badaguichiri;
*Alhousseini Ousmane and Elhadj Idrissa Maïgoro, opposition members arrested at Tahoua;
*Dr. Douma, opposition member arrested at Ayorou;

We condemn the arrest between 4 and 11 August and arbitrary detention at Koutoukalé prison of opposition activist Monsieur Alassane Karfi;

We condemn the arbitrary detention by the Judiciary Police of President of the Front pour la Restauration de la Démocratie (FRD) Hamissou Moumouni;

We especially condemn the multiple arrests, unlawful detention at Koutoukalé prison and beating by FNIS (Ministry of Interior Paramilitary Police) of Marou Amadou, Vice Coordinator  of the  Collectif pour la Défense du Droit à l’énergie au Niger (CODDAE) and spokesperson of the FDD;

We condemn the unlawful detention at Koutoukalé prison beginning 22 August of  Wada Maman, Secretary General of the “Front Uni pour la Sauvegarde des Acquis Démocratiques” (FUSAD), Board Member and Secretary General of the “Association Nigérienne de Lutte contre la Corruption” (ANLC).

We condemn the prosecution of Abdoulaye Tiemogo, editor of a private satirical weekly, Le Canard Dechaine and the orchestrated campaign to silence those who question the financial dealings of those close to the President of Niger.

Rest assured that the people of the world stand by the people of Niger is their demands for democracy, rule of law, judicial Independence, and economic transparency.  The truth will come out, and the people of Niger will judge not only the behavior of their government, but those who failed to act in the defense of law.

With the deepest respect for your great nation,

Signed (Your Name)

=======Ends===========

Addresses:
=====================
TO: Ambassador of the Republic of Niger to the United States, S.E.M Toure Aminata Djibrilla Maiga

Embassy of the Republic of Niger
2204 R Street, NW,
Washington DC 20008

Phone: (202) 483-4224
Fax: (202) 483-3169
Email: embassyofniger@ioip.com, ambassadeniger@hotmail.com
Website: http://ambassadeniger@hotmail.com

—-
TO: Ambassador of the Republic of Niger to Canada, S.E.M Nana Aicha FOUMAKOYE

Embassy of Niger in Ottawa, Canada
38 Blackburn Avenue
Ottawa
Ontario K1N 8A3

Phone: (+1) (613) 232-4291 / 2
Fax: (+1) (613) 230-9808

Email: ambanigeracanada@rogers.com
Website: http://www.ambanigeracanada.ca

—-
TO: President of the Republic of Niger, Tandja Mamadou
Office of the President
Palais Présidentiel
BP 550
Niamey
Niger
Fax: + 227 20 73 34 30

email: pneniger@gmail.com
Website: http://www.presidence.ne/contacts.php

Secrétariat Directeur de Cabinet
Telephone:  + 227 20-72-24-72
Directeur de Cabinet Adjoint
Telephone:  + 227 20-72-36-67

—-
TO: Prime Minister of the Republic of Niger, Seini Oumarou;
Monsieur le Premier Ministre, Chef du Gouvernement ;
Email: webmestre@assemblee.ne
Fax : + 227 20 73 58 59

TO: M. Garba Lompo, Ministre de la Justice,
Fax : +227 20 72 37 77

TO: M. Albade Aboufa, Ministre de l’Intérieur,
Fax: + 227 20 72 21 76

TO: Mission permanente du Niger auprès de l’Union européenne,
Fax : + 32 2 648 27 84

TO: Ambassadeur M. Adani Illo, Mission permanente du Niger auprès des Nations unies à Genève,
Avenue du Lignon 36 (2ème étage), 1219 Le Lignon, Suisse.
Fax: +41 22 979 24 51.
Email: missionduniger@gmail.com

====END ADDRESSES=====

=======Transparency International Statement========
Anti-corruption leader arrested in Niger as civil society faces increased intimidation
Berlin, 24 August 2009

Transparency International (TI) is seriously concerned about the arrest in Niger, of Wada Maman, Board Member and Secretary General of TI chapter, the Association Nigérienne de Lutte contre la Corruption (ANLC)
*http://www.transparency.org/news_room/latest_news/press_releases/2009/2009_08_24_niger_intimidation

=======Ends===========

=======Publish What You Pay statement===============

Action Alert: PWYP calls on the Nigerien government to end all forms of harassment against civil society leader Marou Amadou
Source: PWYP International – Action Alert
Date: 13 Aug 2009

http://www.publishwhatyoupay.org/en/resources/action-alert-pwyp-calls-nigerien-government-end-all-forms-harassment-against-civil-society

PWYP strongly condemns the transfer into police custody of Marou Amadou, president of the United Front for the Safeguard of Democratic Assets (FUSAD), coordinator of the Advisory and Orientation Committee for the Defence of Democratic Rights (CROISADE), and member of the Réseau des Organisations pour la Transparence et l’Analyse Budgetaire (ROTAB) – Publish What You Pay (PWYP) Niger.

According to ROTAB/PWYP Niger, Marou Amadou was discharged on Tuesday, 12 August 2009 after appearing before the Court of First Instance in Niamey, where he had been summoned for “inciting disobedience of defense and security forces” and “regionalist propaganda”, following his arrest on 10 August 2009 by the Nigerien Judicial Police.

PWYP condemns Marou Amadou’s forced transfer into police custody just hours after a court had ordered his release.

PWYP therefore demands that the discharge decision be respected and calls for the immediate release of Marou Amadou.

PWYP urges the Nigerien authorities to guarantee Marou Amadou’s physical and moral integrity.

PWYP calls on President Mamadou Tandja to ensure an end to all forms of harassment and intimidation against Marou Amadou and civil society activists in Niger, and to guarantee freedom of speech and of the press in accordance with the international human rights standards Niger has committed itself to.

Actions Required:

PWYP asks that you write to the Nigerien authorities, Nigerien diplomatic representatives and to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in your respective countries to draw their attention to your concerns and forward them this statement

=======Ends===========

=======Frontline Defenders Statement=======
Niger: Detention of human rights defender Mr Marou Amadou
2009/08/17
(Sample letter included)

http://www.frontlinedefenders.org/node/2128/action

=======OMCT Statement=======
*Organisation Mondiale Contre la Torture
Relaxe et disparition forcée de M. Marou Amadou Niger 11 août 2009

http://omct.org/index.php?id=OBS&lang=fr&actualPageNumber=1&articleSet=Appeal&articleId=8737

====Ends=====

Further links:

*News Reports on the arrest of Marou Amadou
**http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5isewxWl32nJBbl2UP0n3QYpCKSYA
**http://www.voanews.com/english/Africa/2009-08-10-voa36.cfm
** BBC NEWS | Africa | Niger opposition figure ‘beaten’ http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8197439.stm

* Transparency International Statement (22 August)

http://appablog.wordpress.com/2009/08/24/anti-corruption-leader-arrested-in-niger-as-civil-society-faces-increased-intimidation/

* Collectif pour la Défense du Droit à l’énergie au Niger (CODDAE) statement   (Francais)

http://coddae.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=92:declaration-de-presse-relative-a-larrestation-du-camarade-marou-amadou-pour-atteinte-a-la-surete-de-letat&catid=1:actualite&Itemid=50

*  Opposition decalration 11 August http://pnds-tarayya.net/news/news.php?id=41
DÉCLARATION DU 11 AOÛT 2009 La Coordination des Forces pour la Démocratie et la République (CFDR)  (Francais)

*  Opposition decalaration on 4 August arrests
http://pnds-tarayya.net/news/news.php?id=38  (Francais)

*NIGER-En réaction à l’arrestation du président du Fusad, Amnesty international exige la libération de Amadou Arou
le Quotidien (Senegal) 19 August.

http://issikta.blogspot.com/2009/08/niger-en-reaction-larrestation-du.html

* Areva/Niger: organisation exposing links between the French Uranium consortia and the government of Niger  (Francais) http://areva.niger.free.fr/

*Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Annual Report 2009 – Niger

http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/4a5f300dc.html

*Nigerien Labor Confederations joint 72 hour strike, 23 August

http://www.tamtaminfo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2073:preavis-de-greve-generale-de-72-heures-&catid=44:politique&Itemid=61

*Nigerien news articles  (Francais)
*http://www.tamtaminfo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2072:affaire-marou-amadou-le-proces-des-collectifs-associatifs&catid=44:politique&Itemid=61
*http://www.tamtaminfo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1976:vague-darrestation-dans-les-rangs-des-opposants&catid=44:politique&Itemid=61
*http://www.tamtaminfo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2005:-communique-de-presse&catid=44:politique&Itemid=61
*http://www.tamtaminfo.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2007:proces-marou-amadou-et-abdoulaye-tiemogo-des-militants-de-la-cfdr-copieusement-tabasses&catid=44:politique&Itemid=61

*Niger: Les manifestants de l’opposition dispersés par les forces de l’ordre, 22 August.  (Francais)

http://fr.allafrica.com/stories/200908240223.html

*Niger: La matraque du colonel, 23 August. (Francais)

http://fr.allafrica.com/stories/200908240166.html

*Updates in English:

http://www.tomathon.com/mphm/