20100625
africanews

The man who led a near coup d'état in the troubled West African nation of Guinea Bissau in April, has been named head of the army. Government sources in Bissau that President Malam Bacai Sanha officially fired ousted chief of staff, General Jose Zamora Induta, and replace him with the man who ordered his detention, General Antonio Indjai.

"After consulting the government, the president decreed, in terms of Article 59 of the Constitution: General Antonio Indjai is appointed as Chief of Staff of the armed forces," AFP quoted a source at the presidency in Bissau.

The detained General, Jose Zamora Induta, has been held at a military barracks since last April’s uprising. He was detained together with the county’s Prime Minister, Carlos Gomez Junior, who the mutinous soldiers threatened to kill but was later released.

If anything, this latest development in what is one of Africa’s most unpredictable democracies confirms the strong grip the highly influential but seriously compromised military has on the country.

Call for military reform

The United States, last Thursday, urged the Bissau Guinean government to purge its army of rouge elements. A statement from the US embassy in Dakar, which oversees Guinea Bissau, warned that US will not help in international efforts to reform its armed forces unless they were purged of suspected drug lords. One such drug lord is former navy chief Jose Americo Bubo Na Tchuto whom the US has named alongside the country’s Air Force head, Ibraima Papa Camara, as "drug kingpins" and had their assets in the US frozen.

Rea-Admiral Jose Americo Bubo Na Tchuto was in 2008 accused of involvement in an attempted coup plot, leading to the murder of the country’s former president, Nino Vieira. The former Navy chief fled to Gambia where he was given protection by Yahya Jammeh’s government. He subsequently returned to Bissau and sought refuge with the UN there.

During last April’s mutiny, soldiers forcefully removed Na Tchuto from the UN compound, and he was soon seen moving about with the de facto head of the army, General Indjai.

“The appointment of Injai flies in the face of a stern statement by the United States Embassy in Dakar, AFP’s Dakar correspondent said.

With the confirmation of his ally as head of the country’s army, Bubu Na Tchuto’s has been given a green card for business as usual.

Threats to the sub region

A destabilized Guinea Bissau is not only a threat to the US and Europe, but also the rest of the sub region. An ongoing treason trial in neighbouring Gambia involving that country’s former military chief is full of references to Guinea Bissau. Notorious drug dealers in the country have been imported by the Gambian government to testify against the suspects who were said to have planned their alleged coup in the bushes of Guinea Bissau.