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IRIN-WA Update 270 of Events in West Africa, (Tuesday) 11 August 1998
GUINEA BISSAU: Two mediation teams to negotiate
Mediation teams of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries (CPLP) met on Tuesday in Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire, to "harmonise" efforts to find a solution to the two-month conflict in Guinea Bissau, news reports said.
AFP quoted the ECOWAS team leader, Cote d'Ivoire Foreign Minister Essy Amara, as saying that both organisations shared the same goal of bringing peace to Guinea Bissau and were striving towards a common solution to the crisis. Amara reiterated that the two warring parties had expressed their total confidence in ECOWAS and its mediation role. He added that despite criticism of ECOWAS in various quarters, it was the only regional organisation, which had achieved peace and stability in Liberia and Sierra Leone, AFP reported. The CPLP team leader, Cape Verde Foreign Minister Jose Luis de Jesus, echoed the view that both organisations had to join forces to find a solution to the crisis.
Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan lauded the ECOWAS and CPLP peace efforts. He also congratulated the CPLP for its role in getting the two sides to sign a ceasefire on 26 July. The conflict started on 7 June, when President Joao Bernado Vieira sacked General Absumane Mane as armed forces chief of staff over allegations of gun smuggling to separatists in the neighbouring Senegalese province of Casamance.
Other talks
Meanwhile, the presidents of two ECOWAS nations, Yahya Jammeh of The Gambia and Moaouia Ould Sidi Mohammed Taya of Mauritania have held separate talks on mediation efforts, news organisations reported on Tuesday. Mauritanian television quoted the Gambian president as saying that the situation in Guinea Bissau could affect the stability of the whole region.
In a related development, Senegalese President Abdou Diouf, who sent troops to assist Vieira, was scheduled to meet the Portuguese foreign minister, Jaime Gama, on 17 August in Dakar on the eve of formal talks between the warring sides on 18 August, the Portuguese news agency Lusa reported, quoting diplomatic sources.
A journalist at the privately-owned Senegalese media group 'Sud Quotidien' told IRIN on Tuesday that Senegalese opposition members had demanded that Diouf provide an explanation for sending soldiers to Guinea Bissau. He said that to date, there had been no explicit government statement made on the situation in Guinea Bissau. Senegal and Guinea (Conakry) sent some 3,000 men to assist Vieira against the mutineers.
ICRC aid
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Tuesday that since the beginning of the mutiny, it had distributed 300 mt of WFP food aid to the internally displaced people camped in the towns of Cacheu, Quinara, Bafata, Tombali, Biombo, the Bijagos archipelago, and to those who remained in the capital, Bissau.
In a statement, it said that over the next three months it planned to distribute a further 2,610 mt food, buckets, plastic sheeting and soap to some 115,000 displaced people. The UN-OCHA has estimated that there were currently some 350,000 internally displaced people in Guinea Bissau.
SENEGAL: Bus hits mine killing 13
Thirteen people were killed and eight injured when a bus detonated a mine in Casamance, AFP reported on Tuesday. The dispatch did not say when the incident occurred and gave no further details. Casamance has been the centre of conflict between separatists of the Mouvement des Forces Democratiques de Casamance (MFDC) and the authorities. AFP reported that since the Guinea Bissau conflict started, the situation in Casamance has been relatively quiet.
SIERRA LEONE: No talks with RUF leader
President Alhaji Ahmad Tejan Kabbah of Sierra Leone said on Monday he was not yet ready to hold talks with the leader of his country's seven-year rebel movement, AFP reported.
Kabbah said that the commander of the Nigerian-led West African intervention force, ECOMOG, had told him gaoled Revolutionary United Front (RUF) leader Foday Sankoh was "desperate" to talk. "But how can you talk peace to someone who does not believe in it?" AFP quoted him as saying.
Sankoh was extradited from Nigeria in July, after nearly a year in custody following the May 1997 Sierra Leone army coup, which the RUF almost immediately joined.
The military junta was forced out of the capital, Freetown, in February by ECOMOG forces. But the RUF has continued to wage a bush war against ECOMOG in north and east Sierra Leone.
Rebels surrender
Meanwhile, "dozens" of RUF supporters had hurried to surrender to ECOMOG ahead of a presidential amnesty, which expired at the weekend, AFP reported on Monday.
The news agency quoted Kabbah's spokesman, Septimus Kaikai, as saying an undisclosed number of RUF fighters and junta soldiers had given themselves up in the northern and eastern towns of Kabala, Kono and Kailahun.
Humanitarian sources in Freetown told IRIN on Tuesday that estimates of how many rebels had surrendered during Kabbah's amnesty varied widely. "It is possible the remoteness of many part of Sierra Leone where the rebels are operating will make an accurate count impossible," one source said.
Another source said it was also possible other fighters were deterred from surrendering because of fear of retribution from hardline RUF supporters as well as local communities which had been the victim of earlier terror raids.
According to Kaikai, Sierra Leone's government would continue to accept the surrender of RUF supporters even though the latest amnesty had expired on Sunday. "Nothing will happen to them," he said.
LIBERIA: Conference on Liberia's future ends
Liberia's first national conference since the end of its seven-year civil war wound up on Tuesday after a week in which delegates from around the country discussed ways of charting the country's future, news organisation reported.
Although a number of committees were formed to take on a range of issues, the BBC said many delegates had also complained about the poor organisation of the conference.
Some, it added, had opposed the chairmanship of President Charles Taylor, which, they said, discouraged delegates from being objective about the issues.
Taylor orders release of aide
Meanwhile, Taylor reportedly ordered the release on Friday of his military affairs advisor, Isaac Mussah, AFP said.
Mussah was arrested last month for "disorderly conduct" after he allegedly insulted Taylor's Special Security Service (SSS).
Sources in Monrovia told IRIN, however, it was not clear why Taylor had decided to punish his one time ally.
According to one source, splits within the ruling National Patriotic Party (NPP) were pitting new party officials against former commanders from its parent faction, the National Patriotic Front for Liberia (NPFL).
"Who is arresting whom for what is often a confusing affair," one source commented. "A lot depends on who has the president's ear on any given occasion," he added.
On Monday, an NPP senator, Peter Fineboy, claimed armed men beat him and his family in an attempt to retrieve a vehicle belonging to NPP. Referring to the traditional divide between native Liberians and the former American and Congo slaves who dominated the country's economy and legislature until 1980, Fineboy said Congo people within the ruling party were trying to "marginalise" their native colleagues.
"These people are gravy-seeers bent on trying to deceive our president," PANA quoted him as saying.
NIGERIA: Commonwealth to review relations
Commonwealth ministers will meet in October to discuss the group's relations with Nigeria in light of the changes in the country, AFP reported on Tuesday quoting the Nigerian press.
It quoted unnamed diplomats as saying that the eight-nation Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group (CMAG) would invite a Nigerian delegation to a meeting set for 8 and 9 October in London to discuss progress in the new transition towards democracy and elections promised by the country's new military ruler General Abdulsalam Abubakar. However, the sources said the Commonwealth would wait until the elections had actually taken place before lifting Nigeria's suspension from the organisation.
Nigeria was expelled from the Commonwealth in November 1995 following the execution of eight human rights activists, including the writer, Ken Saro-Wiwa. The CMAG comprises Britain, Canada, New Zealand, Botswana, Barbados, Ghana, Malaysia and Zimbabwe.
Clashes in northeast
Police in northeastern Nigeria said four people were killed in a fresh outbreak of fighting at the weekend between the two ethnic groups, the Chamba-Jukun and the Kuteb, the BBC reported on Monday. The four were the latest casualties in a dispute over land in the Takum area of the northern state of Taraba. The police ordered both communities to hand in their weapons by the end of August. There have been frequent bouts of violence since last October over land.
TOGO: Low turnout for general strike in capital
Few people heeded opposition calls for a general strike to contest results of the June presidential elections, which saw the incumbent's mandate renewed for a five-year period, news reports said on Monday.
A coalition of eight opposition parties called the Forces Democratiques, claimed that Gilchrist Olympio, leader of the Union des forces du changement (UFC) had won the elections and not the incumbent, President, Gnasssingbe Eyadema, according to radio station Africa no. 1. It said most government offices, petrol stations, banks and pharmacies remained open.
According to official results, Eyadema won the election with 52 percent of the vote. His re-election was also contested by European Union observers.
Abidjan, 11 August 1998, 18:50 gmt
[ends]
[The material contained in this communication comes to you via IRIN West Africa, a UN humanitarian information unit, but may not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations or its agencies. UN IRIN-WA Tel: +225 21 73 66 Fax: +225 21 63 35 e-mail: irin-wa@africaonline.co.ci for more information or subscription. If you re-print, copy, archive or re-post this report, please retain this credit and disclaimer. Quotations or extracts should include attribution to the original sources. IRIN reports are archived on the Web at: http://www.reliefweb.int or can be retrieved automatically by sending e-mail to <archive@ocha.unon..org> - mailing list: irin-wa-updates]
Date: Tue, 11 Aug 1998 18:56:38 +0000 (GMT) From: UN IRIN - West Africa <irin-wa@wa.dha.unon.org> Subject: IRIN-West Africa Update 270, 98.8.11 Message-Id: <Pine.LNX.3.95.980811185422.23415A-100000@wa.dha.unon.org>
Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar
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