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IRIN-WA Update 450 of events in West Africa (Monday 26 April)
GUINEA BISSAU: Calm returns after tense standoff
Calm returned to the Guinea Bissau capital, Bissau, just hours after a tense standoff on Friday between forces loyal to President Joao Bernardo Vieira and those opposed to him, news reports said at the weekend.
The confrontation occurred after the government of national
unity dismissed Bissau Mayor Paulo Medina, the Portuguese
news agency, Lusa, reported. Troops loyal to Vieira,
who appointed Medina, and those backing the military
rebellion against him last year, gathered at city hall
as tensions rose.
Medina refused to accept his dismissal, saying he was
appointed by presidential decree, Lusa said. Portuguese
radio reported that Medina, accompanied by 10 civilians
had broken into several offices in the council building
and removed documents. The radio said this led Vieira's
supporters and their opponents to gather outside the
building.
However, the troops from both camps were dispersed by the West African peace monitoring force, ECOMOG. This force, sent by the 16-nation Economic Community of West African States, is overseeing the 1 November Abuja peace accord that ended an eight-month military revolt last year.
SIERRA LEONE: Rebel talks begin
After a week of delays, consultative talks were to begin on Monday between ranking members of Sierra Leone's Revolutionary United Front (RUF) and the rebel group's founder, Foday Sankoh.
The talks in the Togolese capital, Lome, which were delayed by the RUF's logistical and security worries, are aimed at setting out proposals for full-fledged peace negotiations with the government of President Alhaji Ahmad Tejan Kabbah of Sierra Leone.
AFP reported that 14 RUF officials had joined Sankoh who was temporarily released from prison in Freetown for the Lome meeting.
However, ranking RUF commander Sam Bockarie and his ally, Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC) leader Major Johnny Koroma, failed to show, news reports said. RUF spokesman Omrie Golley said some of its rebel commanders had remained in Liberia, where they were being assembled for transportation to Lome, still out of concern for their safety.
Sankoh is awaiting an appeal on his treason conviction. Sankoh's commanders and closest aids have been demanding his release if they are to give up their uprising which has so far cost some 20,000 dead, AFP reported.
Many killed in weekend fighting
Dozens of people were killed at the weekend in fighting between the RUF rebels and pro-government traditional hunters known as Kamajors, local reporters said. AFP reported that the fighting broke out in Yele, some 150 km east of Freetown, when the rebels attacked a ferry. Several other people were badly wounded in the incident, the agency said.
In another development, the agency said two pro-government troops escaped rebel captivity on 16 April. The two, a 26-year old Sierra Leonean soldier and a Nigerian member of ECOMOG, were taken prisoner when rebels invaded the capital in January. Speaking on state television from the military hospital beds, both soldiers said they were badly treated in captivity. The Sierra Leonean said he was tied throughout his captivity.
He said the rebels also held a list of all loyalist Sierra Leonean soldiers who went over to ECOMOG when the force flushed rebels out of Freetown in 1998. The Nigerian added that a number of civilians were still in rebel hands.
LIBERIA: ULIMO operating training camps
Liberia's former civil war faction ULIMO, led by Alhaji Kromah was allegedly operating two military training camps in Macenta, in the extreme southeast of Guinea, AFP reported on Friday.
Quoting unidentified officials of humanitarian organisations, it said they had seen some guerrillas training in the Guinean forest. The officials claimed they were the same guerrillas who attacked the northern Liberian town of Voijama, 33.6 km southwest of Macenta in Guinea, last week.
However, Guinea's communication minister, Ibrahima Mongo Diallo, has denied his country's complicity in the attack, so too has the Guinean Consul in Liberia, Joseph Tolno, independent 'Star Radio' reported on Saturday. Both men said Guinea would never serve as a rear base for attacking an OAU member country.
In March, Liberian President Charles Taylor accused Kromah, his arch rival, of preparing another guerrilla war in Liberia and of training his men in Guinea.
Liberia has complained to Guinea, the Economic Community of West African States, the OAU and the UN Security Council about the attack, in which UN officials and diplomats were taken hostage briefly.
Roman Catholic Church to help press union
The Roman Catholic Justice and Peace Commission (JPC) and the Press Union of Liberia (PUL) have renewed a 1996 pact to promote social justice and democracy, 'Star Radio' reported at the weekend. JPC would provide free legal aid to PUL-accredited journalists. In turn, the union would cover human rights and democracy issues.
NIGERIA: Schools closed in teachers' strike
Schools across Nigeria were closed on Monday as teachers joined a public service strike called by the Nigeria Labour Congress to press the government to pay the new minimum monthly wage of 3,000 naira (US $33), news organisations reported.
AFP quoted teachers as saying they had been told by the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) that the strike would last indefinitely, and media reports said most primary and high schools in the country's biggest city, Lagos, Kano in the north, Enugu in the east and Port Harcourt in the southeast were closed on Monday.
The union's secretary-general, Gabriel Falade, was quoted as saying some primary school teachers currently earned 2,000 naira (US $22) a month. "All workers in the public service sector are supposed to get the minimum wage," he said. "Until teachers are paid the new wage, they will stay at home."
As the public service strike entered its third week on Monday, a leading politician, Abdulkadri Balarabe Musa, the former governor of Kaduna state, told the independent daily, 'The Guardian' at the weekend that the minimum wage being demanded was a "slave" wage: "The primary issue is that government must pay a fair and living wage to its workers."
Fuel price increase sought
Fuel marketing companies in Nigeria have asked the government to approve a pump price increase because of the growing costs of crude oil and the depreciation of the naira against the dollar, news organisations reported on Monday.
The reports quoted a joint statement by marketing companies at the weekend in which they recommended a price increase from 20 to 24 naira (22 to 26 US cents) a litre.
"The decision of the government allowing marketers to import and allow normal pricing based on import parity has been the key to the enormous progress achieved so far in the supply situation," the statement said. But with output from the country's four refineries still low, Nigeria could face further shortages "and even longer queues if these slight increases" were not approved, it said.
NIGER: Wanke visits Nigeria
Niger's new leader, Major Daouda Mallam Wanke, briefly visited neighbouring Nigeria at the weekend for talks with the outgoing military leader General Abdulsalami Abubakar, new organisations reported.
No details of the talks were given. Abubakar had called the 9 April killing of Niger President Ibrahim Bare Mainassara by members of Wanke's presidential body guard a "sad event". Wanke has promised a nine-month transition to elections for a civilian government from which serving or retired military officers have been barred as candidates.
Rebels request demilitarised zone
Former Tuareg and Tubu rebels in Niger have called for the demilitarisation of the southeastern Manga region bordering Nigeria and Chad, AFP reported at the weekend.
Seventeen civilians from the area were killed during recent operations carried out by a joint force of soldiers from Niger, Chad and Nigeria, according to a statement by Front democratique revolutionnaire (FDR).
It also demanded an amnesty for rebel detainees and reported the discovery of a mass grave of 150 civilians whom the rebels said had been killed the previous month by Niger soldiers in the Bosso area near Lake Chad. The army has denied the allegation, AFP said.
The former rebels said military operations were paralysing the application of peace accords it signed last year in the Chadian capital, N'Djamena.
"To give peace a chance, we demand the demilitarisation of the Manga area," the statement said.
TOGO: Opposition ceremony banned
Togolese Interior Minister General Seyi Memene has banned independence day ceremonies planned by the country's main opposition party, according to media reports at the weekend.
Independence day on Tuesday was a national event which could not be taken over by a political party, he said. In a bid to test the right to freedom of assembly, the celebrations had been planned by the Union des forces de changement (UFC), an opposition party led by the exiled politician, Gilchrist Olympio.
Olympio, who lives in neighbouring Ghana, said the UFC did not intend to cancel the 41st independence anniversary ceremonies and appealed to supporters not to be intimidated. The UFC has been demanding a re-run of the June 1998 elections.
Olympio is the son of the country's first president, Sylvanus Olympio, who was assassinated in a coup in 1963.
WEST AFRICA: Nigeria, Equatorial Guinea seek "amicable" oil fields solution
Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea were seeking to resolve a maritime dispute over potentially oil-rich seas in the Gulf of Guinea "amicably", Nigeria's military ruler, general Abdulsalami Abubakar said at the weekend.
In remarks carried by news reports after a visit to Malabo, the island capital of Equatorial Guinea, Abubakar said after talks with President Teodor Obiang Nguema, that the two nations had decided to "work towards strengthening bilateral relations and cooperation".
Meanwhile, AFP quoted Radio Malobo as saying Nguema had departed for the United States after the talks with Abubakar. Equatorial Guinea currently produces more than 100,000 barrels of oil per day from offshore wells operated by American companies.
Abidjan, 26 April 1999 17:30 GMT
[ENDS]
Date: Mon, 26 Apr 1999 17:36:38 +0000 (GMT) From: UN IRIN - West Africa <irin-wa@wa.ocha.unon.org> Subject: WEST AFRICA: IRIN Update 450 for 26 April [19990427]
Editor: Ali B. Ali-Dinar
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