President of Niger, Mahamadou Issoufou, survived coup in 2015
Niger Coup: How Fashionable is Coup Still in Africa?
The political quagmire in Zimbabwe, which came to a head in November last year would have been an opportunity for Coup D’état in that country if Africa were to rewind the time back to, say, 20 years ago.
But Africa seemed to have moved forward from the fancy of military dictatorship to the fancy of civilian autocracy. The difference is that now, Africans no longer like Mr. Jack in the military uniform to be their leader, but they still love Mr. Jack in Agbada to be their president whereas Mr. Jack remains constant in the African political equation.
In Zimbabwe, the military seized power out rightly and then gave the power back to the civilian and preferred to be awarded a second-lieutenant position.
What that shows is that military rule is no longer fashionable.
In December 2015, the government of Niger said it had foiled a coup and arrested nine people accused of planning to use aerial firepower to seize control of Niger, a largely desert West African nation, a major uranium producer and Western ally against Saharan jihadists.
A court in Niger on Friday jailed the nine soldiers for between five and 15 years, premising that they attempted to usurp power from President Mahamadou Issoufou.
In the judgement read out by Judge Ibrahim Daoudika, the suspected ringleader, General Salou Souleymane, got 15 years, as did two others. Six co-conspirators received sentences ranging from five to 10 years, and another three accused were acquitted. Issoufou was elected in 2011, one year after a coup.
He was re-elected in February 2016 with 92.5 percent of the vote, after the opposition coalition boycotted the polls.
“This is not what we expected, but the court is sovereign and it judged that they conspired against the state,” lawyer Nabara Ycouba told a news conference. “The law does not allow for an appeal. I will discuss with my clients what to do.”
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