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Niger Republic Court Rejects Third Term Bid For President Mamadou Tandja
21 June 2009
Niamey - Niger's electoral commission said on Friday the country will hold snap elections on August 20 and confirmed the Constitutional Court's rejection of a referendum on a third term for President Mamadou Tandja. A parliamentary election has to be held within 45 days of the dissolution of parliament, which Tandja decreed on May 26 immediately after the Constitutional Court issued a first ruling on amending the constitution for his benefit. Tandja again tried in June to decree a referendum on a new constitution that would open the way for a third five-year mandate, but his opponents went to the Constitutional Court, who again ruled against it.
The issue has become deeply divisive in the poor, landlocked sub-Saharan nation and Tandja also ran into opposition from the regional Economic Community of West African States, of which Niger is among the 15 members. The national independent electoral commission "classified the referendum as dropped the day after the Constitutional Court decision," a member of the poll body Friday told AFP on condition of anonymity. Tandja, 71, is due to step down at the end of his mandate on December 22. A presidential election is already slated for November 14. In a statement broadcast on public television on Thursday night, the poll commission asked parties and independent candidates to submit their electoral lists of candidates to it by June 25. Tandja on Friday called a meeting of the Council of the Republic, a body "responsible for promoting political dialogue and the democratic spirit," an official source said. The council's very first meeting since it was formed in 1999 began in the morning, gathering leaders of various institutions including the opposition to Tandja, but the source gave no details of the agenda. Last Sunday, a slew of opposition parties, trade unions and civil society organisations grouped into a Front for the Defence of Democracy (FDD) coalition, held a giant demonstration in Niamey to hail the Constitutional Court's rulings against Tandja. Analysts said that if the head of state had resorted to convening the Council of the Republic, it seemed likely that he was not ready to fall into line with the ruling of the Constitutional Court handed down last Friday. The highest court in the land has delivered some harsh criticism of Tandja's plans, branding them a "true hijacking of power", though there has been no formal appeal against its decision. Judges told the president he was trying to rewrite a constitution he was duty-bound to "respect and to compel others to respect". Efforts by his allies to get an "extension" by three years of his second mandate were also defeated. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed concern after Tandja dissolved the country's parliament late in May, a day after the first constitutional court ruling went against him, while ECOWAS threatened sanctions. The regional grouping reminded Tandja of a decision that no leaders in it should seek constitutional changes within six months in the period before an election. One opposition leader, Sanoussi Jackou, has stated that the Council of the Republic meets only to "play a mediation role between institutions when there is a conflict of competence" and said the body could "do nothing". "That's not its role. This isn't a political or adminstrative difference. It is a judicial problem arising from President Tandja's deliberate refusal to respect a ruling of the Constitutional Court." - Sapa-AFP
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