Guinea’s president, Alpha Condé has not allayed the doubts of Moussa Sarr, a business lawyer, about the admissibility of amending the constitution eight months before his second five-year term comes to an end.
By Ibrahima Dione
Alpha Condé recently stated that the referendum has nothing to do with the constitution. What do you think about this?
MS: It is an unconvincing answer. If we look at the facts, we realise that the referendum (scheduled for March 1, 2020) will have consequences on the presidential election.
It would be a draft amendment to the constitution to remove the ban on running for a third term.
From that moment on, there is no doubt that this election will have an impact on the presidential election. Now he has tried to cover this up by making it an incidental question.
Alpha Condé’s assertion is contrary to reality. It is really regrettable that a head of state can answer such a serious question with such lightness. It is, however, about the future of Guineans.
For the Guinean President, it is his party that will decide whether or not he will take part in the presidential election. How do you analyse this statement?
MS: In a democracy, everyone knows that it is up to a political party to propose a candidate for an election. But in Guinea, Senegal and even in French-speaking Africa, it is clear that the incumbent president, unless the constitutional prevents him from doing so, will be a candidate for re-election.
If he did not want to be a candidate, then why would he want to break the constitutional lock by removing the impossibility of running for a third term? If Condé had a will to respect the constitution, the party would have chosen another candidate.
The Guinean president must bow out because he has exhausted all his cartridges. But he has emerged as the candidate of his Rally of the Guinean People (RPG) party.
That is why they are obliged to change the constitution. It is a problem of coherence and common sense. His argument is notoriously irrelevant. It does not convince anybody..absolutely nobody!
A fringe of the opposition is planning to boycott the next elections (legislative and referendum). Is this a good strategy?
MS: Boycotting has never been a good strategy in a democracy. When you play empty-chair politics, you give the incumbent power and the chance to perpetrate anti-democratic tendencies. It has never served any purpose.
I have never seen a boycott change the political situation in Africa. In the political arena, everything is won by a balance of power. But at what cost? In politics, when you don’t agree, you have to create the conditions for a balance of power to make the other side back down.
In my opinion, we must participate in these elections; we must encourage a balance of power so that Condé is defeated in the referendum or, in the worst case scenario, if he persists, in the presidential elections.
This was the case in Senegal in 2012 with President Abdoulaye Wade. The renunciation of the political fight or the boycott does not seem to me to be responsible. That cannot solve the problem in Guinea.
The opposition, civil society, in short Guineans, must organise themselves to confront the regime politically and not through violence. That is the best solution. It is a pity that in Africa, presidents tinker with the constitution. They cause constitutional insecurity that destabilises their countries socially and politically.
ID/te/lb/as/APA