Mauritania’s ruling Congress of the Union for the Republic (UPR) has set up a new body entrusted to the close allies of current President Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani, a new strategy aimed at running aground the ambitions of former President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz.
By Mohamed Moctar
Despite his departure from power, Aziz continued to proclaim himself as the founder of UPR and, claiming therefore that he is the party’s supreme leader.
When it ended on Sunday evening, the UPR Congress decided to open a new chapter without Aziz.
It was by a unanimous vote that the hundreds of delegates decided to renew all the UPR’s governing bodies, ranging from its president and assistants to its executive committee, especially the National Council and the General Secretary.
Thus, the chairmanship of the party returned to former minister and diplomat, Sidi Mohamed Ould Taleb Amar, while the post of General Secretary was entrusted to Fall Nguissali, an expert and retired senior executive.
These are all allies of current President Ghazouani.
With this new configuration of the UPR, Ould Abdel Aziz’s bid to maintain a stranglehold on the party has been undone.
However, the ex-president had tried by all means to keep his allies at the helm of the party, in order to maintain influence over the country’s political life, after losing control of the UPR executive.
But these attempts were met with a categorical rejection by Ghazouani, who called the party congress to position his team, which he obtained with the decisions of the congress.
Better still, many small political parties, which have so far been in the opposition, have merged with the Ghazouani-led version of UPR, showing their satisfaction with his style of all-out openness to the political class.
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