Army officers in coup-prone Guinea-Bissau said on Wednesday they had seized power, a day before provisional results were due from a tightly fought presidential election.
In a statement read on state television, the officers said they had removed President Umaro Sissoco Embalo, suspended the electoral process, closed the country’s borders and imposed a curfew.
They announced the creation of a body called “The High Military Command for the Restoration of Order”, saying it would administer the West African nation until further notice.
GUNFIRE IN THE CAPITAL BEFORE ANNOUNCEMENT
The declaration followed bursts of gunfire near the electoral commission, the presidential palace and the interior ministry, witnesses said. The shooting lasted for about an hour but appeared to have ceased by 1400 GMT, a Reuters journalist reported. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
The electoral commission had been due on Thursday to publish provisional results from Sunday’s vote, in which Embalo faced challenger Fernando Dias. Both camps had earlier claimed victory in the first round.
Embalo, who could not immediately be reached for comment, had hoped to become the first leader in three decades to win a second consecutive term in the small coastal state wedged between Senegal and Guinea.
His spokesperson, Antonio Yaya Seidy, told Reuters that unidentified gunmen had attacked the election commission to stop it from announcing the results. He alleged the assailants were linked to Dias, but provided no evidence. A spokesperson for Dias did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Former Prime Minister Domingos Simoes Pereira, who lost to Embalo in a disputed 2019 runoff and backed Dias in this election, denied any involvement by Dias in the incident.
Pereira said Dias had been meeting election observers in Bissau when “some people erupted in the room to announce that there were gunshots in the centre of the town.” He said Dias was safe and remained in the capital.
Guinea-Bissau has experienced at least nine coups or attempted coups between independence from Portugal in 1974 and 2020, when Embalo took office. The president has said he has survived three coup attempts during his tenure, while critics accuse him of inflating or exploiting crises to justify clampdowns.
