Members of the national guard attempted, on the evening of November 30, to kidnap two ministers while they were being questioned by the police, before taking refuge in a military camp.
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Instability is spreading in Guinea-Bissau. The country’s president, Umaro Sissoco Embalo, decided, Monday, December 4, to dissolve the Parliament dominated by the opposition, three days after armed clashes that he describes as “attempted coup d’état”. Violent clashes which plunge this small West African country into yet another crisis, a year and a half after events also described as an aborted putsch.
Thursday, November 30 in the evening, elements of the national guard burst into the premises of the judicial police to extract the Minister of Economy and Finance, Souleiman Seidi, and the Secretary of State for the Public Treasury, Antonio Monteiro who were interrogated there. The two members of the government were taken into custody on Thursday and questioned about a withdrawal of ten million dollars (9.23 million euros) from state coffers. The matter had previously been discussed in Parliament. Members of the national guard then took refuge in a military camp in the capital Bissau, and resisted with arms until Friday morning.
“The date of the next legislative elections will be fixed at the appropriate time, in accordance with the provisions (…) of the Constitution”establishes a presidential decree communicated to the press.
