: Guinea’s New Junta Leaders Seek to Tighten Their Grip on Power #WorldNEWS CONAKRY, Guinea — Guineas new military leaders sought to tighten their grip on power after overthrowing President Alpha

Guinea’s New Junta Leaders Seek to Tighten Their Grip on Power #WorldNEWS
CONAKRY, Guinea — Guineas new military leaders sought to tighten their grip on power after overthrowing President Alpha Conde, warning local officials that refusing to appear at a meeting convened Monday would be considered an act of rebellion against the junta.
After putting the West African nation back under military rule for the first time in over a decade, the junta said Guineas governors were to be replaced by regional commanders. A nightly curfew was put in place, and the countrys constitution and National Assembly were both dissolved.
The military junta also refused to issue a timeline for releasing Conde, saying the 83-year-old deposed leader still had access to medical care and his doctors. The West African regional bloc known as ECOWAS, though, called for his immediate release and threatened to impose sanctions if the demand was not met.
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Condes removal by force Sunday came after the president sought a controversial third term in office last year, saying the term limits did not apply to him. While the political opposition and the junta both sought his ouster, it remained unclear Monday how united the two would be going forward.
It also was unknown how much support the junta leader Col. Mamadi Doumbouya had within the larger military. As the commander of the armys special forces unit he directed elite soldiers but it was still possible that others who remained loyal to the ousted president could mount a countercoup in the coming hours or days.
In announcing the coup on state television, Doumbouya cast himself as a patriot of Guinea, which he said had failed to progress economically since gaining independence from France decades earlier. Observers, though say the tensions between Guinea’s president and the army colonel stem from a recent proposal to cut some military salaries.
“We will no longer entrust politics to one man. We will entrust it to the people,” he said, draped in a Guinean flag with about a half dozen other soldiers flanked at his side.
The junta later announced plans to replace Guinea’s governors with regional commanders at a public event Monday and warned: “Any refusal to appear will be considered rebellion.
U. N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres tweeted that he strongly condemned “any takeover of the government by force of the gun. ”
On Sunday morning, heavy gunfire broke out near the presidential palace and went on for hours, sparking fears in a nation that already has seen multiple coups and presidential assassination attempts. The Defense Ministry initially claimed that the attack had been repelled by security forces, but uncertainty grew when there was no subsequent sign of Conde on state television or radio.

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