Guinea-Bissau’s president says this week’s clashes ‘attempted coup’

By James Tasamba

KIGALI, Rwanda (AA) - Guinea-Bissau’s President Umaro Sissoco Embalo Saturday described this week’s clashes between army factions as an “attempted coup" that will have serious consequences.

The National Guard exchanged gunfire with special forces soldiers early Friday near military camps south of the national capital of Bissau, while Embalo was in Dubai attending a UN climate conference.

“This is an attempted coup d'état and there will be serious consequences for all those involved,” Embalo told reporters in Bissau after he returned to the country.

“I was in Dubai where I took part in COP28. I couldn't return because of the coup attempt.”

The gunfire exchange occurred after National Guard soldiers freed Finance Minister Sulemaine Seide and the Secretary of State for the Treasury Antonio Monteiro, who had been held late Thursday for a withdrawal of $10 million from state coffers to offer credit to 11 businessmen.

The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) bloc on Saturday “strongly” condemned the violence and “all attempts to disrupt the constitutional order and rule of law in Guinea-Bissau.”

Guinea-Bissau, the West African state located between Senegal, Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean, has witnessed nearly one dozen coups, coup plots or attempted military rebellions since it gained independence from Portugal in 1974.

Embalo, who was elected in 2019 to a five-year term, survived an attempted coup In February 2022.