The lawyers of Niger’s President Mohamed Bazoum overthrown on July 26 by a coup d’état on Friday rejected the “fabricated accusations” by the ruling military concerning his attempted escape, affirming that he was “held incommunicado “. Thursday evening, the military regime claimed that Mohamed Bazoum had “tried to escape” with his family and other people, by wanting to borrow “helicopters belonging to a foreign power” on the outskirts of Niamey heading to Nigeria. He specified that this attempt had failed and that “the main perpetrators and some of their accomplices” had been arrested.
“We energetically reject these trumped-up accusations against President Bazoum,” Mohamed Seydou Diagne, coordinator of a group of lawyers for the ousted president, said in a statement. Me Seydou Diagne also affirmed that on Friday morning, “the doctor was refused access even though he was bringing food to the family”. “With this incommunicado detention, it is a new red line which has been crossed by a junta which continues to violate the fundamental rights of our client. She will have to answer for her actions,” he said.
No news for two days
Mohamed Bazoum had until now been sequestered by soldiers in his presidential residence in Niamey since the July coup. According to Me Diagne, Mohamed Bazoum’s entourage has not heard from him “since the night of Wednesday to Thursday”. “Not only must the military authorities provide us with proof that President Bazoum and his family are alive, but above all they must release them immediately,” says another lawyer for the collective, Reed Brody.
Furthermore, the press release indicates that “the Nigerien lawyers of Salem Bazoum (the son of the deposed president, editor’s note) had obtained from a judge in Niamey” that he “be released”. On Thursday, “they had received the order allowing them to notify Niger State so that the decision could be implemented”. On September 18, Mohamed Bazoum took legal action in West Africa to request his release and the restoration of constitutional order in Niger.