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Mediations, information, repression: Faure Gnassingbé's three-band billiard table



At the heart of one of the most serious crises of his regime, the Togolese president oscillates between water and fire. The various attempts at mediation have so far made a flop, because of the suspicions weighing on the diplomats responsible for implementing them. Analysis. Discredit.



From mid-September, Marcel de Souza, the president of the ECOWAS Commission, has vainly multiplied meetings with the various protagonists of the crisis, in Lome. However, the former Beninese minister was in a most uncomfortable position. He was married in second marriage to Naka Gnassingbe, one of Faure Gnassingbe's sisters. Another complication for ECOWAS: the rotating presidency of the regional institution is currently provided by the Togolese President in person for one year.

United Nations Special Representative for West Africa, the Ghanaian Mohamed Ibn Chambas was also challenged by the Togolese opposition. Very close to the Gnassingbé family when he was executive secretary, then president of the ECOWAS Commission (2002-2009), the latter is suspected of being one of the architects of the political compromise that allowed the son of Gnassingbé Eyadéma, died in 2005, to come to power in incredible and bloody conditions the same year. On 29 September, the opposition filed a complaint against the Ghanaian diplomat at the United Nations Ethics Office in New York.
The same suspicion of bias weighs on Aïchatou Mindaoudou, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Niger during the dynastic succession in Togo. From 10 to 13 October, this former UN patron in Côte d'Ivoire was to lead a "political mission" of the International Organization of the Francophonie (OIF) in Lome.

In late October, she still had not set foot in the capital fearing violent reactions from opponents. For several weeks, they have been demanding a return to the 1992 Constitution, which prescribes a two-round election and limits the number of presidential terms to two, the extension of voting rights to Togolese in the diaspora and, no more no less , the resignation of Faure Gnassingbé, who is in his third quinquennium. Plan "com". Taken aback by the magnitude of the protests that have not been empty since August, the head of state has put himself under the protection of his securocrats.

Like the chief of the gendarmerie, Yotrofei Massina, most of them are Kabyés de Kara (North), native fief of Gnassingbé (LC No. 761). Bunkérisé in his palace of Lomé II, the Togolese president also relies on three personalities to distill the "good word" both outside and inside the country. His special adviser since May, lawyer Pacôme Adjourouvi, close to the former French Prime Minister Manuel Valls (LC No. 752), multiplies the public interventions and in the media. Ewé de Noépé (South), Adjourouvi joined, by the way, his colleagues Alexis Coffi Aquereburu and Martial Akakpo to defend the Togolese public companies.

Former Minister of Justice and spokesman for the government of Thomas Boni Yayi, Benin Reckya Madougou, 43, also joined the presidential cabinet in mid-May. Friend of Faure Gnassingbe, this multicart advisor also deals with presidential communication.

Third man of confidence at present: Simfeitcheou Pre. Kabyé of Pagouda near Kara, the latter is one of the most frequent evening visitors of the head of state although he is the chief of staff of the head of the government, Sélom Komi Klassou. Ex-minister of Eyadema-father's plan, this son of a powerful traditional leader of Pagouda watches over the strength of the networks of the head of state in the north of the country.


THE LETTER OF THE CONTINENT N ° 763 of this 25th of October 2017

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