Guinea coup leaders should get out, says Museveni

President Yoweri Museveni has condemned the coup d’état that happened in Guinea on Sunday, describing it as “a step backwards”.  He said the coup leaders should face sanctions and “get out”.

“That’s unfortunate and it is a step backwards. Those military coups are of low value, we had them in the 1960s, and they were part of Africa’s problems. I condemn the coup, I don’t accept the idea of coups, they are not a solution,” he said in an interview with France 24’s Marc Perelman on Wednesday.

“They should get out, they should be told to go away because they are not a solution to problems of the country,” Mr Museveni added.

The 83-year-old Alpha Conde was deposed following intense gunfire in parts of Guinea’s capital Conakry on Sunday.

Turmoil engulfed the impoverished West African nation of Guinea again as army putschists captured the president.

A former opposition leader himself who was at one point imprisoned and sentenced to death, Conde became Guinea’s first democratically-elected leader in 2010 and won re-election in 2015.

Conde won the controversial third term in that poll held in October 2020, but only after pushing through a new constitution in March 2020 that allowed him to sidestep the country’s two-term limit.

Dozens of people were killed during demonstrations against a third term for the president, often in clashes with security forces.

He was among the presidents that witnessed the swearing-in ceremony of President Museveni on May 12, as he extended his rule to four decades.

Meanwhile, in the same interview with France 24, Museveni blamed the Rwandan leader Paul Kagame for shutting the border between the two countries two years ago and denied claims by Kagame that he was acting like the master of the region.

Rwanda reportedly wiretapped conversations of top Ugandan officials, according to revelations in the global reporting investigations, the Pegasus Project, published by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).

Among the Ugandans on the [wiretapping] list are; long-time senior Cabinet member Sam Kutesa, former [Chief of Defence] Forces General David Muhoozi, senior intelligence officer Joseph Ocwet, former Prime Minister Dr Ruhakana Rugunda, and leading opposition figure Fred Nyanzi Ssentamu among others.

“It is a waste of time. Spying on us to do what? If I have secrets you will not know, because the secrets are in my head. They are not on the microphone,” Mr Museveni remarked.

Mr Museveni also announced that the probe into the killings of more than 50 Ugandans during the last presidential campaign in November 2020 would be made public and promised that those responsible would be prosecuted.