Gambia: Yahya Jammeh Snubs Second Deadline as Crisis Persists

 

The deadline for defeated President Yahya Jammeh of The Gambia to quit or forced out by UN-backed forces has expired with no news.

 

The earlier deadline of noon passed as the Guinean and Mauritanian presidents arrived in Banjul for last-ditch talks. There has been no statement from them.

 

Mr Jammeh’s elected successor, Adama Barrow, was sworn in as president at a ceremony in Senegal on Thursday. Troops acting in support of President Barrow have paused their advance.

 

The forces from the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) regional grouping are backed by the United Nations. They crossed into The Gambia from Senegal on Thursday but have been told not to advance further until the talks have finished. Mr Barrow’s legitimacy as president has been recognised internationally, after he won last month’s elections.

 

Mr Jammeh remains at the state house in The Gambia’s capital, where soldiers are calm, the BBC reports. The head of the Gambian army, Gen Ousman Badjie, said that he now recognises Mr Barrow as commander-in-chief.

 

Guinea’s President Alpha Conde and Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz arrived in Banjul on Friday morning for the talks with Mr Jammeh. The chairman of the Ecowas commission, Marcel Alain de Souza, said that if the meeting with Mr Conde proved unsuccessful, military action would follow.

 

With talks still ongoing between Yahya Jammeh and the visiting presidents of Guinea and Mauritania, I have been waiting at State House, the seat of the presidency.

 

-NAN