Guinea Bissau: President Dismisses the Government
By NewsfromAfrica
Guinea Bissau's President Jose Mario Vaz has dismissed the government following disagreements with Prime Minister Domingo Pereira, the Portuguese news agency Lusa reported on Thursday.
The two men are said to have disagreed on a number of issues including the use of aid money and the return to Guinea-Bissau of a former army chief of staff.
President Mario late Wednesday accused the government of corruption, nepotism and obstruction of justice. He dismissed Prime Minister Domingos Pereira and his cabinet with immediate effect, saying a reshuffle is not enough to resolve the crisis.
It wasn't clear when the cabinet would be replaced and there was no immediate reaction from the ruling party.
In a televised address, Mr Vaz said a simple reshuffle would not be sufficient to solve the problem.
"It is public knowledge that there is a crisis undermining the proper working of institutions," he said.
The UN Security Council has asked the leaders to resume dialogue.
Earlier in the week, Portugal warned that development aid could be at risk if the country slipped back into instability.
The former Portuguese colony in West Africa has undergone nine coups or coup attempts since 1980. None of its democratically elected governments have served a full term since a multi-party system was introduced in 1994.
Donors pledged more than 1.1 billion dollars in aid after Guinea Bissau returned to civilian rule last year following a 2012 coup.
An economist, Vaz was elected in April 2014, after serving as finance minister from 2009 until the coup in 2012 and fleeing to Portugal, only to return and spend three days under house arrest in February 2013. He received 40.9 percent of the vote in the dozen-candidate first round and 61.9 percent in the runoff, soundly beating the military-backed Nuno Gomes Nabiam to take office in June 2014.
The political scientist Pereira had served since July 2014, taking office as the elected leader of the center-left African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde. The two men were the country's first leaders when it returned to civilian rule last summer after two years under military control.