MAURITANIA: Another President Booted out

Aug 7th 2008 DAKAR, From The Economist print edition
Why the world likes this coup less than the last one

WHILE the rest of Africa seems to be slowly ridding itself of its penchant for coups, Mauritania seems to be perfecting its ability to stage them. Such is the country’s current strike rate that the last two successful coups on the continent have both taken place in this Islamic republic, a vast, sandy country that sees itself as part of both the black and Arab parts of Africa. The latest victim is President Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, who was arrested by his presidential guard and relieved of his duties on August 6th. Not a shot was fired and the news was spread mostly by the president’s distraught daughter, who telephoned journalists as dissidents occupied their house and whisked her father away.According to script, state television and radio went off air, except to declare Mr Abdallahi a “former” president and to reinstate the senior army officers whose sacking had been announced earlier that morning. The coup was led by Mohamed Ould Abdelaziz, the head of the presidential guard and one of the officers Mr Abdallahi had tried to fire. Even before the military dismissals, politics in Mauritania had been in a rotten state. In the space of three months one government had been sacked and another forced to resign. Complaints have ranged from poor management of rising food prices to the lack of transparency over the first lady’s finances. The army was believed to have instigated a mass resignation of the president’s supporters in parliament earlier this week.