MATAM, CONAKRY, FRIDAY: RPG activists looting stores as police stand by and do nothing. Families applaud as sons and daughters emerge with stolen goods. (Photo: aminata.com)
Below are news reports regarding fighting between opposition supporters and Conde’s forces (security services in collaboration with Conde’s RPG activists and others). In a previous post yesterday, Guinea Oye provided information about gendarmes and RPG activists pillaging the homes of Peuls in opposition-supporting neighborhoods. This is the same scenario which the government employed in the march on Wednesday: RPG activists violently provoke opposition supporters and then security forces move in to attack the opposition. Further, there should be every expectation that certain government security forces are dressing plain clothes posing as RPG members because this has happened several times over the last two years.
Also, it should be assumed that the government has unleashed secret Malinke militias, foreign mercenaries, and Donzos (hunters) which are in secret, but permanent residence in military barracks in Conakry, to enter opposition neighborhoods and conduct the most audacious crimes. The burning of merchant stores and stalls in Guinea’s largest marketplace, Madina. is the work of combined Conde forces as most of the merchants are of the Peul ethnicity.
Ever since the 2010 campaign, the government has used state-sponsored terror to prevent the opposition from attaining true parity in the country’s politics. France and the International Organization of the Francophonie collaborated with the interim president Sekouba Konate and Conde forces to steal the election. Many are under the impression that presidential candidate,Cellou Dalein Diallo, conceded the election to Conde. Actually, Diallo agreed not to contest the final vote tally because he had no other choice. A day after the election, Konate called Diallo and told him that Conakry was teeming with militias and bands of mercenaries and that if Diallo tried to push back on the results, Peul/opposition neighborhoods would be turned into a bloodbath. The international community, desperate to end the military junta of Dadis Camara and install a civilian as president to calm the nerves of foreign investors, could not be bothered with issues of gross election fraud nor the violence used by the Konate government to intimidate voters.
Today, the international community, reaps what it sowed.
“We were able to hide here in a courtyard Afia. But I still hear the sound of gunfire and people, “said Abdul Karim Balde, trader Guineenews © joined on the phone around 11am GMT. It is wanting to go to Madina market that our interlocutor said he was surprised with many others, by “fighting” near the bridge Keniyen.
Of “clashes” were also recorded Boussoura, the Casse, in Hamdallaye to Bambeto, reports Abdoulaye Bah Tierno also trader in Madina, we joined around 13h. Tierno Abdoulaye that made the bike ride said they found a sharp voltage at the quarry near Crusher around 10 when he went to Madina. Two houses were destroyed there yesterday …
Taouyah on the road, coming back Kipe, Kaporo, Lambandji, Sonfonia, Guineenews © witnessed the mayhem and débandades. Markets and schools closed, traffic moved against the direction … A holy mess on this axis, hitherto recorded less disturbance than others.
To be continued …
Nouhou Baldé
Conakry, Guinea
Like yesterday, the clashes continue in Conakry suburb, found our reporter on the ground. According to one of our reporters based Matoto, gunshots are heard everywhere in Matoto. The largest market in the capital, Madina, another reporter of your daily mail © Guinéenews found that stores are being burned right now.
These clashes are the demonstrations of the Guinean opposition that requires the departure of the operator responsible for the Waymark getsion the electoral register and vote Guineans abroad in the next elections.
We will return.
From aminata.com
Shops and boutiques pay the broken pot
Posted on March 1, 2013
Stores and shops pay the pot broken the march of February 27, 2013 organized by the Guinean opposition held within the collective ADP and CDR.
It all started two finger Constantin crossroads in the town of Matam, where the inhabitants of the said town are broken shops and stores under the eye of vigilance officers who stumble any word and make a transition to the applause of those hooligans holding various products.
What is deplorable is the applause of different families when their daughters or son arrived with boxes of mayonnaise or their lockers without knowledge of any kind from which these products.
In any case, while we put this item on the net stores and shops continue to be flat by hooligans.
To be continued ….
Oumar M’Böh / Aminata.com
62624545/66369744
Oumarmbo38@yahoo.fr
REUTERS’ article:
[Note regarding the following article by Saliou Samb about today’s violence: Samb has worked for Reuters for a long time. Since the 2010 campaign and election, he has been more of a cheerleader for Alpha Conde, rather than an independent journalist covering him. In the following article, he describes the conflict in Conakry neighborhoods as between “gangs,” which attempts to criminalize the actions of opposition supporters as they exercise their right to defend themselves and their families. Remember that the aggression is committed by Conde forces, which consist of RPG activists, police, gendarmes and most likely militias and mercenaries against opposition youth who have nothing more than rocks in their hands.]
Ethnic Clashes Erupt in Guinea
Saliou Samb
CONAKRY | Fri Mar 1, 2013 8:46am EST
(Reuters) – Rival gangs fought with knives and truncheons in Guinea’s crumbling seaside capital on Friday as ethnic tension worsened before an election in the unstable West African nation, witnesses said.
Security forces in full anti-riot gear piled into the backs of pick-up trucks and deployed across Conakry to separate the fighters as President Alpha Conde’s government appealed for calm.
“It has become very bad. People set fire to a car right in front of me. I’ve seen four people injured in the fighting,” said Souleymane Bah, a resident of Bambeto, one of several areas where clashes were reported.
“We’ve locked ourselves inside a bank. I can see people fighting outside,” resident Abdoulaye Sylla, told Reuters by telephone from Conakry’s Dixxin neighborhood.
Residents in other areas fled in panic as the gangs from rival ethnic groups roamed the streets, according to witnesses.
The long-delayed legislative vote, tentatively set for May, is needed to complete a transition to civilian rule after a 2008 military coup, and could open the door to hundreds of millions of dollars in European aid.
Politics in Guinea are mainly drawn along ethnic lines with the opposition coalition broadly supported by members of the Peul ethnicity – the country’s biggest ethnic group – and the government supported by the Malinke.
The fighting on Friday follows two days of anti-government protests that have sharpened those divisions.
Conde won a 2010 presidential election promising to unite Guinea in the same way Nelson Mandela did after apartheid in South Africa, but many of his compatriots say he has failed.
The opposition called last month for protests against preparations for the parliamentary election, saying the government was seeking to rig the vote in advance.
Two days of violent demonstrations followed in which one civilian was killed and scores of protesters and police were injured.
A government spokesman said on Friday that opposition leaders should call on their supporters to halt the fighting.
“We are going to make a declaration calling for calm. But the opposition leaders need to do the same thing,” said government spokesman Damantang Albert Camara.
Opposition leader and former premier Sidya Toure said Conde’s government had failed in its promise to reconcile Guinea’s longstanding political and ethnic divisions.
“The situation has clearly degenerated into inter-ethnic violence between the Peuls and Malinkes. We’ve already called for calm, but what can you tell someone who is being attacked with a club?” he said.
Conde has promised prosperity for the former French colony’s 10 million people, which is the world’s top supplier of bauxite, the raw material in aluminum.
Guinea’s economy produces only about $1.50 per person per day despite a wealth of natural resources, including the world’s largest untapped iron ore deposit.
(Writing by Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer)
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