The torch is burning between Guinea’s President Alpha Condé and his Senegalese counterpart Macky Sall. The head of the Guinean government is angry with his Senegal neighbour. This Sunday, March 28, 2021, on the sidelines of a visit to an agricultural field in the rural commune in the sub-prefecture of Tormelin, located in the region of Boké in the west of Guinea, Alpha Condé has frontal accused Senegal of serving as a back ground for opponents plotting against its regime. Everyone knows, all those who insult us, all those cries of Guinea will burn, everything is done in Dakar.”, says the Guinean president in sub-sub, local language.
The relationship between Alpha Condé and Macky Sall is not on the path to reconciliation.Indeed, the Guinean head of state is convinced that his Senegalese counterpart did not want the last presidential election to be held in Guinea on 18 October 2020. Worse still, according to Alpha Condé, he wanted the country to sink into chaos. Several people said not to do this election [the last presidential]. How did I know that there was treachery behind it? […] They said that Guinea would burn but Guinea did not burn. Here we are today, the country is at peace,” he said with a smile.
“As God does not sleep, those who wanted Guinea to burn, we all see what is happening at home. This means that God does not sleep.” , he said, referring to the demonstrations that broke out in Senegal following the arrest of Ousmane Sonko, the leader of Pastef-Les Patriotes.
However, Alpha Condé promises better tomorrow to the Guinean people despite the difficult global context. For him, Guinea will soon be among the most powerful countries in Africa, even if, according to him, it will not please his neighbours. I am sure that when Guinea begins to move forward, as I said in the newspaper Jeune Afrique, only Nigeria will be ahead of us in West Africa in a few years. Many of our neighbours don’t like it. They want Guinea to always stay behind, but we will move forward.” , he said to the people of the rural commune of Tormelin.
These words speak volumes about the tense relations between the two heads of state. Moreover, the border between these two countries has been closed since the last presidential election in October 2020 “for security reasons”. Macky Sall did not hide his attachment and support to the Guinean opponent Cellou Dalein Diallo, which no doubt explains the difficult relationship between the two presidents.
Alpha Condé, 82 years old, was re-elected for a third consecutive term as head of Guinea with 59.5% of the vote, according to the official results of the electoral commission published on Saturday 24 October 2020.
