Niger: Ousted President Bazoum plans legal battle against coup plotters
Lawyers representing Niger’s ousted president have said that they will file a legal lawsuit in the West African country against individuals responsible for the coup that removed the democratically elected leader.
In a statement, the lawyers for Mohamed Bazoum, who was detained after being ousted on July 26, said they would petition the UN Human Rights Council.
The complaint is aimed at new strongman General Abdourahamane Tiani and “all others.”
It constitutes a civil action and alleges “attack and conspiracy against state authority, crimes and offenses committed by civil servants and arbitrary arrests and confinements.”
According to one of the lawyers, the case is expected to be lodged in the next few days with a court in the capital Niamey.
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The lawyers also said they were appealing to two bodies of the UN Human Rights Council including its working group on arbitrary detention.
Inchauspe said the coup was “an infringement on the dignity of the Nigerien state” and reaffirmed the “absolute necessity” to restore the rule of law.
According to his Senegalese lawyer, Seydou Diagne, the ousted President filed a case with an Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) court on September 18.
He has been imprisoned at his home since the coup.
On August 13, the coup leaders announced that they would charge Bazoum with “high treason.“