Tense Electoral Climate in Guinea as President Goes for a Third Term

Presidential candidate, incumbent Alpha Conde, has put his hat into the ring for the third time as Guinea’s 5.4 million voter population has been invited to cast ballots today. There are 12 candidates in the line-up, including two women, yet voting is likely to be marred by apathy and unrest as the opposition has vehemently opposed Conde’s third term bid.  Meanwhile, Guinea’s mining sector, home to over 25% of the world’s bauxite and boasting significant iron ore reserves, has already been negatively impacted by the global pandemic, and will continue to be, in the face of political uncertainty and heightened insecurity.

Significance: A decade ago, 82 year old Conde, a Malinke from the Rally of the Guinean People (RPG)was hailed as Guinea’s first democratically-elected president. Yet his posture in 2020 is one of defiance, as he oversaw a revised constitution in March, enabling him to contest for a third term. Though the referendum was boycotted uniformly by the opposition, presently, the opposition cuts a less united figure, with 11 other candidates vying for the presidency. Main opposition candidate and ex PM, Cellou Dalein Diallo, a Peul from the Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea (UFDG),is unperturbed, vowing to stop the president’s third term bid at any cost. This type of inflammatory language has raised concern, with the UN high commissioner for human rights, Michelle Bachelet calling it “dangerous rhetoric …given the history of intercommunal violence in Guinea[1]”. Indeed, over the past year, Human Rights Watch details that 92 people have been killed by the security forces in their protest of Conde’s third term bid.

Conclusion: Guinea’s electoral past has set an uncomfortable precedent for poll-related unrest and ethnically-charged violence. The opposition will invariably challenge a Conde victory, which will likely translate into street justice rather than the opposition seeking redress through the courts. As one of the leading bauxite producers in the world, Guinea’s mining industry is a prime target for oppositionists in creating supply chain disruption. Mining hubs of Boke and Kamsar for instance, have been negatively affected in the past, with road barricades preventing shipments of bauxite out of Conakry. Any interruption to the government’s main export earner, would hit the economy hard, at a time when mining production has already contracted 5% this year[2], on the back of weaker Chinese demand in the midst of Covid. 

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[1]https://reliefweb.int/report/guinea/hate-speech-ahead-guinea-elections-must-be-curbed-and-condemned-bachelet-and-patten

[2]https://www.imf.org/en/Countries/GIN