Niger has suspended all cooperation with the international organisation of Francophone nations (OIF), its military leaders said, as it progressively severs ties with former colonial ruler France.
A spokesman for the country’s military junta said on national television late on December 31 that the 88-member body defending the French language “has always been used by France as an instrument to defend French interests”.
The OIF had already suspended most cooperation with Niger the previous week because of the coup, but said it would maintain those programmes “directly benefiting civilian populations, and those contributing to the restoration of democracy”.
The organisation’s stated mission is to promote the French language, support peace and democracy, and encourage education and development in Francophone countries around the world, many of which are former French colonies.
This decision by the Nigerièn government fits in with a growing pattern across the three military-led states in the Sahel to reassert national sovereignty. Mali’s new Constitution has elevated the use of local languages for official transactions over the French language and this appears to be direction of the leaderships in Niger and Burkina Faso as well.
“The government of Niger calls on the African people to decolonise their minds and promote their own national languages in accordance with the ideas of the founding fathers of Pan-Africanism,” said the junta’s statement.
In a separate statement relating to the demands by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) for a short transition back to democratic rule, the junta spokesman said that it had not yet decided how long it would hold on to power, but that the length of the transition would be determined after an inclusive national dialogue. It did not say when the dialogue would take place.
