BAMAKO: West African envoys held talks with Mali’s military junta on Saturday to try to push for a speedy return to civilian rule after a coup in the troubled nation.

The delegation, headed by former Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan, held talks for half an hour with soldiers who seized power on Tuesday, including new strongman colonel Assimi Goita, a journalist said.

The envoys from the the regional ECOWAS bloc also hope to meet ousted president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who is being detained by the junta at a military camp outside Bamako.

Rebel soldiers seized Keita and other leaders after a mutiny on Tuesday, dealing another deep blow to a country already struggling with a brutal Islamist insurgency and widespread public discontent over its government.

Mali’s neighbours have called for Keita to be reinstated, saying the purpose of the delegation’s visit was to help “ensure the immediate return of constitutional order”.

“ECOWAS appreciates what is happening in Mali and ECOWAS wants the best for the country,” Jonathan said after his arrival.

“We’re going to discuss with all stakeholders and I think at the end of the day we’ll come out with something that is good for the country, good for ECOWAS and good for the international community.” A delegation official said they would meet Keita, who is being held with prime minister Boubou Cisse in Kati, a military base northwest of Bamako where the coup was unleashed.

Adding to the international pressure, the United States on Friday suspended military aid to Mali, with no further training or support of the Mali armed forces.

But thousands of jubilant Malians took to the streets of Bamako on Friday to celebrate the toppling of Keita, who was reelected in 2018 but became the focus of widespread discontent.

The crowds gathered in Bamako’s central square draped in the national flag and blasting on vuvuzela horns.

The rally, originally organised as an anti-Keita protest by a loose coalition that has led months of mass rallies against him, was recast to “celebrate the victory of the Malian people”. “I am overjoyed! We won,” said Mariam Cisse, 38.

Speaking at the rally Ismael Wague, spokesman for the junta which calls itself the National Committee for the Salvation of the People, paid tribute to the public.

“We merely completed the work that you began and we recognise ourselves in your fight,” he said.

The junta has said it welcomes the ECOWAS visit but has not talked of restoring Keita to power.

“A transitional council, with a transitional president who is going to be either military or civilian” would be appointed, Wague told France 24 television on Thursday.

Keita won election in a landslide in 2013, presenting himself as a unifying figure in a fractured country, and was re-elected in 2018 for another five-year term.

But he failed to make headway against the jihadist revolt that has left swathes of the country in the hands of armed Islamists and ignited ethnic violence in the country’s volatile centre.

Thousands of UN and French troops, along with soldiers from five Sahel countries, have been deployed to try to stem the bloodshed.

In a sign of the continuing challenge facing the country, four soldiers were killed Saturday by an explosive device in the centre of the country.

The ECOWAS visit to Mali comes after the UN’s peacekeeping mission in the country said a human rights team had gained access to the ousted president and other detainees on Thursday.

Published in Dawn, August 23rd, 2020