(FILES) Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embalo conducts a press conference during his state visit to South Africa at the Union Buildings in Pretoria on April 28, 2022. - Guinea-Bissau's President Umaro Sissoco Embalo on December 2, 2023 said deadly violence involving members of the National Guard was an "attempted coup" as the army ordered them back to barracks. (Photo by Phill Magakoe / AFP)
The president of Guinea-Bissau issued a decree on Monday dissolving the parliament after an attempted coup in the West African nation.
Violence had erupted between members of the national guard and special forces of the presidential guard on Thursday night in the capital Bissau, leaving two people dead before the army ordered its forces back to barracks.
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President Umaro Sissoco Embalo, who was in Dubai attending the COP28 climate conference, arrived back in Bissau on Saturday and announced that an “attempted coup d’etat” had prevented him from returning earlier.
On Monday, he said there had been “complicity” between the national guard and “certain political interests within the State apparatus”.
That meant “the normal functioning of the institutions of the Republic has become impossible,” he added.
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“The date of forthcoming legislative elections will be set at the opportune moment, in line with the constitution,” Embalo said in a communique.
Since gaining independence from Portugal in 1974, the country has seen a series of coups and coup attempts.
Elected to a five-year term in December 2019, Embalo survived a bid to overthrow him in February 2022.
© Agence France-Presse
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