Niger Falls Back off Track

IN 2001, SCHOLARS IDENTIFIED A PROMISING democratic transition in the Republic of Niger, following a coup d'état in 1999. Elites were 'righting their political ship and getting their economy in order'. Political liberties were 'generally assured'. However, Niger's political trajectory has dashed these expectations. Elected in 2001, Nigerien president Mamadou Tandja would go on to provoke a constitutional crisis in 2009 and a military coup that unseated him in 2010. That coup was the third since Niger's transition to multiparty democracy in 1991. Tandja's successor, Mahamadou Issoufou, took office in 2011. Initially he enjoyed a strong democratic mandate but later used the war on terror in the greater Sahara...