Conflict and Security Analyst, Colonel Festus Aboagye (Rtd) has expressed discontentment with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) proposed military intervention to restore democracy in Niger.

According to him, the best approach to reinstate the democratically elected but ousted President Mohamed Bazoum is through diplomacy.

Speaking on JoyNews’ Newsfile on Saturday, August 19, he explained that ECOWAS' intention to deploy military troops in Niger will instead worsen the case.

“So the best course of approach currently is to use diplomacy then after the dust has settled, .. sit down, bring your policy practitioners, your experts and politicians, your diplomas together and then find a reason why there is a resurgence of coups and similarly, why the civilian's tendency towards third terms and constitutionally re-engineering is also on the increase.”

Col Aboagye emphasised that ECOWAS has protocols outlined in their book which they used to restore peace when the issue of coup d'état comes up.

He asserted that ECOWAS' intention to deploy military troops to resolve the crises in Niger is not stated in the book.

“There is a playbook for ECOWAS. The ECOWAS playbook is that when you have situations like Niger, which had applied previously in the instances of coups, first of all, you suspend, secondly you sanction, thirdly you engage constructively and in the ECOWAS book – I’m asking anybody who wants to read to go and ready the ECOWAS treaty, revise treaty 1993 …..intervention is not mentioned anywhere."

However, the Conflict and Security Analyst maintained that there is a provision that "in law, we call the omnibus clause which says that - and any other operation that from time to time, the mediation and the security council can or will mandate."

He maintained that ECOWAS should not hide behind the clause and use military intervention to restore democracy in Niger.

"In all of these protocols, we talk about enforcement of sanctions, that is not what we are going to do in Niger, we talk about peace-building ie we’re doing a national peace council using chiefs and so on is not cohesive. So why are we going to use force, interventions?” he said.

Meanwhile, the Economic Community of West African States has said that the proposed deployment of the military to restore democracy in Niger will be considered if all options fail.

ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs, Peace and Security, Abdel-Fatau Musah said that the intent is not to declare war on Niger.

Abdel-Fatau Musah acknowledged that the ECOWAS mission may undertake renewed talks in Niger to seek a peaceful resolution on Saturday, August 19.

He said ECOWAS is ready to engage with the junta.