Hundreds turn out for a pro-coup march in the capital of Niger

AFP journalists reported that hundreds of supporters of the Niger coup came out for a large demonstration in the country’s capital, Niamey, on Thursday. Some of them were waving enormous Russian flags.

On the day of the nation’s 1960 independence from France, the demonstrators gathered at Independence Square in the city center in response to a demand made by a coalition of civil society organisations.

One of the protesters, Issiaka Hamadou, declared that “only security interests us,” regardless of whether assistance comes from “Russia, China, Turkey, if they want to help us.”

“We just don’t want the French, who have been looting us since 1960 – they’ve been there ever since and nothing has changed,” he said.

France has some 1,500 troops in Niger in a bid to fight against jihadism in the Sahel.

“I have no job after studying in this country, because of the regime (of Bazoum), which is supported by France,” said one student who only gave his first name Oumar. “All that has to go!”

Alarms about a jihadist insurgency that began in northern Mali in 2012, spread to Niger and Burkina Faso three years later, and now threatens the frontiers of vulnerable states on the Gulf of Guinea have been raised by the coup in Western nations that are trying to control it.

Supporters of the Nigerunta claim that Russia would be a better partner and that France has failed to protect them from the terrorists.