Lawyers for Niger’s deposed president, Mohamed Bazoum, have called for his immediate release three years after he was toppled and detained by the military.

Elected in 2021, the 66-year-old has been held along with his wife, Hadiza, in a wing of the presidential palace in Niamey since the July 2023 coup.

The international collective of lawyers says Bazoum is being arbitrarily detained.

“They have never been brought before a magistrate and have not been informed of the existence of any proceedings against them,” said West African lawyers and U.S. human rights attorney Reed Brody.

They say the couple has never been brought before a magistrate and have not been informed of the existence of any proceedings against them.

Months after the coup, the military leaders led by General Abdourahamane Tchiani said it intended putting Bazoum on trial.” plotting against the security and authority of the state” but to date, no case has been publicly opened.

In addition, the lawyers say Bazoum and his wife have been allowed almost no contact with the outside world, with no visits from family in the past three years.

The European Union, United Nations experts, and several international leaders have also called for his release.

Bazoum has refused to resign though his term in office formally ended in April this year.
Meanwhile, three years after Niger’s military coup, insecurity has worsened and civic freedoms have been sharply restricted, despite strong economic growth driven by oil, according to former Nigerien ambassador Kiari Liman-Tinguiri.

President Mohamed Bazoum was overthrown on 26 July 2023 and remains detained in Niamey with his wife. Niger has since been governed by the National Council for the Safeguarding of the Fatherland, led by General Abdourahamane Tchiani.

Tchiani was formally sworn in last year as president for a renewable five-year term, while political parties have been dissolved and the authorities have tightened their control over the media and civil society.

Liman-Tinguiri, an economist who served as Niger’s ambassador to the U.S. under Bazoum, said the military had initially justified its takeover by citing insecurity and poor governance.

Three years later, he argued, the situation had deteriorated.

“Unfortunately, the reality is that the situation has undeniably worsened compared with 2023,” he told RFI.

Latest Niamey airport attack tests Niger junta as terror groups ‘adapt’

Citing publicly available data from the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data project, known as ACLED, Liman-Tinguiri pointed to increases in security incidents, deaths and attacks against Niger’s armed forces.

Jihadist violence has also spread geographically, he said.

“There has been a rise in the number of security incidents, fatalities and attacks against the armed forces,” he said. “There has also been a geographical spread of jihadist violence.”

Niger has faced repeated attacks by armed groups linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State, particularly near its borders with Mali and Burkina Faso.

The three military-led countries have strengthened their security ties through the Alliance of Sahel States, after withdrawing from the Economic Community of West African States, Ecowas.

But Liman-Tinguiri said Niger’s western Tillabéri region had become the area worst affected by militant violence in the central Sahel.

“That is where the highest number of deaths has occurred,” he said. “No other region, neither in Mali nor in Burkina Faso, has seen anything like this.”