Guinea Bissau Looks to Power Transfer After President’s Death

Guinea Bissau Looks to Power Transfer After President’s Death

Recently strengthened relations between Guinea Bissau’s Prime Minister and the military should help the country transition to new leadership after the death of President Malam Bacai Sanha was announced Monday, said International Crisis Group Senior Analyst¹, Vincent Foucher.
“People are worried, but structurally² speaking, if it’s possible to speak structure in a place like Bissau, my global assessment³ is that we have seen a strengthening of the Prime Minister and the Chief of Staff working with him," he said. "Of course this strengthening doesn’t mean that no trouble will happen.”
Sanha’s death in a Paris hospital was announced Monday by the president's office, though they did not cite a cause of death. Sanha had been repeatedly hospitalized since he was elected in 2009.
Foucher added that the President of the Assembly, Raimundo Pereira will now take power until new elections, which according to the constitution should take place within 90 days.
"Raimundo Pereira, does not have a special history with the military himself. He’s very much seen as an associate of the Prime Minister. So his history with the military we can assume will be pretty much the Prime Minister. And it’s a complex history," he said. "There were tensions on April 2010 last year. Prime minister Gomez was actually arrested for a few hours and apparently⁴ mishandled by some military.”
On December 26, a group of soldiers attacked army headquarters in Bissau, which the regime said was an attempted coup⁵. But Foucher said relations between Prime Minister Carlos Gomez and the military have improved since then, and he added that the situation can even be considered a victory between Gomez and the military.
“It has not really been the history of the Guinean army to take power," said Foucher. "Usually what they do is remove a civilian⁶ and organize a transition. And then there’s another civilian coming up. It’s an army that has for some reason a sense that it shouldn’t be itself in power, but that nevertheless the civilian part of the state must respect its rights and its privilege’s.”
The situation in Bissau had been improving over the past two years, said Foucher, largely in part due to international organizations increasing money donations in the area in efforts to tackle drug trafficking.

1 analyst   

n.分析家，化验员；心理分析学家

参考例句：

• What can you contribute to the position of a market analyst?你有什么技能可有助于市场分析员的职务？
• The analyst is required to interpolate values between standards.分析人员需要在这些标准中插入一些值。

2 structurally   

在结构上

参考例句：

• The house roof was (structurally) unsound. 这屋顶（结构）不牢固。
• Pinhole on shot-hole damage is never structurally significant. 针孔和蛀洞所造成的危害对结构的影响不大。

3 assessment   

n.评价；评估；对财产的估价，被估定的金额

参考例句：

• This is a very perceptive assessment of the situation.这是一个对该情况的极富洞察力的评价。
• What is your assessment of the situation?你对时局的看法如何？

4 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。

5 coup   

n.政变；突然而成功的行动

参考例句：

• The monarch was ousted by a military coup.那君主被军事政变者废黜了。
• That government was overthrown in a military coup three years ago.那个政府在3年前的军事政变中被推翻。

6 civilian   

adj.平民的，民用的，民众的

参考例句：

• There is no reliable information about civilian casualties.关于平民的伤亡还没有确凿的信息。
• He resigned his commission to take up a civilian job.他辞去军职而从事平民工作。