Under the sun of Doumbouya as yesterday in the time of President Touré, we are certain that at the Presidential Palace we live with a heavy sword of Damocles above our heads as long as we do not change our system of governance based on hatred of others, the repression of our own in blood and the disrespect of our prior commitment to replace the power of arms with the power of dialogue and the ballot box.
We said No to General de Gaulle in 1958, then No to one mandate too many in 2021. Our fellow citizens believed in our good faith. They applauded. In return, instead of meeting their expectations, we chose a system that plays on their fears in order to try to stifle the legitimate demands of any fellow citizen opposed to our way of managing our country. This favorite sport must be stopped. This despicable system of systematic repression of any voice and any protest movement that we recycle with each advent of a new head of state must be banned.
If yesterday, we killed our people in the dungeon and on the gallows, buried the lifeless bodies of our compatriots in mass graves; perpetuated the crime on July 4, 1985, assassinated hope by killing protesters with bare hands and raping hundreds of girls and women, made hundreds of our people disappear on September 28, 2009; organized elections in 2010 by shedding blood for the benefit of the power of manipulation instead of the triumph of the truth of the ballot boxes; now, let us say “never again”!
By Alpha Abdoulaye Diallo, in Le Populaire
