Supporters of Guinea Bissau’s ruling PAIGC party rallied on Saturday to pressure President Jose Mario Vaz to name their party leader Domingos Simoes Pereira as prime minister after an election win in March. Led by Pereira, over a thousand party supporters rallied, marching from a suburb of the capital Bissau to the port area two kilometres away. They carried placards and shouted slogans against the president, who has not reinstated his estranged ally. The new parliament has been sitting since April 18 but President Vaz, who is himself nearing the end of his mandate, suggested recently that he wasn’t ready to nominate Pereira as prime minister, calling on citizens “to discuss, debate their problems”. Wedged between Senegal and Guinea on Africa’s west coast, Guinea-Bissau is notorious for volatility.

Source: Punch May 25, 2019 16:52 UTC