Fulfill Promises Of Transition To Democratic Government, Guinean Junta Leader Appoints Civilian Prime Minister

JAKARTA - Guinea's military junta on Wednesday appointed Mohamed Beavogui, a former civil servant and agricultural finance expert, as prime minister to lead a promised transition back to democratic rule following a coup in September.

Beavogui is the nephew of Diallo Telli, a prominent Guinean diplomat who served as the first secretary general of the Organization of African Unity, the forerunner of the African Union, and was assassinated by the dictatorial regime of Sekou Touré in 1977 .

As prime minister, Beavogui, whose candidacy was announced in a decree read out on national television, will oversee a transition whose exact contours have yet to be determined.

Colonel Mamadi Doumbouya, the leader of the September 5 coup against President Alpha Conde, was sworn in as interim president last Friday. He promised to hold free and transparent elections but did not say when.

"According to the charter of the transitional government, Doumbouya will become president, with a government consisting of a civilian prime minister and a cabinet, no one should be a candidate in the election," a junta spokesman told state broadcasters last month.

The coup against Conde in Guinea is the fourth in West and Central Africa since last year, following two coups in Mali and one in Chad. He angered his opponents by changing the constitution to allow himself to run for a third term.

West African countries, concerned about the effects of contagion across the region, last month agreed to impose sanctions on junta members and their relatives.

To note, in the 1980s Beavogui worked as a civil servant and at the Compagnie des Bauxites de Guinee (CBG), one of the country's leading bauxite producers. Guinea has the largest aluminum ore reserves in the world.

He later worked for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization and, more recently, as director general of African Risk Capacity, an African Union agency that helps governments plan for natural disasters.