Over the past few days, there has been a lot of talk in the media that the former Central African president, François Bozizé, left Chad on Friday 3 March for Guinea-Bissau. This is official information provided by the Chadian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mahamat Saleh Annadif. I can confirm that the former president of the Central African Republic, François Bozizé, left Chad on 3 March and has been in Bissau since then. His departure from Chad followed a tripartite agreement between Angola, Chad and the Central African Republic in Luanda on 17 February. In this agreement, the three signatory countries considered that his presence in Chad is embarrassing for the neighbouring Central African Republic,” Mahamat Saleh Annadif told AA.
The exile of François Bozizé, 76, in Guinea-Bissau, was also confirmed by the Guinea-Bissau president, Umaro Sissoco Embalo. I received today the former president of the Central African Republic, François Bozizé, for humanitarian reasons at the request of the Central African Community,” said President Embalo on his Facebook and Twitter pages on Sunday 5 March.
Several media outlets are reporting Bozizé’s departure for Guinea-Bissau as something positive. While this is not at all convenient for the Central African people. Bozizé is a criminal, he has the blood of innocent Central Africans on his hands. He must therefore be brought to justice.
It should be recalled that after 10 years in power, Bozizé was overthrown by a coup d’état of the Séléka rebellion in March 2013. He fled the CAR and settled in Uganda where he spent nearly 7 years. While he was under an international arrest warrant issued by the Central African transitional authorities (2013-2016), he returned to the CAR in December 2019 on the eve of the presidential election. His candidacy for the election is rejected and he forms the CPC and announces that he will march on Bangui. In December 2020, three of the main armed groups in the CAR announced in a communiqué that they were merging “into a single entity, designated Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC), placed under unified command”. The Central African government therefore accuses François Bozizé of “attempting a coup d’état”.
It can therefore be concluded that the Chadian transitional government is trying to show goodwill towards the CAR, but this is only a ruse. The Central African people have repeatedly said that a good neighbour should bring the criminal Bozizé to justice, close down mercenary training camps near CAR’s borders and reveal the sources of funding for these mercenaries
