GUINEA BISSAU SECURITY SECTOR REFORM

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 DAKAR 001188

SIPDIS

PARIS FOR POL D'ELIA AND DEA HOUSTON
LAGOS FOR DEA

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/06/2018
TAGS: PGOV PREL PU
SUBJECT: GUINEA BISSAU SECURITY SECTOR REFORM


1. (C) SUMMARY. An 25-26 August familiarization visit by
the State Department AF/W desk officer to Bissau revealed in
interviews defiance, optimism and some worry about the 16
November legislative elections, fighting drug trafficking and
the influence of traffickers on national politics.
Subsequent developments, notably the political parties'
submission of candidate lists by the 16 September deadline,
and Batista Tagme Na Wae,s declaration that as long as he is
the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff there will be no
coup d,etat in Guinea-Bissau, confirm this course of events.
Most sources interviewed thought the elections would proceed
on that day despite severe underfunding. The three chief
figures in the fight against cocaine smuggling through Bissau
waterways and airports, the Minister of Justice, the Attorney
General and the chief of the Judicial Police, betrayed no
sign of being intimidated by the traffickers and their local
confederates, or of giving up the fight. The Attorney
General sees no connecting for the moment at least between
drug trafficking and terrorism in his country. Escorting
Dakar Emboff conveyed Ambassador,s strong support for their
efforts. END SUMMARY.

NOVEMBER LEGISLATIVE ELECTIONS: FULL SPEED AHEAD NO MATTER
WHAT?
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2. (C) The talk of Bissau, at least among the
intelligentsia, is currently the legislative elections that
were supposed to have been held in March 2008 but which were
unconstitutionally postponed until November 2008. The
capital has been swirling with speculation, fear of drug
money influence and appeals for international help to
minimize this influence. Carlos Gomes Jr. (&Cadogo Jr.8),
leader of the African Party for the Independence of Guinea
and Cape Verde (PAIGC),which emerged from a June party
congress in strong alliance with the Guinea-Bissau President
Joao Bernardo &Nino8 Vieira, expressed great confidence not
only that the elections would occur but that the PAIGC would
sweep the elections, despite strong pressure to postpone once
again the elections due to very tardy preparation and to
pressure from suddenly weakened ethnic Balanta political
figures (of which more below).


3. (C) After some fears that parties would not register
their candidates by the 16 September deadline and thereby
call into question the date of the elections, 21 parties and
two coalitions of small parties submitted their candidate
lists on time. The PAIGC and Independent Republican Party
for Development (PRID),submitted their lists accompanied by
large crowds of supporters. Mohamed Yala Embalo's Social
Renewal Party (PRS) and the United Social Democratic Party
(PSUD) also submitted lists.

ELECTIONS ARE UNDERFUNDED
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4. (C) United Nations Peacebuilding Support Office in
Guinea-Bissau (UNOGBIS) Resrep Ambassador Shola Omoregie
detailed the USD 4.315 million contributed thus far to
elections preparations and execution as funding and in-kind
donations from: UNOGBIS (USD 1.3 million),ECOWAS (USD 0.5
million),Angola (USD 700,000),the EU (USD 850,000),the
United Nations Development Program (USD 600,000),Portugal
(material support),Brazil (USD 330,000) and Mexico (material
support). Omoregie stated that USD 4.3 million more was
needed to be raised to have fully funded elections not
lacking in staffing and materials. Asked if the elections
would go forward without funding, he said that they would.

WORRIES AND NO WORRIES ABOUT DRUG MONEY INFLUENCE ON ELECTIONS
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5. (C) For months analysts and observers have theorized
about whether Latin American drug traffickers would influence
the legislative elections by funding candidates in return for
turning a blind eye to drug trafficking once they are
elected. Gemima Neves, whose National Democratic Institute
office in Bissau closed on 30 September due to lack of
funding, expressed fear that the elections might be bought by
drug money. Omoregie agreed, as did PAIGC leader Cadogo,
Jr., the latter a partisan wont to identify the drug
traffickers with the rival PRS party. By contrast, Attorney
General Luis Cabral Manuel said that drug money will not
influence the elections.

DRUG TRAFFICKING AND TERRORISM ARE PARALLEL, NOT CONVERGENT
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6. (C) Meanwhile, the war against drug trafficking by
the plucky trio of Minister of Justice Carmelita Pires,
Attorney General Manuel and Judicial Police Chief Lucinda
Ahukarie continues with unprecedented vigor, even if it has a
very long way to go before they can declare victory. Reftel

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details the grounding at Bissau International Airport of one
of two airplanes in July that probably carried a large
quantity of cocaine from Latin America to Europe and three
Venezuelan crew who were arrested and then released by a
corrupt judge who was thereafter suspended from duty.
Minister Pires, sounding as if the wind were at her back,
said that she expected to stay in office after the November
elections. Judicial Police Chief Ahukarie said that 35 of
her agents were to train in Brazil, that she was recruiting
100 agents, and made a passionate appeal to the USG to fund
training. She concluded with the appeal to the USG to
pressure President Vieira to make very strong statements
against narco-trafficking. Attorney General Cabral related
how he personally went out to the hapless plane to seize
suspects and evidence, and how his wife refused to move with
their children to Portugal after traffickers threatened his
family. He states that he will fight as long as he is
Attorney General. He expressed confidence in the PAIGC,s
ability to win a big majority in the November elections, and
he expects to remain in office after the elections.


7. (C) In response to a question based on the arrest of
two Mauritanians in Bissau in January suspected of
participating in the murder of four French tourists in
Mauritania, one of whom swore vengeance against their captors
in fluent Bissau-Guinean Criollo, Attorney General Cabral
stated that he saw no evidence of collusion between
terrorists and drug traffickers.

MORE VERSIONS OF THE FAILED COUP D,ETAT
--------------

8. (C) Bissau is still talking about the unsuccessful
coup d,etat of 7 August in which Navy head Rear Admiral
Americo Bubo Na Tchuto attempted to arrest President Vieira.
Most sources continue to indicate that Na Tchuto,s arrest
was the result of a power struggle between a strong chief of
the armed forces Batista Tagme Na Wae and a weak President
Vieira on the one hand and on the other hand, Bubo Na Tchuto,
until then the strongest local ally of the narco-traffickers.
The partisan PAIGC head Cadogo Jr. asserted that
ex-president and PRS head Koumba Yala, recently converted to
Islam and now known as Mohamed Yala Embalo, was behind the
coup. Embalo stated to a group of Muslims in the
northeastern town of Gabu that he was greater than Amilcar
Cabral, the nationally revered figure who led the war of
independence from Portugal until he was assassinated in 1973.
Others assert that Embalo was Na Tchuto,s chief political
prop, so that when the coup failed he had to flee back to
Morocco. Some interviewees pointed out that Tagme, Bubo Na
Tchuto and Yala Embalo are Balanta, as are the armed forces,
predominantly. UNOGBIS head Omoregie (strictly protect)
shrewdly suggested that Tagme, reputed to be the power behind
the presidential throne, and Bubo No Tchuto conspired to
overthrow Vieira, but that when Tagme was in Dakar, Bubo No
Tchuto did not wait for Tagme to return to Bissau and
launched the coup himself in order to take absolute power
from Tagme and Vieira.

THE PEOPLE ARE MORE WORRIED ABOUT RICE THAN COCAINE
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9. (SBU) Voters would well define good governance by how
well the people in power respond to the cost of living, which
during the past 6 months has risen due to a 27%. The price of
rice risen sharply. The current regime, however, is not at
fault for this, but has been blamed for it by an opposition
who said it will reduce prices if elected.

A SMALL BUT REAL WIND BEHIND THE BACKS OF THE GOOD GUYS
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10. (C) COMMENT. The public, be it in Bissau or in the
provinces, is by no means as passionate about the elections
as party activists, and may indeed firstly vote for the party
they think will be able to govern best, among parties which
are decidedly not ideological in nature, and secondly, for
the parties they have supported in the past. However, the
one party that has lost a following is the Balanta-based PRS.
In declaring during the 10-12 September visit by the
Portuguese defense minister to Bissau that as long as he is
chief of the Bissau-Guinean armed forces, Tagme Na Wae will
tolerate no coup d,etats, the country can probably look
forward to a short term of political stability, even if it
needs the legitimacy of functioning democratic institutions
for stability in the medium and long run.


11. (C) COMMENT CONTINUED. Mission Dakar Ambassador,s
pledge to the Minister of Justice, Attorney General and the
Judicial Police Chief through these Department visitors that
the USG will do all it can to support the country in its
fight against its drug scourge was another smooth stone laid

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in the counter-narcotics foundation being built in
Guinea-Bissau. END COMMENT
SMITH