FILE - Guinea Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embalo speaks at the Peace Forum on Nov. 11, 2022 in Paris. A shootout in Guinea-Bissau’s capital Friday was an attempted coup, Embalo said Sunday Dec. 3, 2023 after a meeting with security forces, confirming fears over the latest threat to democracy in the increasingly volatile and coup-hit West Africa. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena, Pool, File)
BISSAU, Guinea-Bissau (AP) – Guinea-Bissau President Umaro Sissoco Embalo has dissolved the West African nation’s parliament, according to a presidential decree issued on Monday that cited last week’s shootout which the government said was a failed coup.
“The date for holding the next legislative elections will be set in due time in accordance with the provisions of “¦ the Constitution,” the decree stated. “This Presidential Decree comes into force immediately.”
The order referred to the “seriousness,” of the shootout which started in the capital, Bissau, between members of the Presidential Palace Battalion and the National Guard as the former tried to rearrest two ministers released from custody while being investigated for alleged corruption.