There is a governmental crisis brewing in Guinea-Bissau. The current prime minister, Martinho Dafa Cabi, has been in office since April 2007. He came to power when his predecessor was subject to a vote of no-confidence in the Assembly. Prime Minister Dafa Cabi was appointed on the basis of a so-called Political and Parliamentary Stability Pact that was signed by three parties, the PAIGC with 45/100 seats, the PRS and the PUSD.

Now, the PAIGC has broken with the pact. Afriqueenligne reports that it has done so because it was not told of the prime minister’s decision to replace a number of senior officials before the changes were made. The PAIGC is likely to withdraw from the government and go into opposition, which will make it difficult for the government to survive.

Prime Minister Dafa Cabi is originally from the PAIGC, but he has supported President João Bernardo ‘Nino’ Vieira who was also originally from the PAIGC but who was elected in 2005 against the official PAIGC candidate. The party has not recovered from this schism and President Vieira has had difficulty governing since his election.

The PAIGC’s decision needs to be placed in the context of the parliamentary elections that are supposed to take place later this year in November and the presidential election that is likely to take place early next year.

In Guinea-Bissau, allafrica.com reports that President Joao Vieira has set a date for legislative elections. They will be held on 16 November.

Guinea-Bissau has a turbulent democratic history. It has been classed as Partly Free by Freedom House since 1991, despite two coups in the meantime – the first in 1999 and the second in 2003.

President Vieira was first elected in 1994, but he was ousted from power in the 1999 coup. He returned from exile in May 2005 and was elected as president in July 2005.

Vieira is an historic leader of the PAIGC, the former ruling party prior to any democratisation. However, at the 2005 election he ran as an independent candidate and at the second ballot he narrowly defeated Malam Bacai Sanha, who represented the PAIGC. There was a tense period immediately after the election when President Vieira had to ‘cohabit’ with then Prime Minister Carlos Gomez Junior from the PAIGC. However, within days Vieira sacked the Prime Minister and appointed Aristides Gomes, who supported Vieira at the 2005 election. Gomes founded a new party, the PRID, in 2008. The PRID supports President Vieira.

In March 2007 the opposition in parliament passed a vote of no-confidence in Gomes and he was forced to resign. The new Prime Minister, Martinho Ndafa Kabi, is from the PAIGC. The government includes a majority of representatives from the PAIGC and another opposition party, the PRS. However, President Vieira’s representatives also sit in the cabinet. So, this is not a period of cohabitation as defined in this blog.

The situation is Guinea-Bissau is, if you have not already gathered, extremely fluid and confused. This situation is compounded by the fact that representatives of the PAIGC and other parties continue, in effect, to support President Vieira. For example, the opposition parties control 97/100 seats in the legislature, but only 54 deputies voted in favour of censure and 28 voted against. There are good reports available from AFP (in French).