{"id":47090,"date":"2026-10-02T14:36:38","date_gmt":"2026-10-02T12:36:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/?post_type=news&#038;p=47090"},"modified":"2026-10-02T14:37:22","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T12:37:22","slug":"guinea-bissau-military-leaders-bar-ousted-presidents-return","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/guinea-bissau-military-leaders-bar-ousted-presidents-return\/","title":{"rendered":"Guinea-Bissau military leaders bar ousted President&#8217;s return"},"content":{"rendered":"<div dir=\"ltr\" data-olk-copy-source=\"MessageBody\">The military leaders of Guinea-Bissau have decided to block former President Umaro Sissoco Embalo from returning \u200bto the West African country, citing national security \u200cconcerns and the need to preserve public order.<\/div>\n<div id=\"x_ms-outlook-mobile-signature\">\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>Embalo, who was toppled in a military coup last November, had planned to return on \u200bSunday and contest a presidential election scheduled for \u200bDecember, a source familiar with the matter told \u2060<i>Reuters<\/i>\u00a0earlier this week.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>The coup last year came shortly \u200bbefore results from presidential and legislative elections were due to \u200bbe announced<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>The senior army officers who carried it out suspended the electoral process and installed Major-General Horta Inta-a as transitional President. Embalo \u200bhas been in exile since then.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>&#8220;It is considered \u200bthat the necessary security conditions are not yet in place to guarantee \u200cthe \u2060return to national territory of the former President of the Republic, Umaro Sissoco Embalo,&#8221; a government statement published on Thursday said Guinea-Bissau approved a new constitution in \u200ba referendum in August \u200bthat expanded \u2060presidential powers and changed electoral rules.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>\u00a0Among other provisions, it requires presidential candidates to \u200bhave lived continuously in the country for \u200bthe \u2060preceding five years.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div>It was unclear how that provision might have affected Embalo&#8217;s candidacy Guinea-Bissau, a small Portuguese-speaking West African \u2060country, has \u200ba long history of military \u200bcoups and is a transit hub for cocaine bound for Europe.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"ltr\">\u2014Reuters\u2014<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":44989,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[78,26],"class_list":["post-47090","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-featured","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The coup last year came shortly \u200bbefore results from presidential and legislative elections were due to \u200bbe announced.","published_date":"","news_description":"The coup last year came shortly \u200bbefore results from presidential and legislative elections were due to \u200bbe announced.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47090","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47090\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47092,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/47090\/revisions\/47092"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=47090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}