International News

Guinea-Bissau president names new PM in bid to end crisis

Bissau, (MILLAT ONLINE):Guinea-Bissau’s President Jose Mario Vaz named a new prime minister late Tuesday, appointing Augusto Antonio Artur Da Silva by decree after the previous PM resigned in a bid to end a political crisis.
The new prime minister’s first job will be to organise fresh parliamentary elections in the coming months.
The impoverished West African nation has been in the throes of a power struggle since August 2015, when Vaz sacked then prime minister Domingos Simoes Pereira.
Vaz and Pereira — who heads the ruling African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde (PAIGC) party of which the president is a member — have accused each other of blocking the implementation of an accord reached in 2016.
The agreement had envisaged naming a new prime minister “who had the president’s trust”, and who would maintain his position until elections to be held in 2018.