Experts appointed by Mali’s military coup leaders have proposed a two-year transitional government to be led by a president chosen by the army during a forum on Friday while debating how to restore civilian rule.
Reports say the proposal made by junta-appointed experts, has been submitted to about 500 participants from political parties, unions and NGOs, at a three-day conference in the capital Bamako.
In an eight-page “charter of the transition”, the constitutional experts wrote that a transitional period of 24 months was needed “in light of the complexity, the gravity and the structural depth of the Malian crisis”.
The two-year transitional government would be led by a president picked by the army, for example, although the text stipulates that the office could be filled by either a “civil or military personality”.
The president would also nominate the prime minister, according to the text, and an army officer would lead a proposed 51-member legislative body, dubbed the “national transition council”.
Under the proposal, the president would be a “civil or military personality”. The candidate must be between the ages of 35 and 75 and would not be eligible to stand for election at the end of the transition, it said.
The recommendations have not yet been formally approved by the representatives of the CNSP, political leaders and civil society groups taking part in the talks, which are due to end on Saturday.
