When the man who took control through a coup begins to fear being toppled himself, the entire logic of power shifts. In Niger, General Abdourahamane Tiani is living that paradox in real time.
A decree signed on 17 September stripping five Nigeriens of their nationality including former Prime Minister Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou lands in a political and military climate already stretched to breaking point. Having survived an attempted putsch on 29 August, Tiani appears to have turned suspicion into a governing doctrine.
From coup leader to coup target
There are coincidences that tell a story all on their own.
On 26 July 2023, General Abdourahamane Tiani came to power after overthrowing Mohamed Bazoum. Three years later, on 29 August 2026, the man who had taken power by force found himself facing an attempted overthrow.
This time, the gunfire did not come from outside.
It came from within.
The presidential palace was targeted. Air Base 101 was attacked. The public television station was taken as an objective. For several hours, the balance of forces remained uncertain inside the military apparatus itself. Some soldiers hesitated to commit, while mutineers sought to rally other officers.
For a man who reached power through a coup, the signal is brutal: the very scenario he helped set in motion can now turn against him.
The 29 August turning point
The attempted putsch did not topple Tiani.
But it profoundly changed the equation of power.
The junta reportedly had to rely on the intervention of several hundred Russian Africa Corps soldiers to retake Air Base 101. At least 200 military personnel have been arrested since the events of 29 August, mainly from the special forces.
Then the chain of command began to move.
On 11 September, the chief of defence staff, General Moussa Salaou Barmou, was dismissed. Days later, four ministers were replaced. The junta describes the measures as a tightening of ranks after the putsch attempt.
Officially, the talk is of reorganisation, dysfunction and securing the chain of command.
But in politics, timing matters.
And the timing tells a story: after being threatened, the regime is reorganising around those it considers most reliable.
Then came the decree
On 17 September, another thunderclap.
Abdourahamane Tiani signed a decree provisionally stripping five people of their Nigerien nationality.
Among them: Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou, former Prime Minister under Mohamed Bazoum.
The decree cites acts including intelligence with foreign powers, the dissemination of data likely to disturb public order, alleged participation in an effort to demoralise the army and the nation, and breaches of state security.
It must be emphasised: these are accusations and proceedings mentioned in the decree, not a definitive judicial conviction.
But politically, the symbolism is heavy.
Because Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou is not just any opponent.
He belongs to the former state apparatus.
He served as Prime Minister under Mohamed Bazoum, the president Tiani overthrew.
And that is precisely where the case takes on another dimension.
Bazoum is no longer in power but his shadow remains
Three years after the coup, former President Mohamed Bazoum remains a central figure in Niger’s political confrontation.
His regime is gone.
His institutions have been dismantled.
But the men who served him continue to appear in the security and judicial files of the new authorities.
With this new decree, five Nigeriens are now provisionally deprived of their nationality under a mechanism introduced in 2024. According to the Nigerien press agency, the total now stands at 25 people.
A question then arises:
At what point does defending the state stop being purely a security operation and become a political cleanup?
The question deserves to be asked without presuming the guilt or innocence of those targeted.
A regime that sees enemies everywhere?
This is where the file becomes more troubling.
Since 29 August, the Nigerien authorities have had to manage a threat that no longer comes only from armed groups or external adversaries.
The threat can now, based on reported events, come from within the military apparatus itself.
And when the loyalty of soldiers becomes a central question, the temptation can be strong to look for those responsible, for relays, for accomplices or for sponsors.
The risk, then, is seeing suspicion become a method of government.
A military officer replaced.
A minister sidelined.
Soldiers arrested.
Former officials of the Bazoum regime targeted.
And now, citizens provisionally stripped of their nationality.
Taken separately, each of these acts has its official justification.
Put end to end, however, they sketch the image of a regime that, after being directly threatened, is seeking to regain control of every circle that could represent a vulnerability.
Tiani, the president who no longer trusts anyone?
This may be the most embarrassing question for the regime.
How do you govern durably when a power born of a coup discovers that another coup can be applied to it?
General Tiani now knows this mechanism from the inside.
He knows that a military power can seem firmly installed until the day a few officers decide to cross a line.
29 August demonstrated it.
What was supposed to be impossible became possible.
What was supposed to be unthinkable happened around the presidential palace.
And when a regime discovers it can be overthrown by the same methods that brought it to the top, fear of the next plot can quickly become a political obsession.
“Niger is me”?
This is precisely where critics of the regime see a worrying drift.
By deciding who is loyal, who is suspect, who must be arrested, who must be sidelined and now who may provisionally keep their nationality, Tiani gives his detractors the impression of a leader behaving as if he alone holds the keys to the Republic.
As if Niger must be divided between those who support the regime and those who must be excluded from it.
As if serving under Bazoum now constitutes a permanent political fault.
As if every dissenting voice must necessarily hide a plot.
General Tiani is obviously not Niger.
But the concentration of decisions around his person feeds a fundamental question: how far can a regime go when, to protect itself, it ends up seeing threats behind every face?
The paradox of a power born from a putsch
This is where the irony of the story lies.
Tiani reached the top after a coup.
Today, he leads a regime that has itself just escaped an attempted putsch.
And between those two dates, Niger appears to have tipped into a cycle where each crisis produces new purges, each suspicion calls for a new sanction and each attempt at contestation reinforces the concentration of power.
The 17 September decree is therefore not merely a matter of nationality.
It is a new episode in a broader battle: that of a regime seeking to eliminate the zones of uncertainty around itself.
One question remains, perhaps the most important:
By fighting real or supposed plots, is Tiani building a system where any contestation automatically becomes a plot?
If so, the problem would no longer be only knowing who wants to overthrow Tiani.
It would also mean asking why a regime that claims to be firmly installed now seems to fear those around it so much.
And above all, how far will this logic go?
Because when a regime starts treating its own citizens as potential threats, the line between protecting the state and protecting the power becomes dangerously thin.
By Marguerite Ndongo — Political and Security Analyst
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