Burkina Faso’s junta-led government has suspended one of the country’s most popular radio stations – Radio Omega.
Gatekeepers News reports that the suspension came after Radio Omega broadcast an interview deemed “insulting” to Niger’s new military leaders.
Communications Minister Rimtalba Jean Emmanuel Ouedraogo in a statement said Radio Omega was immediately suspended on Thursday “until further notice.
According to him, the measure was “in the higher interests of the nation.”
Following this, the station which is part of the Omega media group owned by journalist and former foreign minister Alpha Barry, ceased broadcasting after the statement was issued late Thursday.
The channel had run an interview with the spokesman of a newly-established Nigerien group campaigning, Ousmane Abdoul Moumouni planning to return President Mohamed Bazoum to power.
On July 26, Gatekeepers News reported that Bazoum was overthrown on July 26 by members of the Presidential Guard.
Ouedraogo, who is also a government spokesman, said Moumouni made “insulting comments about the new Nigerien authorities.”
He added that His organisation “is clearly campaigning for violence and war against the sovereign people of Niger” and seeks to restore Bazoum “by every means.”
In 2022, Burkina Faso underwent two military coups, each triggered in part (as in Mali and Niger) by discontent at failures to stem a raging jihadist insurgency.
Burkina Faso swiftly declared solidarity with Niger’s new leaders and joined Mali in warning that any military intervention to restore Bazoum would be considered a “declaration of war” against them.
In recent months, the Burkinabe authorities have suspended the French TV outlets LCI and France24 as well as Radio France Internationale and expelled the correspondents of the French newspapers Liberation and Le Monde.
