Guinea's embattled President Lansana Conte has agreed to change his prime minister and the west African country's trade unions will end a crippling general strike, union leader Ibrahima Fofana said Sunday.
"President Conte has agreed to a scenario that ends the crisis by naming a consensus prime minister by March 2 among candidates, three of them proposed by the trade unions and two by civil society leaders," Fofana said.
Fofana, head of the National Union of Workers of Guinea (USTG), added that representatives of his labour body and others that launched a general strike on January 10 voted to suspend the strike from Tuesday.
The announcement came after crisis talks brokered in Conakry by the Economic Union of West African States (ECOWAS), but attended neither by the ailing Conte or the close aide he named prime minister a fortnight earlier.
"Eugene Camara is no longer the prime minister," Fofana said following the talks with politicians and civic leaders, which opened earlier Sunday, two days after parliament voted to end martial law decreed by Conte on February 12.
"The strike will be suspended starting on Tuesday," Fofana said.
When the ailing Conte, who has ruled Guinea since 1984, filled the vacant post of prime minister with Camara, the appointment only deepened the strife and the president declared a state of siege, strengthening the powers of the military.
The unrest since January 10 has claimed 113 lives in a brutal crackdown that was widely condemned worldwide, including by African organisations that stepped up pressure on the parties in Guinea to negotiate a solution.
