NIGER’s former prime minister Hama Amadou, known as “the Phoenix” for his talent for political comebacks, has died in Niamey aged 74, his family announced on Thursday.
Newspaper L’Enqueteur said the “giant of Nigerien politics” had died overnight on Wednesday to Thursday in the capital after contracting malaria.
Tributes poured in on social media for Amadou, who was premier from 1995 to 1996 under President Mahamane Ousmane and again from 2000 to 2007 under President Mamadou Tandja.
He then became speaker of parliament from 2011 to 2014 under President Mahamadou Issoufou.
“Hama Amadou marked the history of our country with his commitment and devotion to serving the nation,” wrote Tourism Minister Soufiane Aghaichata Guishene.
“His political legacy and his sense of humanity will continue to inspire generations to come.”
State television on Thursday interrupted its programmes to air religious music and Koran recitations, as it typically does when important figures pass away in the majority-Muslim country.
A ceremony will be held at the Presidential Palace in Niamey, before a funeral in Amadou’s ethnic Fulani home village of Youri, near the capital, his party said.
Issoufou, Niger’s president from 2011 to 2021 with whom Amadou fell out, shared his condolences on Facebook.
“In moments of convergence as well as divergence, we were all conscious of being the same tear, coming out of the same eye — Niger. I mourn the loss of one of my best allies. I mourn the loss of one of my best opponents,” Issoufou wrote.
L’Enqueteur wrote: “Niger is in tears. Hama Amadou, the man of every fight, is no longer!”
“Niger today is mourning the loss of one of its most illustrious children,” the newspaper added on its website. “So ends the long journey of a man who marked the history of our country forever.”
Amadou was a fierce critic of President Mohamed Bazoum, who took office in 2021 and was overthrown two years later by a military coup led by Brigade General Abdourahamane Tiani.