"I am a candidate for the presidential election to lose Alpha Condé at the polls," former Prime Minister and main Guinean opponent Cellou Dalein Diallo announced on Sunday (September 6th) when he announced his candidacy in Conakry.

"The party decided to participate in this election and appointed me to represent it," continued the head of the Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea (UFDG).

The UFDG "felt that it was good that in addition to the peaceful demonstrations against the third term of Alpha Condé, to also fight at the polls against this third term. We can do both simultaneously," said Cellou. Dalein Diallo, 66, unsuccessful candidate in the 2010 and 2015 presidential elections.

He spoke shortly before the start of a convention of his party to designate him as his representative in the presidential election of October 18, after the announcement of the candidacy of Alpha Condé, 82, former historic opponent, first democratically president elected in Guinea, in 2010.

Alpha Condé, re-elected in 2015, put a definitive end on September 2 to months of ambiguity by confirming to be a candidate of the Rassemblement pour le peuple de Guinée (RPG) for a third term, despite a challenge that cost the lives of dozens of civilians.

The National Front for the Defense of the Constitution (FNDC), a collective of parties, unions and members of civil society, has been campaigning since last year against the constitutional revision adopted in March following a referendum controversial and peppered with violence, which he denounces as an institutional coup d'état.

The new Constitution, like the previous one, limits the number of presidential terms to two.

But supporters of Mr. Condé argue that this change in fundamental law resets the counters to zero.

Cellou Dalein Diallo is the eighth candidate declared for the presidential election.

The deadline for submitting candidacy files to the Constitutional Court expires at midnight on Tuesday.

Four candidates, including Alpha Condé, have already officially submitted their file.

Among these candidates are the economist and former minister Ousmane Kaba (Party of Democrats for Hope), excluded in 2016 from the party of Mr. Condé, the lawyer and former minister Abdoul Kabélé Camara (Guinean Party for Development) and the former minister and former economist at the IMF Ousmane Doré (National Movement for Development), these personalities told AFP.

With AFP

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