Several days after high-brass military men ousted President Taya from power in Mauritania, diplomats are finally taking my line on this: cautious optimism. I’ve been arguing consistently that this may just be what Mauritania needs to order to secure real democracy in the face of a dictator who cracked down on all political opposition — not to mention falsified every election he ever held. When the coup first happened, everyone from the AU to the EU to the US to every other acronym organization condemned it. That line of thought is now changing.

NOUAKCHOTT (Reuters) – Western nations will support the military junta that staged a bloodless coup in Mauritania if it shows it can live up to its promise of organizing democratic elections, diplomats said on Tuesday.
…
But the United States, European Union (EU) and African Union (AU) among others condemned the putsch, with Washington initially calling for Taya to be restored to power.

“The international community had to condemn the coup out of principle. A coup is a coup. But the team that took over has a lot of support here,” said one Western diplomat in Nouakchott.

“There will be a period of observation … If the council shows it can live up to its promises then after a while relations will normalize,” he said.

An EU delegation would consult with the coup leaders over the next few months to lay out a timetable guaranteeing a return to constitutional rule, the diplomat said.

Should the military council then fail to stick to the timetable, the EU could in theory suspend aid to Mauritania, which plans to start pumping crude next year.

Taya, who is in Niger, told Dubai-based satellite television Al Arabiya on Monday that he would return to his country “soon” and urged soldiers to resist the new leadership, which is comprised of senior officers from his innerc circle.

A delegation of Nigerian and South African diplomats sent by the 53-nation AU, which has suspended Mauritania, was in Nouakchott on Tuesday and envoys from Libya and the Arab League were also expected.

“The principle of the AU is not to agree with coups … But we believe we shall not have one policy to fit every situation,” Rantobeng William Mokou, South Africa’s ambassador to Mauritania, told Reuters.

This is a good development, I think. While the coup is still being formally condemned, it is very important to note that none of the countries or organizations are actually calling for Taya to be returned to power. They are simply saying that the country should be returned to constitutional rule as soon as possible, which is what they’ll be working with the new military junta to bring about. It seems that any support for Taya’s return to power has been vanquished by both reality and better days ahead.

The new government has already released several political prisoners, met with diplomats and political parties, and promised a constitutional referendum with general elections. These are big promises, and the end results usually don’t match up. So again, and there is no limit to how much this has to be stressed, every party involved needs to continue to be involved over the next couple of years to make sure that the military junta does, in fact, bring about a liberal democratic system.