Guinea-Bissau's President Umaro Sissoco Embalo speaks with the Russian president during their meeting at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, 26 February 2025. The president of Guinea-Bissau was on a state visit to Russia. EPA-EFE/YURI KOCHETKOV / POOL Embalo, after a trip to Russia, Azerbaijan and Hungary, told reporters at the airport: "I will be a candidate in my own succession."
Embalo has been at odds with the political opposition in the coup-prone West African nation over when his current five-year term, which began in 2020, ends. The opposition says it ran out at the end of February, while the Supreme Court of Justice has ruled that it ends on September 4.
There has also been disgruntlement after Embalo said presidential and legislative elections would not be held until November 30 this year.
Originally scheduled for November 2024, the parliamentary polls were indefinitely postponed, citing technical and financial obstacles and scrambling the electoral calendar.
"I will talk to the political parties first about the forthcoming elections, and then I will issue a presidential decree," Embalo said late on Monday.
A 52-year-old former army general, Embalo inherited a long-running political impasse in a country where coups and unrest have been common since independence from Portugal in 1974.
He has said there were two attempts to overthrow him during his presidency, the latest in December 2023.
The president said last year that his wife had dissuaded him from running for a second term.
(Reporting by Alberto Dabo Writing by Sofia ChristensenEditing by Bernadette Baum)