Ibrahim Hassane Mayaki

Fourth Republic

Under President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara, who seized power in a January 1996 coup, Mayaki was named Deputy Minister for Cooperation, under the Minister of Foreign Affairs, André Salifou, on August 23, 1996. He was then named Minister of Foreign Affairs and Nigeriens Abroad in December 1996, in which position he served until being named Prime Minister in November 1997.

Fifth Republic

When President Maïnassara was overthrown and assassinated in April 1999, Mayaki was reappointed by Daouda Malam Wanké, the leader of the coup, to lead the country during the transition to new elections. He left office after the elections were held late in the year.

United States political scandal

According to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence report on prewar intelligence, Joe Wilson said that during Mayaki's time in office he was contacted by a businessman who asked him to meet with a delegation from Saddam Hussein's Iraq government, to discuss "expanding commercial relations." Mayaki interpreted that to mean they wanted to discuss the sale of yellowcake uranium, a natural resource of Niger, though upon meeting with the delegation, the subject of uranium never came up.

None of the CIA, DIA, or INR analysts said this gave weight to claims that Iraq was trying to get uranium from Africa, and the Vice President (who requested the information that prompted Wilson's trip to Niger) was not briefed on the issue. There is no evidence that this claim about the meeting of an Iraqi delegation with Mayaki was used to bolster the case for war, or that it was in any way related to U.S. President George W. Bush's claim in the 2003 State of the Union address that "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa," which was based on what the British says in the Butler Report is completely separate evidence.

Later career

In August 2000, Mayaki created the Public Policy Analysis Circle (Cercle d'analyse des politiques publiques), a thinktank focusing on health and education policy.

Since 2009, Mayaki has headed the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD), an African Union body located in Midrand, South Africa. In 2016, he was appointed by Erik Solheim, the Chairman of the Development Assistance Committee, to serve on the High Level Panel on the Future of the Development Assistance Committee under the leadership of Mary Robinson. Later that year, he was appointed by United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to serve as member of the Lead Group of the Scaling Up Nutrition Movement.

Honours

In 2011, Mayaki was awarded medal of Officer in the National Order of Agricultural Merit, an order of merit established by the French government in 1883.

Publications

In addition to several academic articles, he published La Caravane Passe (Paris, Odilon Média, 1999, 210 p. ISBN 2-84213-029-4), a book relating his political experience.