Coumba Ba for OIF: a consensus candidacy to renew francophone ambition
By the AFREEQUE newsroom, based on Initiatives News
The candidacy of Coumba Ba to head the OIF, in a column signed by Cheikh Ahmed Ould Mohamed, defends a line of dialogue and neutrality a few days before the Phnom Penh summit. The text lists her strengths without announcing any new fact, and four candidates are in the running.
The candidacy of Coumba Ba for the post of secretary general of the International Organisation of La Francophonie (OIF) will be put to a vote of member states at the 20th Francophonie Summit, due on 15 and 16 November 2026 in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, reports Initiatives News in a column by Cheikh Ahmed Ould Mohamed. Four candidates are in the running to succeed at the head of the organisation.
According to the author, the Mauritanian candidate highlights twenty years of ministerial experience and an established dialogue with nearly forty member states called to vote. She presents herself as a third way between the contenders, in a context of diplomatic tensions between several states of the francophone space.
Her campaign centres on dialogue, neutrality and the modernisation of the OIF. Coumba Bâ notably makes the return of the Sahel countries to the organisation a priority, after the withdrawals of Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger following the coups of 2020 to 2023.
In early November, she had denied any withdrawal of her candidacy, while rumours were circulating in Nouakchott. Her move also comes in a context of the weakening of the francophone space, marked by Kinshasa's threat to reconsider its place in La Francophonie, announced on 7 November.
