Ex- Prime Minister arrested

Niger arrests ex-prime minister over fraud - source

By Abdoulaye Massalatchi

NIAMEY (Reuters) - Niger police arrested former prime minister and ruling party chief Hama Amadou on Thursday on corruption charges, a judicial source in the poor West African country said.

Uranium-exporting Niger's parliament voted this week to try Amadou, who is accused of embezzling 100 million CFA francs from a fund intended to help the media.

A conviction could bar Amadou from contesting a presidential election in 2009, when his former ally President Mamadou Tandja must stand down after serving the maximum two terms in office.

The source said that Amdou was put in jail in Koutakale, some 60 km (37 miles) west of Niger's capital Niamey.Police in Niamey used teargas to stop a demonstration of about 100 supporters of Amadou, who had gathered in front of the country's high court to protest against his arrest, a Reuters reporter witnessed.

Amadou was widely regarded as a favourite to succeed Tandja until he was ousted as prime minister last year over a separate corruption scandal.Any trial would take place in the high court, which hears cases involving government members or former members of the executive charged with crimes committed while in power, officials said.

Amadou chairs the majority National Movement for Society and Development party (MNSD), to which Tandja also belongs.Amadou accused Tandja last week of launching a "political plot" to bar him from running in the election.He is the third politician parliament has voted to put on trial in recent years. In 2006 it voted to prosecute two former education ministers in a bigger corruption scandal that led to Amadou losing a parliamentary vote of confidence in May 2007.

Niger is the world's third largest uranium producer, but many of its people live in poverty.In 2005 an estimated 3.6 million people ran short of food, shocking TV viewers abroad with images of wasted bodies and prompting an international food aid effort.