Mauritania announced a new government late on Saturday, October 10, after President Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani kept El Moctar Ould Djay as prime minister and approved a cabinet spanning 29 ministerial portfolios. The official announcement was made at the presidential palace in Nouakchott by presidency secretary-general Aissata Ba Yahya.
The sequence was unusual but clear. Ould Djay submitted his government’s resignation on Friday, October 9. Ghazouani reappointed him hours later and instructed him to propose a new team. The prime minister therefore remains in office, while the composition beneath him has been reshaped.
A resignation followed by continuity at the top
The presidency said the government should combine political and technical competence to continue the president’s programme, respond to the wider global crisis, strengthen social protection for low-income citizens, expand training and employment for young people and promote development beyond the capital. Those are stated priorities, not completed outcomes.
The official list names Mohamed Abdallahi Ould Louly to the youth, employment, sports and civic-service portfolio; Mohamed Ould Soueidatt as justice minister; and Mohamed Salem Ould Merzoug as foreign minister. Codioro Moussa N’Guenore becomes finance minister, while Mohamedou Ould M’Haimid takes economic affairs and development.
Several politically and operationally important portfolios changed hands. Ba Ousmane was appointed defence minister, El Moctar Ould Ahmed Bouceif interior minister, Naha Hamdi Mouknass health minister, Sidi El Hadj Ould Dah Islamic affairs minister and Mohamed Ould Abdel Vetah energy and petroleum minister.
Which portfolios changed
The government also named Houda Babah to education reform, Yacoub Ould Moine to higher education and research, Amal Maouloud to water and sanitation, Ahmed Salem Bede to digital transformation, and Ahmed Baba Ould Ali to agriculture and food sovereignty. The official announcement lists Aïssata Lam for fisheries and maritime infrastructure and Zeinabou Ahmednah for trade and tourism.
State and wire reporting indicate that foreign affairs, justice, finance, equipment and transport, mines and industry, and trade and tourism were among the portfolios whose officeholders were retained, while defence, interior, health, energy and Islamic affairs changed. The new cabinet should therefore be read as a targeted reshuffle under the same president and prime minister, not a transfer of national power.
The reshuffle followed publication of an independent commission’s report into fires at two Mauritanian Electricity Company substations in Nouakchott-North and Nouakchott-West. The August 21 and 22 fires caused outages across large parts of the capital and nearby communities that lasted between three and five days, according to AFP’s account of the report.
Why the electricity inquiry matters
The commission identified serious shortcomings involving prevention, electrical protection, supervision of work and emergency management. It linked the failures to three recently installed power lines, identified overheating as the most likely cause and reported no evidence of sabotage or operator error. The report’s findings concern systems and oversight; they do not establish criminal liability by themselves.
Mauritania’s energy ministry said it had begun implementing the commission’s recommendations. The replacement of the energy minister gives that response added political significance, but a new appointment does not prove that technical weaknesses have been corrected. The practical tests are whether protection systems, maintenance, contractor supervision and emergency procedures are measurably improved.
The inquiry also gives the reshuffle a sharper accountability question. Ould Djay accepted responsibility for any shortcomings when he resigned, yet Ghazouani immediately renewed confidence in him. The president has chosen continuity in the prime minister’s office while changing parts of the team responsible for delivery.
A cabinet announcement is not accountability
That decision may help preserve administrative continuity, but it also concentrates attention on implementation. The government has not announced criminal charges in connection with the substation fires, and the reviewed sources do not establish that any departing minister personally caused them. Political responsibility, administrative failure and legal guilt must be kept distinct.
For residents, the first benchmarks are concrete: stable power in Nouakchott and surrounding towns, transparent publication of remedial work, fewer emergency outages, functioning complaint channels and clear procurement oversight. The cabinet’s promises on jobs, social protection and regional development will likewise need budgets, timetables and public reporting.
What Mauritanians can measure next
The next formal signal will be the government’s programme and the decisions taken by the incoming ministers. Parliament, journalists and civil society can compare those actions with the inquiry’s recommendations and the presidency’s stated priorities. Until then, the confirmed development is a 29-portfolio cabinet reshuffle under the same president and prime minister, following a documented infrastructure-governance failure.
This report uses a clearly labelled AI-created symbolic image because no suitably licensed documentary photograph of the October 10 announcement was available for local publication. The image shows no real meeting, minister or government document and should not be read as visual evidence of the event.
