Burundi General Godefroid Niyombare, who announced the overthrow of the president Wednesday, is a former spy chief, diplomat and respected army officer.

A former sports teacher, ex-rebel, born-again Christian and football fanatic, Burundi President Pierre Nkurunziza, the subject of a coup attempt Wednesday, has divided the nation over his bid to secure a third term in office.

East African leaders condemned an attempted coup in Burundi Wednesday, after a top general said he had deposed President Pierre Nkurunziza while he and regional presidents held talks to end weeks of violent protests.

President Jonathan’s remark last week that his friends had deserted him owing to his electoral loss gathered momentum on Wednesday when his kinsmen representing him at the National and State Assembly left in droves from his party to the All Progressives Congress, APC.

“I order the closure of the airport and border, and I ask every citizen and law enforcement down to the airport to protect it,” General Godefroid Niyombare said in the radio broadcast.

“It is with regret that we have learned that a group from the armed forces mutinied this morning and declared an imaginary coup,” the office of President Pierre Nkurunziza said in its first full statement since the coup attempt was launched.

Rescuers battled Wednesday to reach survivors of a deadly new earthquake in Nepal that triggered landslides and brought down buildings, as hundreds of troops searched for a missing US military helicopter. Thousands of traumatised survivors spent the night outdoors, afraid to return to their houses after Tuesday’s 7.3-magnitude quake hit, less than three weeks after the country was devastated by its deadliest quake in more than 80 years.

A suspected member of the armed robbery gang who invaded a bank in Lekki Lagos killing three policemen and a teenage hawker has been arrested.

Burundi’s President Pierre Nkurunziza was still in Tanzania on Wednesday early evening, hours after a top general staged an attempted coup in his country, Tanzania’s presidency said.

A Spanish judge Wednesday ordered Barcelona football club and its chairman Josep Maria Bartomeu to stand trial over alleged tax fraud linked to the signing of star striker Neymar. The National Court in Madrid in a written ruling ordered the trial of Bartomeu, his predecessor Sandro Rosell and the club as a defendant in its own right, over allegations that they paid more for Neymar than they declared to the taxman.