DAKAR, Jan. 9 (Xinhua) -- Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade reiterated his support to the Guinean military junta on Thursday, saying he would pay a visit within hours to Conakry, the capital of the neighboring West African country.

    The trip, he said, would be made to confirm his support to military officers who took power on Dec. 23 following the death of President Lansana Conte, according to the Dakar-based Pan African News Agency (PANA).

    Wade said the military officers did not launch a coup, "because the president (Conte) was already dead and the power was in the street."

    "You can always count on me," Wade was quoted as saying to the leader of the military junta, Moussa Dadis Camara, who has explained their motivations on telephone to the Senegalese leader since seizing power.

    Camara, among others, told President Wade that "the place for the military is in the barracks, not in power."

    Meanwhile, Libyan leader Muammar al Gaddafi has reportedly traveled to Conakry in a gesture of support for the military junta.

    Wade had previously announced his visit to Guinea on Dec. 31, but decided to put it off soon afterwards to press Camara to fix a date for the presidential elections.

    "You have respected your declaration on what is concerned with the consultation with different compositions of the Guinean society, but I have no knowledge that you have fixed with political parties the date of elections," Wade said in a message to Camara. "It is for these reasons that I have deterred the voyage I should make to Conakry," the president declared at the time.

    But he pledged to pay a visit to Guinea after the military junta sets the date with political parties.

    The military junta held consultations with civilian representatives at the Alpha Yaya Diallo barracks in Conakry three days after the seizure of power, promising to hold the presidential vote in December 2010, without fixing a date for it.

    Wade is among the first African leaders to voice support to the Guinean military junta, which is widely shunned and accused of seizing power in a military coup.

    The Senegalese first expressed support to Camara on Dec. 26 when he told the latter to "let you handle your own problems" in a telephone conversation. Wade said Guinea might have elections well before 2010.

    To break the isolation, Camara's deputy Mamadouba Toto Camara shuttled between the neighboring countries of Guinea-Bissau, Mali and Sierra Leone by the year end. Wade has indicated that several African states join him in support of the Guinean military junta, without elaborating.

    The African Union has suspended Guinea's membership to press for the restoration of the constitutional order and democracy. The Economic Community of West African States is to convene on Friday in Abuja, Nigeria, to discuss sanctions against the Guinean military junta.

    Guinea won independence from France in 1958. Rich in mineral resources such as bauxite, gold and iron ore, the world's top bauxite exporter and the second biggest producer attracts billions of dollars in mining investments from foreign firms, including RioTinto Alcan, Alcoa and Russia's United Company Rusal.

    The country, however, is placed the 160th of 177 countries in the development survey by the United Nations.