“Pdarker”: in these two words could be summed up the security situation in which Burkina finds itself if we rely on a quarterly note, from April to June 2022, produced by the NGO Interpeace. “This quarter was marked by extensive activism by organized armed groups” in the four regions of the country most affected by the terrorist hydra, namely the Centre-North, the East, the Sahel and the Boucle du Mouhoun. The NGO explains that the incidents recorded during the second quarter amount to “416 against 207 in the first quarter, a rate of 215%”, while the number of people internally displaced by the violence is close to the 2 million mark. .
And yet, at the beginning of July, it was a whole country that had hoped for a decline in attacks with the return to the country of former President Blaise Compaoré, exiled in Côte d’Ivoire, since he was ousted from power in 2014. However, it is clear that the terrorist vice has tightened further in Burkina, after only a few days of calm. From mid-July, pressure from armed terrorist groups increased.
The shock wave came from the north of the country, where two simultaneous attacks targeted infrastructure. Friday, July 15, a bridge located about a hundred kilometers north of Ouagadougou, linking the capital to several other cities, including Kaya and Dori, was blown up by armed men. The same day, a similar attack targeted the bridge which connects the towns of Kongoussi and Djibo, still in the northern part of the country. For several hours, road traffic was disrupted on these axes before the two infrastructures were repaired, one by local residents supported by Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP), civilian army auxiliaries, the other by a mining company, according to witnesses. Objective: to isolate the populations, to allow the terrorists to remain confused with the population and to put the army in difficulty in its maneuvers.
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The reasons for unprecedented pressure
The strategy of isolating certain parts of the territory is not new, but it has been gaining ground in recent years, eight years after the appearance of the jihadist phenomenon in the Land of Upright Men in 2015. There is particularly the case emblematic of the city of Djibo, located 200 km from Ouagadougou and close to the Malian border. Since February, Djibo has been under blockade by armed terrorist groups, which prevent the 350,000 inhabitants from going out or going about their business. The Sahelian city has already experienced a similar situation in 2020, then in 2021.
For Hamadoum Tamboura, there is no doubt that this terrorist pressure is linked to the recent more offensive discourse of the new authorities resulting from the January 24 coup and which makes people believe in “a rise in power of the defense and security forces”. , points out the spokesperson for the consultation framework for civil society organizations in Soum, the province to which the martyred city of Djibo belongs.
At the beginning of June, during a fortnightly update on army operations, the director of the Command of the National Theater of Operations (COTN) – a structure created to plan, conduct and coordinate national defense –, Lieutenant-Colonel Yves Didier Bamouni makes the direct link between the formalization of the elimination of two terrorist leaders and the reprisals against civilian populations that followed in May.
Alongside the victorious speech, the authorities announced the creation, in the regions most affected by terrorism, of “zones of military interest” that the populations should release when the time comes in order to facilitate military operations. “By increasing the pressure, the armed groups want to show that they still have a capacity for harm despite the announcements of the elimination of certain terrorist leaders. By sabotaging bridges, for example, they cut off the supply of cities,” comments Hamadoum Tamboura.
“Every time the state tries to regain ground, the armed groups do everything to show that they are the ones who ultimately dictate the pace”, analyzes the journalist and writer, Atiana Serge Oulon, author of the book “Understanding armed attacks in Burkina Faso. Profiles and Routes of Terrorists”. And to add: “It is not excluded that this pressure is a response to what the central authority has decided as actions on the ground. »
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The inconspicuous fruits of the meeting of presidents
Beyond the activism of armed groups, there is the purely political question of the effects of the return to the country of Blaise Compaoré – sentenced to life imprisonment for the death of Thomas Sankara in October 1987 – and the summit meeting of heads of state . These two events were supposed to augur a relaxation of the security climate. It should be noted that during the governance of Compaoré, when Mali and Niger were taken by storm by jihadism, Burkina Faso was spared for a long time. For many experts, the influence of Blaise Compaoré and his relations in many political, economic or religious spheres in the sub-region, had a lot to do with it.
For Hamadoum Tamboura, “the meeting between President Damiba and his predecessors did not take place as planned due to absences, the most notable of which was that of Roch Kaboré. It would have been necessary that all the presidents are there, that in the long term they make a joint declaration which would have served as an appeal to their fellow citizens”, estimates this leader of the civil society. “The situation in which we find ourselves is such that we must give priority to this reconciliation. Each of the former heads of state has popularity both among the population and within the army, he argues. In some villages, for example, Blaise Compaoré is still popular. It is the same in the army. It is obvious that being himself a soldier, he always has men in the army who appreciate him,” continues Hamadoum Tamboura.
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Blaise Compaoré’s act of contrition
Among those who firmly believe in a solution to the security crisis through reconciliation, there is obviously Blaise Compaoré himself on the front line. Less than three weeks after his brief stay in his native country, the former head of state dispatched a delegation from Abidjan to Ouagadougou to deliver a message to his compatriots, those who nevertheless forced him to leave the power eight years earlier. To Burkinabè, Blaise Compaoré’s message – conveyed by his daughter, Djamila Compaoré and the special adviser to the Ivorian president, Ally Coulibaly – is that of “forgiveness” and mobilization around the higher interest of the nation. “Faced with this dramatic and critical situation that our dear homeland is experiencing, we have no choice but to silence our differences in order to save our common heritage, Burkina Faso. This nation, which was bequeathed to us by our ancestors, deserves better than the disastrous fate that terrorists want to reserve for it. This is why I call on all our compatriots, the daughters and sons of the country, from inside and outside, to a sacred union, to tolerance, to restraint, but above all to forgiveness so that the best interest of our nation,” said Blaise Compaoré. “For my part, I apologize to the people of Burkina Faso for all the acts that I may have committed during my magisterium, more particularly to the family of my brother and friend Thomas Isidore Noël Sankara. I assume and deplore, from the bottom of my heart, all the suffering and drama experienced by all the victims during my mandates at the head of the country and ask their families to grant me their forgiveness. » Late awareness? True repentance or political calculation? In any case, this message from the former did not fail to react.
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“Armed groups dictate the agenda”
But, reconciliation or not, “we should not expect an immediate improvement in the security picture”, maintains the journalist-writer Atiana Serge Oulon. “The pressure is completely, I would say, natural since it is these armed groups who dictate the agenda of the soldiers on the ground”, explains the director of publication of the bimonthly L’Événement. And to continue in these terms: “The testimonies agree on the fact that there is no action on the ground to stop the expansion of armed groups. The various military detachments are always in a defensive position. Even if here and there there are actions to dismantle terrorist bases, but this is not put together within the framework of a global strategy of struggle. The proof is that a few days after the coup, an ad hoc commission was set up to reflect on and finalize the national strategy for the fight against terrorism but has not yet submitted its report”, he analyzes. . So many aspects which show that the impasse is indeed there and that the challenges remain daunting for the new authorities who, despite everything, maintain their promise to the Burkinabè of a better tomorrow.
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