Vincent Hervouet
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2:52 p.m., January 25, 2022
In Burkina Faso, all presidents since independence have been violently dismissed. The national icon, Captain Thomas Sankara, carried out two successive putschs and succumbed to the third. Until proven otherwise, the France of François Mitterrand had nothing to do with it. But it is the exception that proves the rule.
In the past, France played with local governments like playing with cubes. And then, she lost the hand, the desire and the know-how.
In Mali, twice in one year, the military staged a putsch and confronted the thousands of French soldiers bivouacking there with a fait accompli. And they continue, moreover, these putschists, to defy France by making it boo in the demonstrations and by calling for the rescue of Russian mercenaries.
Is the Mali scenario repeating itself in Burkina Faso?
Is this the same thing that happened in Burkina? For months, Burkinabés have been protesting against the negligence of their leaders. The state now controls only a third of the country. The terrorists emptied the rest. 2,000 deaths caused the desperate flight of a million and a half inhabitants, as in Mali. An army that has lost all its battles blames the civilian government for it and thus justifies its overthrow. The crowd looking for a savior applauds him. Everyone saw the putsch coming.
In early January, a first attempt was foiled. Sunday, the troop mutinied and Monday, the officers landed the elected president and all the political class, without asking his opinion. While the French special forces are based at the airport, while the leader of the putschists went to war school in Paris and a postgraduate degree in criminology at the Sorbonne. In the past, that would have signed the crime. Well, that’s no longer the case.
What role can France still play?
This coup d’etat embarrasses France, because it puts it at odds. But why is France embarrassed if it has nothing to do with it? Because it shows the extent of his failure. First, the multiplication of coups d’etat in the Sahel buries all the discourse on good governance and the rule of law that has been repeated like parrots since Mitterrand. Putsch in Mali, putsch in Burkina. Against the Malian putschists, Paris had stretched a sanitary cordon. The borders are closed. The African Union and the regional organization, ECOWAS, took sanctions. Well, that didn’t deter their comrades in Burkina from doing the same.
The disappointment is total
In this context, nothing can be built in the Sahel. France is bogged down. It did not prevent the contagion of jihad, the contagion of the putsch. Its aid has not consolidated fragile states. It is even the opposite. It is a total disappointment, especially when we remember François Hollande, euphoric in Timbuktu, freed from the jihadists. The best day of his life, he said. Nine years later, the tricolor flag is burned in Bamako. Also remember Emmanuel Macron, euphoric, talking in shirt sleeves with the students of Ouagadougou. And when President Kaboré slips out, the French president laughs and asks if he’s going to fix the air conditioning.
Four years later, French military convoys are rocked in Burkina and President Kaboré now has plenty of time to adjust the air conditioning. The French presidents should not have been jubilant as on conquered ground in Timbuktu and Ouagadougou. They would have done better right away to look for the emergency exits. What does it mean? It is a French downgrading in Africa, where it is a lack of lucidity. Do you think? This means that the world has completely changed, that we must bury Françafrique. She is dead and buried.