Time.news – Three men in power, three soldiers, all in their forties and none of them who attended the French military academy, just a few “schools”. They are the authors of three coups in three West African states: Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea Conacry. Coincidence? Maybe not.
In this region of Africa, discontent and French sentiment took over. The former colonial force was able to deploy a large military force in an attempt to stem terrorism in the Sahel without succeeding. The populations have seen a great deployment of military means but no effect on their living conditions. Indeed, these have worsened and there has not even been a noticeable improvement in safety. Things got worse.
The coups d’état certainly cannot be attributed to this sentiment alone, certainly the current holders of power have used it to maintain and consolidate their power. In one case, they even “forced” France to leave the country, it is Mali, with people who took to the streets with Russian flags, as if to demonstrate a passage of protection from Paris to Moscow. Of course, Russia managed to wrest a piece of the empire from the French and placed the infamous Wagner Company of mercenaries there.
The military, in all three of these countries, has opened a “transition” with ambitious goals, but none has managed to dispel doubts about the will or ability to quickly restore leadership to civilians. As if West Africa has been hit by a sort of coup d’état syndrome, which is worrying beyond measure. But what happened in these countries. Four coups in 17 months.
Mali: August 18, 2020, a group of officers headed by colonel Assimi Goita (39 years old) overthrew the president-elect Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, after months of protests against the regime unable to cope with the growing violence in the country starting from 2012, to chaos economic and rampant corruption. In 2021 Mali does an encore. On May 24, Goita placed under arrest the president and the transitional prime minister that the military junta had installed because they do not meet the needs of the coup leaders. Goita is self-appointed president.
© CELLOU BINANI / AFP
Mamady Doumbouya
Guinea Conacry: 5 September 2021, Colonel Mamady Doumbouya (42), head of the special forces, captures President Alpha Condé. The last two years of the Condé presidency have been marked by protests, bloodily repressed, against his third term which the country’s constitution does not provide. Doumbouya was sworn in as transitional president on 1 October.
Burkina Faso: January 24, 2022 Lieutenant Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba (41) took power after two days of mutinies and deposed the elected president, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, in a context of exasperation for the jihadist “contagion”. Damiba was sworn in as president on February 16.
Return of civilians. All three new leaders have assured that they are not heading the states to stay there, but they promise a “refoundation” of their country. The three colonels have drawn up a “transition charter”, a sort of founding act, almost constitutive, for a period that should remain, in fact, of transition. They appoint a prime minister, a government, a replacement body for the elected parliament, all under their direct control. In Mali and Guinea Conacry, the military pledged to return civilians to power after regular elections.
Under pressure from the international community and the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas), the Malian colonels set a date: February 2022. At the end of 2021, however, they backtracked and set a five-year transition period. The colonels in Mali really want to stay in power.
In Guinea, Doumbouya assures that the transition calendar will be set by a National Council (NTC) which acts as a legislative body, but refuses to let Ecowas or anyone else influence, determine, or such deadlines that belong only to the NTC. . All power in his hands. After Condé not much has changed in the country including rampant poverty. In Burkina Faso, the “charter” signed by Lieutenant Colonel Damiba provides for a transition period of three years before the return to constitutional order, canceled with a swipe of the sponge.
The Economic Community of West African States has taken the measures it deemed necessary. However, they are difficult to interpret and one can only assume that they are determined by the good or bad will of its coup leaders, by local contexts, by the internal dynamics of Ecowas and by the interests of its members. Partners such as France, the United States and the European Union have deferred to the decisions of Ecowas, formally, but certainly, too, by asserting their interests.
The measures taken differ from country to country. The toughest attitude was reserved for Mali: freezing of financial assets and travel ban for 150 personalities linked to the junta, closure of borders, financial and commercial embargo with the exclusion of basic necessities and freezing of assets of the Malian state in banks of member countries. Guinea is suspended from all instances of Ecowas, which also announced the freezing of the financial assets of members of the junta and their families. Burkina Faso has been suspended by Ecowas. The country was given the softest treatment.
Two conclusions can be drawn from all this: Ecowas is not sure how to behave in the face of this “coup epidemic”. It is to be assumed that many member states are thinking about what could happen to them. So be careful. The military, after having declared that they want to refound the states and made high-sounding promises to the populations, have realized that power is not so bad. Therefore, the imperative is to keep it for as long as possible, as the price to pay is not so dramatic.