Burkina Faso's PM resigns, helpless in the face of jihadist attacks

Burkina Faso’s prime minister resigned Wednesday evening (8 December) after several protests by the population denouncing the government's inability to fight recurrent jihadist attacks that plague the West African country every week. The resignation of the Prime Minister automatically entails that of the government, according to the law in Burkina Faso.

Christophe Joseph Dabiré, prime minister of Burkina Faso since January 2019, handed a letter of resignation to the president, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, who accepted it. “The functions of prime minister of Christophe Joseph Dabiré are terminated”, the secretary general of the government, Stéphane Wenceslas Sanou, declared on public television whilst reading a presidential decree.

Despite this resignation, in accordance with the law, "the members of the outgoing government are responsible for the day-to-day running of the ministerial departments until a new government is formed," said Sanou.

“I invite the Burkinabè, as a whole, to mobilize, to support the president of Faso and the new executive that will be put in place. I remain convinced that it is through unity of action that we will be able to meet the challenges. with which our country and our people are confronted”, declared Christophe Joseph Dabiré on his Facebook page.

For several weeks, anger had been building against the executive. On 9 November, the opposition notably demanded “urgent measures” to deal with the “deterioration of the security situation”, within a month. And on 27 November, hundreds of protestors took to the streets of the capital Ouagadougou to denounce the “inability” of the government to counter the jihadist violence that plagues the country since 2015.

 

source: commonspace.eu with France24 (Île-de-France) and agencies.
photo: Christophe Joseph Dabiré in May 2021; @ChristopheDabir (Twitter).

Related articles

Editor's choice
News
Mark Carney: "The world is in the midst of a rupture, not a transition"

Mark Carney: "The world is in the midst of a rupture, not a transition"

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said the "old order is not coming back" and urged fellow middle powers to come together in a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. "Middle powers must act together because if we're not at the table, we're on the menu," Carney said on Tuesday, adding that he believed powerful nations were using economic coercion to get what they want. He also affirmed Canada's support for Greenland, Denmark and the Nato alliance, drawing applause. "Great powers" are often defined as countries with permanent seats on United Nations Security Council - China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States - which shows their economic and military dominance in the world. Middle powers, such as Canada, Australia, Argentina, South Korea and Brazil, are nations that still exert large influence in global politics, even though their economies are smaller. In his speech, Carney said the world is "in the midst of a rupture, not a transition". "Great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited," he said. He also said "Canada was amongst the first to hear the wake-up call" that geography and historic alliances no longer guaranteed security or prosperity. As a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato), Canada stands firmly with Greenland and Denmark and supports "their unique right to determine Greenland's future", Carney said in his speech. "Our commitment to Article Five is unwavering," the prime minister added, referring to a clause in the Nato agreement that states an attack against one member state is considered an attack on all. (read the full speech of the Canadian prime minister at Davos by clicking the picture).

Popular

Editor's choice
Interview
Thursday Interview: Murad Muradov

Thursday Interview: Murad Muradov

Today, commonspace.eu starts a new regular weekly series. THURSDAY INTERVIEW, conducted by Lauri Nikulainen, will host  persons who are thinkers, opinion shapers, and implementors in their countries and spheres. We start the series with an interview with Murad Muradov, a leading person in Azerbaijan's think tank community. He is also the first co-chair of the Action Committee for a new Armenian-Azerbaijani Dialogue. Last September he made history by being the first Azerbaijani civil society activist to visit Armenia after the 44 day war, and the start of the peace process. Speaking about this visit Murad Muradov said: "My experience was largely positive. My negative expectations luckily didn’t play out. The discussions were respectful, the panel format bringing together experts from Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Turkey was particularly valuable during the NATO Rose-Roth Seminar in Yerevan, and media coverage, while varied in tone, remained largely constructive. Some media outlets though attempted to represent me as more of a government mouthpiece than an independent expert, which was totally misleading.  Overall, I see these initiatives as important steps in rebuilding trust and normalising professional engagement. The fact that soon a larger Azerbaijani civil society visits to Armenia followed, reinforces the sense that this process is moving in the right direction." (click the image to read the interview in full)