After 27 years of presidency, former President Blaise Compaoré was forced from power in 2014 due to his contested political victory and corruption allegations. Since then, protests and political unrest have escalated in Burkina Faso. Although he was forced from power and presidential and legislative elections soon followed, the majority of people who gained power were those from Compaoré’s administration. Since 2015, north and east Burkina Faso has faced attacks from al-Qaeda and ISIL. Since 2019, these attacks occurred nearly every day. A recent attack in June 2021 in a northeastern village resulted in the deaths of almost 160 people, which marked the worst attack in Burkina Faso in six years. In the past few years, 1.8 million people fled their homes due to jihadist attacks. Over 1.5 million people are in need of humanitarian assistance and 87,000 people are internally displaced. In 2022, Lieutenant-General Paul‑Henri Sandaogo Damiba forced President Roch Marc Kaboré out of power in an attempt to combat the rising jihadist violence suffered in the country. In this attempt, he dissolved the parliament and government. This coup follows a series of other military coups that have occurred in the past year in West Africa and the Sahel. Damiba promised to follow a three-year transition period into democratic elections in 2025.
Peace attempts:
In 2017, the United Nations launched a peace agenda to allocate funds to promote reconciliation and security-sector reform in the country. Following a worsening security crisis in the past few years, UN efforts were forced to reform to the increasing needs of the country. Current president (then) Damiba has attempted to improve efforts at local reconciliation, with increased levels of community-level dialogues and peace talks with jihadists in the past year. Burkina Faso has become the epicentre of conflict in the Sahel due to the efforts of armed groups to seize the country’s trade routes and gold mines. Further, the country is ranked the second-most neglected displacement crisis in the world.
In more recent developments, the transitional military regime led by Ibrahim Traoré (who took power in a subsequent coup) has extended its rule beyond the promised transition period and in July 2025 formally dissolved the independent electoral commission, transferring election responsibilities to the interior ministry and allowing Traoré to remain in power until July 2029. (AP News) Burkina Faso formally exited the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) in January 2025 along with Mali and Niger, undermining regional democracy frameworks. (Reuters) The human rights situation has further deteriorated: in 2024 alone, an estimated 6,000 civilians died in conflict-related violence between January and August, over 2.3 million people were forced from their homes, and the junta’s crackdown on media and dissent escalated. (Human Rights Watch) Militias allied to the state such as the Rapid Intervention Battalions (BIR) and Volunteers for the Defence of the Homeland (VDP) have been accused of massacres and serious rights abuses, particularly against Fulani civilians. (Le Monde.fr) These patterns point to peace that remains fragile and whose durability is undermined by unresolved governance deficits, pervasive insecurity and systemic injustice.
