What’s next for Burkina Faso?

On Wednesday, February 2 at 19:30GMT:
West Africa has been hit by a wave of coups over the last 18 months, with governments being overthrown in Mali, Guinea, Chad and, last week, Burkina Faso. On Tuesday, in the latest attempted putsch, which appears to have failed, armed men surrounded the government palace in Guinea-Bissau.

In this episode of The Stream, we will ask what is behind such a large number of coups for one region and we’ll also look closely at the most recent, in Burkina Faso.

The country’s military coup leaders have now restored the constitution a week after toppling the country’s government and named coup leader, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaoga Damiba, interim president.

The army made the announcement on Monday, just hours after the African Union suspended Burkina Faso until civilian rule was back in place. The military says Damiba’s appointment is just for a transitional period, although no timeline was given.

Rising public anger over a security crisis, which resulted in street protests in the capital, helped to fuel the coup. Many Burkinabes had grown increasingly frustrated with President Roch Kabore’s apparent inability to thwart attacks by armed groups with links to ISIL and al-Qaeda.

In this episode of The Stream, we talk about West Africa’s mounting coups and ask what’s next for Burkina Faso.

In this episode of The Stream, we are joined by:
Henry Wilkins, @Henry_Wilkins
Freelance Journalist

Lassane Ouedraogo, @lassaneo
Adjunct Professor, Universite Libre du Burkina