By Ken Afor
Barely one year after a successful coup, the Captain Ibrahim Traoré-led military government in Burkina Faso, Tuesday, foiled a military coup attempt.
According to Burkina Faso’s intelligence and security services, the plotters had the motive of causing chaos in the country but it was averted.
The security services said some officers have been arrested while others are on the run.
According to the security services, “A proven coup attempt was foiled on September 26, 2023, by Burkina Faso’s intelligence and security services.
“At present, officers and other alleged participants in this destabilisation attempt have been arrested and others are being actively sought.
“They had the sinister intention of attacking the institutions of the Republic and plunging the country into chaos.”
The military regretted that officers who are under oath to defend the country would deviate into an adventure to hinder the people’s quest of liberation from the claws of terrorists.
It noted that it has launched an investigation based on “credible allegations about a plot against state security implicating officers.”
“We regret that officers whose oath is to defend their homeland have strayed into an undertaking of this nature, which aims to hinder the Burkinabe people’s march for sovereignty and total liberation from the terrorist hordes trying to enslave them,” it stated.
Burkina Faso is one of the seven countries in Africa that is under military dictatorship after the January 24, 2022 incident when President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré was ousted from power by the military, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba.
On September 30, Damiba was ousted by Captain Traoré. The 34-year-old who sees himself as transitional president is expected to hand over to a democratically elected president in 2024 after a scheduled election in July the same year.
According to some schools of thought, Africa is experiencing this current wave because some leaders who were democratically elected into office have refused to relinquish power by changing the constitutions in their country to elongate their tenures and yet with little or no development to show for it.
