Presidential elections in Burkina Faso amidst inter-community tensions, pandemics and jihadism.

The first round of the presidential elections in Burkina Faso will be held tomorrow, 22 November 2020. The Constitutional Council published the minutes of the elections on 22 October. Apart from the current President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, who is running for a second term, the other twelve candidates include some historic opposition leaders such as former economy minister Zéphirin Diabré and other candidates who attract a young audience such as Tahirou Barry. Six years after the resignation of President Blaise Compaoré, who was in power from 1987 to 2014, Burkina Faso's democracy appears to have consolidated. Although talk of political regeneration is beginning to emerge in Burkina Faso, most of the candidates still come from the ministerial portfolios of the last two presidents. Of the thirteen candidates, this is the case of over half of them. Diabré was minister of economy, Kadré Désiré Ouédraogo was former prime minister, Ablassé Ouédraogo was minister of foreign affairs, Gilbert Noël Ouédraogo was minister of transport. Even those who present themselves as leaders of regeneration and attract young people en masse, such as Tahirou Barry, have been in politics for years. Although he resigned early, Barry was President Kaboré's minister of culture. 
 

One of the candidatures that has had the greatest impact is that of Major General Yaccocuba Isaac Zida, who had been in exile in Canada for the past three years and poses a threat to Kaboré owing to his influence among the military. Zida was prime minister of the Transition following Campaoré's resignation. His term was highly controversial as he was the number two in Compaoré's presidential security regime. In 2016 Kaboré considered opening a judicial process against Zida for "desertion in peacetime" and for alleged embezzlement of funds that took place during his term of office. Now that Zida has decided to return, these proceedings could make it difficult for him to enter the country. Her election campaign has been conducted remotely. 

These elections are taking place in a climate of insecurity and a breakdown of social cohesion that is endangering the elections in several regions of the country. The Jihadist attacks in the north of the country by the Ansaroul Islam, JNIM and ISGS terrorist groups have claimed over 1,000 lives so far this year. Jihadist groups mainly attack state security forces and bodies, but, as in Mali, their attacks also target schools. According to the Human Rights Watch report, there have been more than 126 attacks on schools in the period 2019-2020, leading to the closure of more than 2500 schools in the central-northern areas of the country. 
 

In addition to jihadist groups, the other protagonists of the violence are the self-defence militias that have been responsible for the deaths of 1300 civilians during 2019, aggravating inter-community tensions in the northern region of the country. In response to common criminality and Jihadist groups, part of civil society has organised itself into armed militias to protect local populations in places where the state has little presence. This is the example of the Mossi militia of Koglweogo, which aims to protect the populations of the Jihadist group Ansaroul Islam. These militias act as security providers and law enforcers, meaning that they perform these functions in the absence of the state, which gives them dangerous power to act in the region. As some of the members of the Jihadist groups are from the Peul community, the self-defence militias have focused their efforts on attacking the Peul community, equating all the members of this community group with Jihadists. This has led to major massacres of civilians by these militias such as that which occurred on 8 March in the province of Yatenga in the north of the country, where the Koglweogo militias killed at least forty-three Peul civilians in three villages. In January 2019 another similar event occurred in Yirgou where forty-nine Peuls were killed by armed groups. Despite these incidents, the Burkinabe government considers that the formation of state-controlled self-defence militias to defend the villages is a policy that should be encouraged. This is why a law on "volunteers for the defence of the homeland" was passed in January. This law aims to train volunteers for two weeks so that they can protect their villages from the Jihadist threat.
 

This escalation of violence has resulted in nearly 17% of Burkina Faso's electoral districts being unable to participate in the elections because they were unable to ensure the proper conduct of the elections or to properly register voters during the summer. This means that almost 400,000 people will not be able to exercise their right to vote due to "force majeure", according to the government. On the other hand, in addition to the violence in the rural areas of the north and centre of the country, the precarious standard of living in the cities last year led to demonstrations against the government in September for its mismanagement, lack of economic reform and growing insecurity. Coupled with the ravages of the global health crisis and its elections, these elections present numerous challenges for the presidential candidates.