We could see it coming; everything pointed at what was to come. Yet it was more surprising than what I had imagined.
On Tuesday, October 21, in a Special Council of Ministers, the Government considered a bill to modify article 37 of the Constitution in order to allow the President, Blaise Compaoré – who’d already been in power for 27 years, to try for a fifth term. The Council decided to send the bill to the National Assembly, which, with a two-thirds majority in the vote, would have approved the modification. The Assembly was set to meet on Thursday the 30.
In response, the opposition convened a campaign of civil disobedience to begin on Tuesday the 28. The Government announced the closing of all schools from Monday the 27 through Friday the 31.
A tempest was brewing. So – under the appropriate guidance – as a precaution against what could happen, we decided to stay in our homes from the 28 until a new order was established.
The day before the civil disobedience – the 27 – all loose ends tied up in Rimkieta with provisions of water, food and gas.
The first demonstration – “women in support of the opposition,” took place that afternoon. I can’t deny how proud I felt to see the women demonstrate with their spatulas in hand, with force and passion that –given women’s place in this society – are infrequent. It is considered a very threatening gesture for a woman to raise a spatula to a man – the spatula with which she prepares the traditional fare of millet or corn: tô. I was on the brink of grabbing my own spatula and joining them.
DAY 1, Tuesday the 28: Ouagadougou was deserted. Everything was closed. A mass demonstration was held all over the country. In the capital it was said that there were a million people (the number seems high to me…); even if they were a quarter as many, the call to demonstrate was successful beyond anything seen before in the country. The demonstration against modifying the law was peaceful, led by the main opposition party leaders and by representatives of “Balai Citoyen” – a grass roots movement of young people ready to go to any lengths to prevent the president from continuing in power.
DAY 2, Wednesday the 29: Another demonstration, this one convened by labor movements against “the high cost of living,” also went off without incident. During the day, the government set in motion security measures to assure that the ministers – staying at a hotel just meters from the National Assembly – would be able to vote the following day without event.
DAY 3, Thursday the 30: Despite the deployment of strong security measures, the elite forces’ attempts to disperse the demonstrators with tear gas, water shots and firing into the air did not prevent the crowd from entering the Assembly. After sacking it, they set fire to the building, and did the same to the RTB (Burkina’s radio and television station). The airport was closed and all flights cancelled. The Government’s spokesperson confirmed that the vote would not be held. But the young people wanted more: they wanted the president to step down. And so the rioting began in all the country’s cities. The most violent and uncontrolled rioters took to sacking and in some cases setting fire to stores, hotels (the worst affected was where the ministers were staying), the homes of people in high political offices and their families, town halls, political party headquarters, etc. They took everything: doors, windows, tables, chairs, appliances, beds, mattresses, toilets, faucets, clothes, electric cables…. everything!! A whatsapp chat group through which we shared what we were seeing in first person connected the Spanish expat community. Some, like myself, were mere spectators from our homes, but others suffered truly stressful experiences, fortunately without incident. Rumors bred one after the other, endlessly. Just after five in the afternoon, a radio communiqué announced that the president had understood the public’s message and had dissolved the government, declared martial law and retracted the bill to modify the law. The communiqué did not manage to calm people’s doubts. The measures the president announced were not enough. The battle waged on, insisting on the president’s resignation and his replacement by Kouamé Lougué, a retired ex coronel. At seven o’clock, the army’s commander-in-chief announced the National Assembly’s dissolution, the establishment of an interim government, and a countrywide curfew from 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. Uncertainty remained. We didn’t know what role the president would play in the transition. There were ever more rumors, looting and pillaging and “coming to terms” with political operatives. At day’s end – just before 10 p.m., the president appeared on television informing us that he was dissolving the government and putting a stop to martial law, and that he was still available to lead a transition period. As was unavoidable, this led to even greater confusion, and the demonstrators – unafraid of the curfew – remained on the streets. I went to bed unsure of what was happening, but quite calm. A whole lot has to happen to me to keep me awake!!!
DAY 4, Friday the 31: We awoke with former President Blaise Compaore in power. Just after 1 p.m. he resigned and ran off. At 2 p.m., a coronel, Honoré Traoré, commander-in-chief of the military, declared himself to be president. And we went to sleep that night with Lieutenant Coronel Isaac Zidá – second in command in the president’s security force – in power. Three presidents in less than 24 hours. The same confusion as the night before stayed with me all day as I stayed connected to the Spanish group chat, to RFI, France24, lefaso.net, NewsOuaga, Omega radio and any source of information to try to find out what was happening. The last I heard before falling asleep was the lieutenant coronel in power and the representatives of “Balai Citoyen” calling the entire public to put and end to pillaging, which had continued violently all day, and to enact what was being called “operation ‘mana-mana’,” (which means ‘clean-clean’ in dioula, the language spoken by the country’s second-largest ethnic group: the Bobolais). The curfew was still in force and both air and land borders closed. Again I fell asleep confused over what looked to be a division in the military, but I was calm.
DAY 5: Saturday, November 1: The day dawned in peace. I could hardly have imagined the incredible images that the operation “mana-mana” was to leave printed in my mind’s eye. In yet another example of what makes this place unique and special, men, women, and children, military and civilian, responded in an exemplary fashion and all through the morning they exchanged the rocks, torches and wheelbarrows of the previous day’s looting for brooms and mops. They got to work cleaning the streets of tires, burned cars and motorbikes and the wreckage of the burned and looted buildings. People brought what they had. Some brought trucks to pick up the garbage, others gave water, others food. The scene repeated itself in all the country’s major cities. We spent the entire morning ignorant of what was happening in terms of the governing of the country. At midday, it became known that the president and his entire family had taken refuge in Ivory Coast. An hour later, another declaration from the army commander-in-chief confirmed that all the military forces were in agreement that Lieutenant Coronel Isaac Zida should serve as acting president until a transition government could be formed and general elections held. I couldn’t help but feel optimistic all afternoon, though I went to bed with the news that the opposition and the grass-roots movement were calling on the entire Burkinabé population to dispute the naming of the lieutenant coronel and to gather the following day in the Plaza de la Nación, which they wanted to rename “Plaza de la Revolución.” They wanted to make sure the transition would take them into account.
DAY 6, Sunday the 2: The day broke with a calm that made it tempting to venture outside. After five days holed-up inside the house, the urge was strong. The gathering at the Plaza de la Nación, in which a civil rather than a military transition was demanded, seemed to be proceeding calmly. But unexpectedly, some young people went to the national radio and television station to impede an opposition party president –trying to impose order – from proclaiming himself president of the transition as well. As if things weren’t bad enough all ready… It was a highly tense episode that ended with the army intervening with firearms and one dead. The army took the city center and dispersed the crowds. Again, Ouaga was deserted. And again, rumors were rife and uncertainty returned. The UN, the African Union and the CEDEAO (Economic Community of West African States) made a joint declaration of their wish to see the transition led by a civilian. The US issued a statement along the same lines. Urgent meetings were begun between the acting president the lieutenant coronel and the leaders of the opposition coalition. Other meetings followed with the presidential security forces, with diplomatic representatives and with one of Burkina’s ex presidents. Finally signs of dialogue so that political and civil society could be part of a true democratic transition. We went to bed with another communiqué in which the army assured us that they weren’t interested in power and that the transition would be established by consensus. They confirmed having begun to consult with civil society and political parties and that they would continue the following day with religious and social (“coutumières”) authorities. And they announced that the curfew had been reduced to between midnight and 5 a.m. The recommendation to remain at home was still in force. I had to be careful not to get so comfortable that I wouldn’t want to move later!
DAY 7. Monday the 3. This morning the ban was lifted and I was able to go out, with caution, to take the city’s pulse. I was impressed at how everything seemed back to normal, just like that. As if nothing had happened at all. Aside from the ruins of buildings like the National Assembly, the Independence Hotel – which was a center-city landmark where I’d gone now and then for a dip in the pool – and the former political leaders’ houses, there were no other signs whatsoever of what had transpired on these streets over the last days. The Lieutenant coronel’s meetings kept going all day, and according to what the interested parties were telling us, as of today – Monday, November 3, 2014 at 6 p.m. – everything seemed to be going accordingly.
Rereading the story before posting it, it seems incredible that so much has happened over only six days. The road ahead is long. The balance of change is dramatic. There are no official figures, but people are talking about 30 dead and 200 injured. I feel sure it’s for the good of Burkina.
The experience has taught me that, in a country as fragile as Burkina, everything can change in a minute. It is a country that remains number 181 of 187 countries on any Human Development Index, with 83 % of its population living in “multidimensional poverty’” (health, education, living conditions) according to the United Nations Development Program, whose only concern is how to survive each day.
We could see it coming; everything pointed at what was to come. The hardest part – that the president would resign – has already come to pass. So I hope to be able to get back to normal tomorrow, to routine, to everything I put on hold, because it was as if the world stopped turning. Back to worrying about the uncertainty of Ebola; to the sound of the maternelle children reading aloud as it reaches my office; to the daily “hassles” that the street boys will have in store for me; to the smiles on the faces of the girls in the unschooled girls project as they stop by my office before class to say “hi”; to the weekly collection from the garden harvest sales; to the surveys of family situations we use to adjudicate the bicycles we distribute every month, etc.
Back to my daily life in Rimkieta. Back to happiness.