Elections in Mali and Burkina Faso postponed for forever (and a day)

2024 had het jaar van de presidentsverkiezingen moeten worden in zowel Mali als Burkina Faso. Maar de junta’s in beide Sahellanden onder leiding van respectievelijk Assimi Goïta en Ibrahim Traoré lijken niet te staan te springen om een einde te maken aan hun militaire ‘overgangsregimes’. Integendeel. Verkiezingen zijn er uitgesteld tot sint-juttemis…

After a few twists and turns in the calendar following Colonel Assimi Goïta’s coup, the Malian transition was extended “for 24 months, starting on 26 March 2022”. In Burkina Faso, a few weeks after Captain Ibrahim Traoré took power, the transition charter adopted on 14 October 2022 set the end of the transition for 1 July 2024.

The Malian deadline has already passed. As for the Burkina Faso authorities, who are two months from the expiration date, they have explained that organising elections is not ‘a priority’.

These electoral commitments had been made to the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), an institution to which Mali and Burkina Faso have slammed the door, supposedly because they no longer feel obliged to meet its requirements.

As for national opinions, the people have been offered a sort of ‘High Mass’ in the form of ‘national assemblies’.

More dialogue

The proponents of the ‘inter-Malian dialogue’ are not only trying to make light of the fact that the transitional deadlines will not be met, but are also suggesting, in one of the proposals put forward during the regional phase, that the transition should be extended from 12 to 36 months.

The high-end estimate would allow the colonels – or potentially generals, according to another proposal – to continue holding power for almost seven years.

In Burkina Faso, the Assemblée Législative de Transition (ALT) has unanimously agreed to hold a new national assembly.

After a statement by Traoré explaining that he was not interested in power, the initial meetings provided participants with a document before the debates, reserving the transitional period leadership role for the captain.

Ersatz elections

“What [kind of] elections and for whom?” is certainly what the junta aficionados are wondering, convinced of the popular 2.0 legitimacy of their heroes. And should they use fake or genuine images in their campaign?

Social media networks in Burkina Faso are circulating an image announcing a ‘people’s meeting’ in support of the transition, with the slogan ‘No to elections’ in red letters.

Costly and ruinous election campaigns … convoluted speeches and procedures that are incomprehensible to the majority.

Is this a lack of coordination on the part of the pro-IT [Ibrahim Traoré] movement? The leaflet also proclaims ‘No to the National Assemblies’.

As long as the loudest part of the population supports the idea of a national meeting and elections, the latter will be no more than an imitation.

Referring to past elections in his country’s four republics, Burkinabe Prime Minister Apollinaire Joachim Kyelem de Tambela denounced the ‘costly and ruinous election campaigns’ and the ‘convoluted speeches and procedures that are incomprehensible to the majority’.

He seems to prefer the ‘democracy’ in which ‘traditional societies’ lived. Without ballot boxes.

The prolonged transition could eventually end with an ‘election’ that doesn’t include universal suffrage. Mali has demonstrated through its constitutional referendum in June 2023 that it still gives credence to nationwide ballots. But for how much longer?

By Damien Glez

Damien Glez is columnist en cartoonist bij Jeune Afrique. Hij schrijft vooral over West-Afrika.

Dit opiniestuk verscheen op 6 mei 2024 op de website van The Africa Report: https://www.theafricareport.com/346803/elections-in-mali-and-burkina-faso-postponed-for-forever-and-a-day/

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Lees verder (inhoud juni 2024)