Burkina Faso: The Irony of Human Rights Activists, Journalists
By Elempe Dele
Although the online mob has been at the forefront of the glorification of the 36-year old Burkina Faso military dictator, Captain Ibrahim Traoré, I am particular more interested in how and why human rights activists, even journalists, are wired into the irony since they have been led into the Traore fold where AI-generated images, Deepfake technologies, identity and mind theft, and algorithmic presentations have been used to substitute the dictator for an African god.
Just recently, a human right activist in Edo State, Nigeria, my immediate constituency, was detained and questioned by the Nigerian Department of State Service, DSS, for allegedly planning a rally in support for the Burkina Faso dictator, which could possibly incite the citizens against the democratically elected government. Now, my question is – what I find unnerving, how possible for a supposed human right activist to lend such a support to a military dictator that has abrogated all democratic norms in his country? To me, its like a Christian going to meet the devil for vengeance.
Under Captain Traore, according to independent reports, people in the Burkina Faso have faced arbitrary arrest for ‘plotting against the state.’ The said victims, ironically are human activists, journalists, court magistrates, critics and ordinary citizens. There are enforced disappearances. Some of those who disappear would later be conscripted to join the military at war against the insurgents. Nothing will be heard of others. Atiana Sege Oulon, editor of the biweekly investigative newspaper, LEvenement, was such a victim, as well as journalist, Alain Traore, television presenters, Kalifara Sere and Adama Bayala. Up till date, the whereabouts of some of these victims are unknown.
In November last year, the government, without court authority, froze assets of individuals, including exiled opponents, critics, human right activists, that were accused of involvement in terrorism.
Under Traore, there are arbitrary detention, and the story is always accusation of ‘involvement in coup plot’, an MO used by military dictators worldwide. Those arrested are held incommunicado, and court injunctions for release of these victims are rejected by the junta.
Other several rights of the people have been violated by the military junta including abuses by the government forces. For example, last year over 200 civilians were killed in Soro and Nodin villages.
There are also clamp down on rights to information. Last year, the junta, through its agency, the Higher Communications Council, CSC, suspended some broadcasters including BBC and Voice of America, VOA. Access to several websites were also affected during that period.
It is this conundrum, this irony, that kept me awake this small hours before dawn; why and how can human rights activists in Nigeria, youth, social reformers, elites, even journalists, lend their support to a junta that has suspended democracy, littering its country with human rights abuses, in the backyard of their ideological rival?
In my next offering on this topic, I am going to try to analyse why Captain Traore, the head of the military junta in Burkina Faso, is being glorified online in Nigeria and beyond.
Elempe Dele, a journalist, wrote from, Okpe, Akoko-Edo, Edo State.
