Burkina Faso’s young coup leader, Ibrahim Traore, was sworn-in as the country’s new interim president on Friday, reported The France 24.
Traore, dressed in military fatigues and a scarf with the country’s national colours, took the oath of office in the capital Ouagadougou under tight security on Friday. He pledged support for a transition leading to elections in July 2024.
“We are confronted with a security and humanitarian crisis without precedent,” Burkina Faso’s new president said after taking the oath.
“Our aims are none other than the reconquest of territory occupied by these hordes of terrorists,” he added. “Burkina’s existence is in danger”.
Earlier this week, Burkina Faso’s constitutional council announced that Traore had been designated as “president of the transition, head of state, and supreme chief of the national armed forces” by a national meeting of some 300 delegates from political parties and several religious and social groups and security forces.
Traore led a group of rebellious military officers on September 30 in the second coup in eight months in the West African country. The coup ousted Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba from power due to his inability to deal with the country’s worsening security conditions. Damiba had himself seized power in a coup in January this year, forcing out Burkina Faso’s last elected president, Roch Marc Christian Kabore from power.
Meanwhile, on Thursday, the United Nations (UN) said Burkina Faso’s humanitarian situation has become so bad that some women and children were forced to eat just leaves and salt for weeks.
In a statement, Martin Griffiths, the UN’s Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, said growing insecurity and blockades in many parts of the country have left communities cut off from the rest of the country and facing growing hunger. He said aid workers are finding it difficult to reach to these people who need assistance.
