The Water and Forestry Special Intervention Unit has been disbanded for “severe acts of indiscipline,” the government reported on Wednesday 28 February, at the end of the Council of Ministers.
According to the Minister for the Environment, Roger Barro, a mission of this special unit was deployed on Friday 16 February 2024 in the Hauts-Bassins region, “as part of operations to secure forest area” in the western sector of the country.
On Sunday 18 February 2024, the Command decided to suspend the operation and carry out another mission in the Centre-West region, the Minister added.
Some elements, 165 in number, “in an act of defiance,” wanted to continue the first mission, the government said.
“The unit refused to accept. It was therefore ordered to return to Ouagadougou. Once in the capital, it took the Director General of Water and Forests hostage, preventing him from leaving. After a great deal of negotiation, the unit was disarmed,” Minister Roger Baro explains.
He considers that these are “serious and extremely serious offences” and that those at fault are liable to disciplinary action.
The 250-strong Special Water and Forestry Unit was set up in 2023 and became operational in the second half of the same year.
Members of an elite police unit based in the east of the country were recalled to Ouagadougou last week for similar reasons.
On 22 February, the national police ended the mission and security activities of elements of the 9th Groupement des Unites Mobiles d’Intervention (GUMI 9), based in the east of the country.
The police officers had been recalled to Ouagadougou in order, according to the General Management, to “reorganise and deal with all the problems of this GUMI.”
At the end of December 2023, Captain Ibrahim Traore had promised to punish all acts of indiscipline within the Defence and Security Forces.
Since the beginning of the year, four soldiers have been struck off the army’s rolls for several charges.
DS/ac/fss/abj/APA