Even before he was installed as the president of the transition, Captain Ibrahim Traore was under no illusion about the mammoth challenges confronting his leadership of the Burkinabe nation.
The national meetings were scheduled for 48 hours but in the end, these consultations convened by Captain Ibrahim Traoré lasted only 24 hours, at the end of which the 354 delegates from the 13 regions of Burkina Faso arrived at a decision.
The young 34-year-old captain will be the president of the transition for the next 21 months.
The junior officer, who toppled Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba on 30 September, will have the onerous task of “re-establishing and strengthening security throughout the national territory”.
This is one of the remits assigned to the head of state by the transitional charter validated on Friday 14 October at the Ouaga 2000 conference hall in Ouagadougou.
This may be a Herculean task for Captain Traoré who does not have the luxury of time on his side.
The proof is as he was marking the anniversary of the October 15 1987 assassination of Thomas Sankara, he learned of a jihadist ambush against a military detachment in Silmagué or Silmadjé, in the province of Bouroum, more than 187 kilometres north-east of the capital.
An unofficial report suggests that at least ten Burkinabe soldiers were killed.
The Groupe de Soutien à l’Islam et aux Musulmans (GSIM) is being blamed for the incident because of its presence in the area.
The jihadist group affiliated to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) had already warned the new authorities of more raids when claiming responsibility for the attack on a supply convoy in Gaskindé, in the Sahel region.
For the insurgents, the way out of the crisis is through dialogue and not through the force of arms.
“If you want peace, seek it by its own means” they recommended to the new central government.
Will their message be heeded by Damiba’s successor, one of whose missions is also to “work towards national reconciliation and social cohesion”?
The future will tell.
But according to Rida Lyammouri, Senior Researcher at the Policy Center for the New South (PCNS), an influential Moroccan think tank, “Captain Traoré’s first challenge is to work on unifying the security forces before thinking about a possible reversal of the trend in the fight against jihadist groups. The security forces are still divided.
He alludes to the tensions between soldiers during the overthrow of Lieutenant Colonel Damiba by Captain Traoré and his men.
“If he manages to unify the security forces, it will be a good start to the next stage, which is to engage in the mother of all battles against extremist groups,” Mr Lyammouri says.
If this step is taken, the PCNS researcher invites the new authorities to strengthen the means of the security forces to confront the jihadists.
In addition to equipping the military, to which Ouagadougou seems to attach great importance, as evidenced by the recent acquisition of airborne equipment, including Turkish drones called Bayraktar, the researcher adds that the support of Western partners is essential to considerably change the situation on the ground.
To do this, Rida Lyammouri believes that Captain Traoré must be deaf to the voices asking him to call on Russia or mercenaries of the Wagner Group.
“Wagner can achieve small successes on the ground, but they are not effective when it comes to restoring the legitimacy of the state and stabilising territories threatened by non-state armed groups” he adds.
AC/lb/as/APA