The former president of Burkina Faso is making his first trip outside the country since the military coup of January 24, 2022.
After a stopover of a few hours on Thursday in Abidjan, the Ivorian capital, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré flew to the United Arab Emirates. He had not experienced this feeling for seven months when he was overthrown by a group of soldiers led by Lieutenant Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba, the current caretaker president.
His visit to this Gulf country has health motivations, according to his relatives. “It is not a medical evacuation. It is for a medical examination, planned for a long time, and to rest,” one of them told RFI, specifying that he does not suffer from any particular disease, but just needed to do some medical checks.
In Ouagadougou, however, some sources believe that the short period of detention of the 65-year-old former president, has had effects on his health to the point that he now expresses the desire to go abroad for a medical check-up, with the approval of the transitional authorities. After his release, some people quickly noticed that Roch Marc Christian Kaboré had lost weight.
In addition, some questioned the reasons for his stopover in Abidjan, where his predecessor Blaise Compaoré lives in exile since his fall in October 2014. “The agenda of former President Kaboré during the stopover in Cote d’Ivoire has not been disclosed,” said a former aide while other observers believe that “something has been prepared” between the two men.
In recent weeks, the head of the military junta has come close to the former heads of state of Burkina Faso in an attempt to find “social cohesion in view of the difficult situation” that the country is experiencing due to jihadist violence. But a recent meeting in Ouagadougou with his predecessors, in the presence of ex-president Blaise Compaoré, who returned expressly from Cote d’Ivoire, created a controversy and led to a demonstration by opponents.
ODL/cgd/lb/abj/APA