In Burkina Faso, attacks and Robberies have increased since 2016 is palpable. Nearly 136,000 people are in front of the violence on the run. It is also a self-defense militia patches nothing – on the contrary.
In the refugee camp of Barsalogho 1400 people
In the refugee camp of Barsalogho in the North of Burkina Faso, dozens of children sit in a small hut. Woven mats to keep out the sun. The Little ones sing, clap and play with their teachers. The most since January here. It is completely uncertain, how long have you and the rest of the nearly 1,400 residents have to stay.
The reason for their escape: In the North of the country, it is for 2016 more and more often to attacks and massacres, this Monday (29.04.) only were killed in an attack on a Church of five people. Terrorist groups and organized crime to flourish, ethnic tensions do the Rest. According to estimates by the United Nations (UN) are now almost 136,000 people fleeing. The massacre of Yirgou at the beginning of January was the reason why the Camp in Barsalogho ever built.
Murders, retaliatory acts, and rumors of the time had let the already tense mood between ethnic groups in the Region escalate. Various reportedly were killed between 49 and more than 200 people, most of them members of the ethnic group Peul, who are called in Anglophone Africa, Fulani.
Self-defense militia under suspicion
The 40-year-old Adama Dicko stares off into the distance. She lives in one of the tents and recalls haltingly of the attack on Yirgou and the people are neighbor villages: “to kill us. You have also killed my husband. We walked in the forest.” Police officers or soldiers had come days in the village, to tell the refugees and criticize the security authorities sharp.
Adama Dicko has to return to the fear, in your village
Adama Dicko and the other inhabitants of the refugee camps agree: responsible For the massacre of the members of the Koglweogo. So the self-defense militia, which was established in 2015 in the whole country. Translated, the Name means “guardian of the forest”. After the fall of long time ruler Blaise Compaoré, and the new elections a year later, the hopes for a more democratic Burkina Faso were great. At the same time there was uncertainty in the direction in which the stable Sahelian state to develop.
Militia fills security vacuum
“Since the state did not have the means to organize security for its citizens, have you done the self,” says Bienvenue Ambroise Bakyono about the beginnings of the self-defense militia. Bakyono sitting for the ruling party, the movement of people for progress (MPP) in the Parliament and is Deputy President of the defence and security Commission.
Since then, the group moves in a grey zone. In the capital city of Ouagadougou and their representatives will be invited to discussion sessions and sit with members of the civil society and regular security agencies at a table. In the province, Centre-Nord, in the Barsalogho and Yirgou, is at least their existence by the official Letter of recognition.
The Koglweogo have ensured safety, Moumini Ouedraogo
Moumini Ouedraogo is happy. He is a member of the Koglweogo and at the local level is responsible for the communication with the public administration. “The Foundation was absolutely necessary,” he says in the Koglweogo headquarters in the provincial capital of Kaya. “You could go neither in the city nor in the villages for a walk. No longer was self home safely.”
Too few police officers in Burkina Faso
The allegations, to the massacres in and around Yirgou have been involved, he and the rest of the men. On the contrary, their presence have ensured that the bandits are no road blockages, more buildings, livestock would not be stolen and the people again felt safe. A little later Moumini grants Ouedraogo, however: “of Course, that should make the police. However, you have in proportion to population, far too few people. If we catch someone, we call the police.” Anyway, his group was not armed, he protested. “If the others have weapons, we can do nothing. That would be too dangerous.”
Everyone knows that the danger is there, says Rodrigue Wangraoua
The Koglweogo be praised by representatives of the authorities often, also the armament of the group was discussed. Rodrigue Wangraoua, Secretary-General of the regional Centre-North, sees this critically: “If an armed group within the population, for the safety of others, then that is a danger.” No one can control or influence.
Burkina Faso is destabilized
There are, however, not only local conflicts with ethnic coloration, the distrust in Burkina Faso and an increase in anxiety. Again and again it comes to attacks by Islamist terror groups, even in the capital, Ouagadougou. “There is the aspect of Jihadism and cross-border crime,” says the member of Parliament Bienvenue Ambroise Bakyono. The destabilizing the country, in addition, because the terrorists were the existence of the Burkinabe state in question.
Especially the North of the country, as well as the border regions of Niger and to the neighboring country of Benin are affected. “Everyone knows that the danger is there,” Rodrigue Wangraoua in Kaya. Noticeable is that also in the economic field. Burkina Faso has long been one of the poorest countries in the world and is in the UN development index ranked 183 out of 189. “In the case of a terrorist threat some people for other markets,” feared Wangraoua. And the weaknesses of Burkina Faso.