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Burkina Faso votes in Sunday’s general elections in the shadow of a growing jihadist insurgency. With 40 percent of the country under the age of 30, the youth vote could be a major factor in incumbent Roch Marc Christian Kabore getting a second term.
Approximately 6.5 million people are called to vote at the polls on Sunday, but at least 400,000 people, almost 7 percent of the electorate, will not be able to vote because they cannot access the polling places due to security risks.
One fifth of the country’s territory is effectively outside the control of the state and subject to regular jihadist attacks.
Violence has forced one million people, five percent of the 20 million inhabitants, to leave their homes in the past two years, and at least 1,200 have died since 2015.
The security crisis in Burkina Faso has dominated the campaign and an undisclosed number of troops have been deployed for election day in the landlocked West African country, one of the poorest in the world.
13 candidates
12 opposition candidates are running against Roch Marc Christian Kabore, who is seeking a second term.
The incumbent promised development and prosperity, but failed to stop the bloodshed.
However, political scientist Drissa Traore said that Kabore remains “the great favorite against an opposition that has failed to rally behind a single candidate.”
Kabore can avoid a runoff by winning more than 50 percent of the vote in the first round on Sunday, as he did in the last election in 2015.
The main challengers
Kabore’s two main rivals are Zephirin Diabre and Eddie Komboigo.
Diabre is the veteran opposition leader, runner-up in 2015 and has a lot of young support that could be decisive in a country where 40 percent are between 18 and 30 years old.
Meanwhile, Komboigo leads the party of ousted former President Blaise Compaore and enjoys the large network of funding it provides.
Both men sought to exploit the security situation, which could harm the president. Many of their votes come from the countryside, where so many have fled.
“Traditionally, cities are not favorable to the incumbent president. The current situation could reduce Kabore’s chances of winning, ”Siaka Coulibaly, from the Center for Monitoring Public Policy by Citizens in Ouagadougou, told Reuters.
Campaign route marked by bloodshed
The top three candidates concluded their campaigns on Friday, and Komboigo told a rally in the capital, Ouagadougou, that Compaore, now living in exile, “would return with full honors.”
Kabore packed Ouagadougou’s largest stadium with tens of thousands of supporters wearing the orange of his ruling party.
And Diabre told thousands in the economic capital Bobo Dioulasso that his proposals “can help our country get ahead.”
The campaign was marked by bloodshed.
Earlier this month, fourteen soldiers were killed in an ambush in the north claimed by the armed group Islamic State, one of the deadliest attacks against the army in the five-year insurgency.
Days later, the propaganda arm of the Islamic State published a photo of two jihadists killing a man dressed in an army uniform, but the army denied that there had been a new attack.
Dialogue with jihadists?
Almost all of Kabore’s challengers have asked that dialogue with the jihadists be explored, a suggestion that Kabore has emphatically rejected.
Diabre said that “military action alone has never been able to defeat terrorism anywhere in the world.”
“Along with military action, there must be other actions.”
One of Kabore’s efforts has been the creation earlier this year of state-supervised volunteer militias, called Volunteers for the Defense of the Nation (VDP).
(with newswires)
