By Abdul Hameed
The harsh reality is that Comrade Ibrahim Traoré is a dead man walking. We must live with that reality. Once France and the U.S. have set their sights on him, it is just a matter of time.
They don’t like him fundamentally because they are unable to get access to his country’s resources while he is in charge. That is the exact reason Sudan is in flames. Who do you think funds the Rapid Support Forces? This is the same reason Congo is in flames. Who funds the rebels? They say Rwanda—but whose interest is Rwanda fronting?
It is a complete lie to suggest that Ibrahim Traoré is being targeted because there is human rights abuse in Burkina Faso. There is no country in the world with a worse human rights record (past and present) than the U.S. The U.S. cannot lecture any country on human rights.
Unfortunately, they have succeeded in sowing seeds of discord among Traoré’s men. It won’t be long until one of them (literally) stabs him in the back. Blaise Compaoré killed Thomas Sankara. They were friends from school days into military training. Sankara’s family welcomed Blaise into their home, fed him, and supported him. When Sankara became head of state, Blaise was his right-hand man. But he forgot their friendship and connived with Félix Houphouët-Boigny, the then Ivorian president, to get rid of Sankara. It is the same script that is playing out now—a perfect puppet in Alassane Ouattara is facilitating the compromise of Traoré’s men to take him down, and I personally believe they will succeed soon.
Just as they succeeded in taking down Muammar Gaddafi—and we did nothing—they will take down Traoré, and we won’t be able to do anything. Already, some politicians from Nigeria and Kenya (two countries very friendly to imperialism) have started referring to him as a mere hype who has offered nothing to his people. Much as there is some hype and misinformation about Traoré—and in fact, it is not all milk and honey in Burkina—there is also evidence to show that Traoré is working for his people and is taking control of the ownership and exploration of mineral resources from European and American interests.
Some of the accusations against him are that he has banned the critical press, he’s not conducting free elections, there is no opposition—bla bla bla. Israel has banned critical press, killed journalists in the line of duty, killed volunteers in their line of work, etc. Why is the U.S. not having a problem with that? Paul Kagame and Faure Gnassingbé have banned and oppressed opposition, do not conduct any credible elections, and have banned free media. Why is nobody having a problem with them? There are many military leaders who got to power through coup d’états in Africa. Why is Ibrahim Traoré the only one that is wanted? These are critical questions we should ask ourselves.
In a recent video widely circulated online, the current U.S. Vice President was heard clearly stating that they are at war with China because the goal of globalization was to ensure that smaller countries supply cheap labour and raw materials to the bigger countries to drive their development. But China decided to not only supply cheap labour and raw materials—they copied, perfected the act of production, and became competitive. That’s why they are currently targeting China with false propaganda and tariffs.
In Ghana, Nkrumah was brought down because he was accused of being a dictator who abused human rights and all that. Those who came after him did worse. In Congo, Lumumba was killed—some of his body parts dissolved in acid—because he would rather take control of his resources and put his people first than allow Belgium to continue to exploit them. Italy dropped bombs on Ethiopia because they couldn’t stand seeing an African country prosper. Thomas Sankara and Gaddafi died for the same reason. Laurent Gbagbo was harassed out of power because he was beginning to cut his country from France’s umbilical cord. The history goes on and on and on—and in all that, they are able to find conspirators within the countries to help execute their plans. Unfortunately, Traoré won’t be different.