OUAGADOUGOU,
Burkina Faso — He recently boasted that the streets would never oust
him, not after he had won at the ballot box and survived multiple
violent outbursts against his 27-year rule.
But
after days of turmoil in which protesters burned the Parliament
building here and set fire to the homes of his relatives and aides,
President Blaise Compaoré of Burkina Faso
announced Friday that he had stepped down — a rare case of the kind of
popular uprising that toppled autocrats during the Arab Spring
succeeding in sub-Saharan Africa.
The political demise of Mr. Compaoré, 63, who stoked some of the region’worst conflicts but later refashioned himself into an elder statesman
committed to resolving them, closed the book on one of Africa’s most
enduring rulers in a region where some leaders cling to power for
decades.“When you imagine that our young men and women who are now 27 years old
have known a single president, it’s absurd,” said Issouf Traore, a
44-year-old business owner who took to the streets this week to demand
the president’s resignation.With a mix of guile and charm, Mr. Compaoré managed to juggle alliances
with Western governments and the Libyan leader Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi,
turning himself into a regional power broker whose influence far
outweighed the resources of his nation: a poor, landlocked country where
more than half of the population has had no other leader.“The demonstrations he could live with; he’s had that over the years,”
said Pierre Englebert, a professor of African politics at Pomona
College. “When they went for Parliament and set it on fire, then it went
to a different level. It showed a certain resolve by the
demonstrators.”
Mr.
Compaoré’s dual and often contradictory roles on the continent meant
that he both fed conflict and, in later years, earned praise on the
international stage for working to foster peace and greater stability.
“He
has always been an extremely adept and sophisticated player in that
region,” said Lansana Gberie, a historian from Sierra Leone who has
written about the civil war there. “It has confounded many people.”
Historians have described Mr. Compaoré as a principal supporter of Charles G. Taylor, the former Liberian president convicted in 2012 of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
During the civil war in Sierra Leone more than a decade ago, American officials accused
Mr. Compaoré of fueling the violence by funneling arms to rebels and
sending mercenaries to fight alongside them against United Nations
peacekeepers in exchange for diamonds.
But
Mr. Compaoré often took on the role of regional peacemaker as well.
This year, the United Nations secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, commended
him for “his contribution to peace and stability in Mali,” including
his help in reaching an agreement for a cease-fire after that country, a
neighbor, was split in half by an insurgency.
A few years earlier, the United Nations Security Council had singled him out
for “his critical role” in supporting the peace process in Ivory Coast —
another country where he has been accused of stoking instability.
He
remained close to the French during his presidency and came to be seen
as a pro-Western leader and ally in the battle against Islamist
militancy in the region.
“Over
the years, Compaoré has played both the role of accomplice and
peacemaker,” said Corinne Dufka, an associate director at Human Rights
Watch.
As
“big men” like Qaddafi, Mr. Taylor and Foday Sankoh of Sierra Leone
were toppled or indicted, “he took on the role of elder statesman,
filling a vacuum for the role of Francophone negotiator,” Ms. Dufka
said. “But still, why Compaoré’s actions in support of abusive regimes
didn’t receive more scrutiny — indeed, condemnation — has always been a
bit of a mystery.”
Mr.
Compaoré was only 36 when he seized power in a coup in 1987 that felled
his former friend and military colleague Thomas Sankara, a national
hero whose death many in Burkina Faso continue to grieve. Though the precise circumstances of the killing have long been opaque, it has cast a long shadow over Mr. Compaoré for decades, with many residents continuing to see it as an unforgivable betrayal.
The
recent protests against Mr. Compaoré sprang from a legislative proposal
to remove term limits from the Constitution, which would have allowed
him to extend his rule.
The
limits were introduced in 2000, but because of a legal technicality,
they were not applied to Mr. Compaoré until the 2005 elections, which he
won. In 2010, he triumphed again, but he would have been ineligible to
run in 2015 unless the term limits were rescinded.
Opposition to his plans for another term had been building for weeks. Anger exploded Thursday
as protesters stormed the Parliament building, bursting past police
lines to prevent lawmakers from voting on a draft of the legislation.
Thousands
rampaged through the capital, Ouagadougou, burning the homes of
presidential aides and relatives and storming state broadcasting
facilities. Social media sites showed images of demonstrators toppling a
statue of Mr. Compaoré.
