Organized Suppression In ECOWAS – Burkina Faso, Mali and Equatorial Guinea

By Sam Biden, Junior Fellow

19 June, 2025

Introduction

Enforced disappearances and arbitrary detentions have become recurring practices in several states across West Africa, particularly in Burkina Faso, Mali and Equatorial Guinea. These measures are often framed by authorities as necessary for maintaining national security or public order, however, recent developments indicate a growing use of such actions against political opponents, civil society actors, journalists and members of the judiciary. These actions are rarely acknowledged, let alone investigated, by the very institutions tasked with upholding the law.

Burkina Faso

The troubled state of Burkina Faso, with its military-led transitional government, has continued its crackdown on perceived dissidents. Under the aforementioned, all-too-familiar guise of national security, Burkina Faso has engaged in systematic targeting of former military figures, legal professionals, journalists and civilians through the use of arbitrary detention, illegitimate courts and enforced disappearances.

In 2024, former High Commander of the National Gendarmerie, Evrard Somda, was kidnapped under accusations of participating in an attempted coup. His detention, which persisted through the end of the year, was like many others, marked by complete incommunicado status. Similarly, Guy-Hervé Kam, a Burkinabè lawyer, was arrested for the alleged plot within the same month. Despite multiple court injunctions for the release of both parties, the Burkinabè authorities refused to cooperate, labelling the men involved as “plotting against state security”. Re-arrests were also made against former military commander, Emmanuel Zoungrana, ending his 3 years of freedom from his first arrest in 2022. Further arrests followed later with the systematic targeting of the judiciary. In August, seven magistrates serving in the Burkinabè circuit were arrested and forcibly displaced from their families and allegedly forced into conscription, something often used as a punitive tool against dissenters. The basis for the arrests lay in retaliation as the men in question were involved in the investigation of offences committed under the current military regime, a pattern similarly applying to other critics.

Since late November 2023, at least six activists, opposition party members and members of the media have been abducted by unidentified men in the capital of Ouagadougou. That same month, Lamine Ouattara, of the Burkinabè Movement for Human and Peoples’ Rights (MBDHP) was abducted from his home by individuals identifying as intelligence agents, followed by the abduction of human rights activist Daouda Diallo, secretary-general of the Collective Against Impunity and Stigmatization of Communities (CISC), the following month. Two other key figures – Rasmané Zinaba and Bassirou Badjo, both members of the civil society group Balai Citoyen, were abducted in Ouagadougou over 2 days by individuals identifying themselves as government security agents at the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs. In response, Balai Citoyen issued a public statement condemning the abductions and demanding the immediate release of its members. Despite the filing of formal complaints by families and the organization, authorities have taken no action to investigate these incidents. Importantly, the authorities had issued conscription notices to at least a dozen opposition figures, including Diallo, Ouédraogo, Zinaba and Badjo, under the guise of national security operations in November 2023. A new wave of disappearances emerged against journalists in 2024. The disappearance of Atiana Serge Oulon, editor of the biweekly investigative publication L’Évènement, Alain Traoré, an online media journalist, alongside a further two television presenters, Kalifara Séré and Adama Bayala, demonstrated the extension of dissent targeting. By October, the government admitted that Oulon, Séré and Bayala had been conscripted for military service but failed to provide any information on the whereabouts or condition of Traoré, who remains missing to this day. The targeting of journalists holds forth into 2025 with the arrest of popular political activist and national secretary of the current opposing political party Servir et Non se Servir (SENS), Idrissa Barry. As with other examples, Barry’s whereabouts remains a secret with little recourse for discovery. Compounding this concern are reports that the men accused of detaining Barry showed no signs of allegiance to the current regime, appearing in an unmarked vehicle with no identifying uniforms, paired with the knowledge that no arrest warrant was ever issued for Barry, leading some to conclude the use of unidentifiable actors to act on behalf of the government, allowing plausible deniability. Adding further concerns is the fact that SENS had only recently openly criticized the military regime for their massacre of civilians in the town of Solenzo some three months prior, causing many to now believe Barry was targeted directly due to his involvement in SENSs statements.

These crimes have not gone unnoticed on the international stage with the Committee on Enforced Disappearances (CED) drafting multiple recommendations. To address many persistent shortcomings identified, CED called on the government to urgently establish a centralized national registry for disappeared persons to allow the effective tracking of missing persons. This registry would serve as a unified platform, consolidating fragmented public databases and providing a regularly updated, accurate record of all reported disappearances. It is intended not only to document individual cases but also to support broader analysis by identifying patterns, underlying causes and the sociopolitical dynamics behind enforced disappearances. Comprehensive statistical data generated through the registry would enhance search efforts, investigative procedures and preventive measures.

CED acknowledged that the existing legal framework empowers the public prosecution service to initiate proceedings ex officio upon learning of possible enforced disappearances, even without a formal complaint, by any government entity or third party. However, it expressed concern over the lack of evidence demonstrating that this mechanism is being effectively implemented, especially with such little information surrounding the whereabouts of critics. Notably, Burkina Faso had consistently failed to provide any meaningful data regarding the number of investigations launched, their progress, or their outcomes, such as disciplinary measures or criminal sanctions imposed on perpetrators. In response, CERD urged Burkina Faso to ensure that all reports of enforced disappearance are investigated without delay, in a manner that is independent, exhaustive and free from interference by those potentially implicated.

Mali

Similar crackdowns can be seen in neighbouring Mali. In the aftermath of the failed counter-coup of April 2012, the transitional military authorities carried out a wave of arrests against participating soldiers, with over 20 being subject to enforced disappearance by being abducted from their prison cells between May 2-3. One example is that of Baba Lamine Kalouchi, witnesses claim Kalouchi was publicly threatened by government officials during his time in prison, shortly before being subjected to an enforced disappearance the following day, alongside two more inmates, Abdoul Karim Keita and Yuba Diarra. Both Keita and Diarra were forced to appear on national television prior to their disappearance, where they were coerced into admitting involvement in the coup. Other men would be forcibly disappeared in the remainder of 2012 from Gabriel Touré Hospital, which was housing injured persons from the coup at the time. They were abducted by government officials in May with no information provided by the hospital or government in regards to their whereabouts or personal information. The following months saw additional key figures in the counter-coup be abducted, with Lieutenant Moussa Traoré, previous commander of the Mali Red Berets, being among those targeted. Reporting bodies, including Amnesty International, were not able to gather information regarding the location or status of any of those targeted.

Since this initial surge of arrests after the coup, many dissenters, especially journalists and political rivals, have been subject to enforced disappearances for advocating against human rights abuses by the Malian army. One such person is Lieutenant Colonel Alpha Yaga Sangaré who was arrested for publishing a book critical of human rights abuses, with no charges brought against him ever being disclosed, he assumingly faced similar incommunicado treatment as those in Burkina Faso. Another author, Etienne Fabaka Sissiko was also arrested for publishing a book that criticized the government’s use of propaganda. In May, Sissoko was convicted of defamation, tarnishing the state’s image and disseminating false information. He was sentenced to three years in prison, with one year suspended and was fined, yet his conviction was upheld in November when he lost his appeal.

Further arrests of key figures continued in May with Boubacar Traoré being detained on similar grounds to Sissoko. Traoré played a key role in the post-2020 election protests, acting as the interim President of the strategic committee of the June 5th Movement-Rally of Patriotic Forces, a key opposition party from the election run that eventually led former President Keïta to resign and dissolve parliament, allowing the coup to be established. The next month, Malian security forces arrested eleven politicians who were attending a meeting in Bamako at the residence of the vice president of the Alliance for Democracy in Mali–African Party for Solidarity and Justice, a competing political party in Mali. Only four days later, following a summary hearing before an investigating judge, ten of them were remanded in custody with all eleven charged with disturbing public order and plotting against the state. Another political opponent, Youssouf Daba Diawara, former coordinator of the now-dissolved Coordination of Movements, Friends and Sympathizers of Imam Mahmoud Dicko (CMAS) was abducted by unidentified men, later being charged for opposing legitimate authority by participating in unauthorized protests against the coup in the months prior, yet was eventually released.

Equatorial Guinea

With rampant poverty, starvation, a lack of healthcare and violence by government forces, pockets of protestors have emerged against the backlash of the Equatorial Guinean government with 2023 marking a year where they performed a crackdown on political dissenters opposing long reigning President Mbasogo.

On 26 January, Anacleto Micha Ndong, a prominent activist, was arrested at his home in Malabo by four unidentified men, later being accused of slandering a police officer whom he had previously denounced for torture during an earlier detention at Black Beach prison. Despite the absence of any formal charges, Ndong was arbitrarily detained at the Malabo gendarmerie for more than a month before being transferred on 1 March to Black Beach and subsequently in April to Oveng Ansem prison in Mongomo, where he remains imprisoned on false charges. In the background, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) were drafting an opinion on two more opponents that were detained. Peter Shane Huxham and Frederik Johannes Potgieter are both South African nationals detained on alleged false drug trafficking charges. During their sentencing and incarceration, they were routinely denied due process at the hands of the judiciary, similar to Ndong in the months prior. South Africa’s government has repeatedly asked for information regarding the whereabouts of their falsely imprisoned citizens, with rumors claiming they are being held in a facility designated for political prisoners. Later in August, Joaquín Elo Ayeto was detained at his Malabo residence for his advocacy efforts on social media platform Somos+, with his lawyer, Ángel Eseng, also being detained for assisting his client, resulting in his license being revoked for his unfounded participation in “illegal organizations”.

The pattern of targeting political opponents broadened in 2024 with members of the Front National pour la Défense de la Constitution (FNDC), a civic group renowned for protesting against the election of the current administration, becoming a prime target. FNDC members Oumar Sylla, Mamadou Bah and Mohammed Cissé, were all detained with Sylla and Bah going missing for over 3 months as they were forced into incommunicado detention. Both National and International attention against the harassment campaign yielded little results, with the Court of Appeal located in Conakry denying any governmental involvement in any disappearances related to the FNDC, alongside the International Criminal Court being unsuccessfully petitioned to investigate the crimes.

Conclusion

The cross-jurisdictional use of enforced disappearances and arbitrary detention in the three states reflects more than a decline in civil rights, pointing directly to an intentional effort by ruling authorities to eliminate dissent and fortify control of critics, all under the guise of safeguarding national security. This trend stems from conscious political choices that forces public critics into being maliciously silenced, when paired with an absent sustained international engagement and a renewed commitment to human rights enforcement at both national and regional levels, such abuses are likely to deepen, undermining the core principles of democratic governance throughout the ECOWAS more broadly.

Image: Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (Source: Helge Fahrnberger via GNU Free Documentation License/CC BY-SA 3.0)