Thomas Sankara: Burkina Faso icon.

Student: Kouliga Koala
Instructors: Jess; Jasmine
Class: American Culture
Date: 07/28/2010


Thomas Sankara: Burkina Faso icon

Thomas Sankara was born in December 21st, 1949 in Yako; Burkina Faso. He became president in August 4th, 1983 and will be unanimously known as thefirst president to represent and promote the country, its values and its people ideals nationally and internationally.

Sankara went through a series of military training from secondary school in 1966, to his training in Madagascar in 1970, Morocco in 1978. He also fought in the war Mali-Burkina Faso in 1974. In the political field, he was successively Secretary of State of Information in 1981, Prime Minister in 1982, jailed in 1981 and 1982 because of accused corruption. He finally led the ‘Democratic and Popular Revolution’ party.

One of the dear fights that Sankara had in mind when he became president was to call for integrity and dignity. In fact, he wanted the government of the time to be responsible and set a good example for the young generation. Corruption was not one and was to be banished. The reintegration of the value of dignity, integrity, honesty began when he changed the name of the country from Upper Volta, name issued from colonization to Burkina Faso, ‘Land of the Upright People’. In addition, he changed the motto which became ‘Homeland or Death, We Shall Overcome’. The population was urged by the ideas of the defense, union and patriotism of the country

More interestingly, Sankara was not isolated from his people. He played guitar, football with everyone else and biked anytime. As a result, everybody was proud to have their president so close to them.Sankara leadership brought about many changes. He started by eliminating the chiefs privileges and redistribute lands to everybody. Then, he nationalized the country national resources and proclaims that no powerful country could abuse of these. For people, he represented the future and rebuilt the people personality because a country with no property and no prospect of any for the future has ever died. He also recognized that children were the future and makes health and education his priorities. So, 2.5 million children were vaccinated against meningitis, yellow fever in less than 2 weeks, a success that no former West African president had ever done. Sankara became the ideal person who understands better his people need and was seen as the real Burkinabe and African that represents the exact symbol of Community service and solidarity.
His fight went further to launch a reforestation campaign to plant 10 million trees to stop the advance of the Sahara desert. In fact, he wanted to prevent the country from natural chaos.

More importantly, Sankara speaks against African presidents who cannot rely on themselves for their own development. He started refusing importation of certain goods, rejecting odious debt

from rich countries, IMF and the World Bank by making sure that he will not pay back old debt that he was not responsible for, and that in fact according to the statistics had been used for development but for individuals. In Burkina Faso, cotton was no longer sold abroad but transformed and the population was obliged to consume what they produced. There was a glimmer of hope for the future since people increased their standard of living, and altogether, the Burkinabe saw a steady walk toward integration in the global economy.

In conclusion, Thomas Sankara revolution was short-lived as his death followed four years after. He did a lot and changed the minds in four years’ term than decades of leadership. If his death made every African young man cry in the streets, it was not because someone has died, but because the hoping destiny of Africa was being once more led in the depths, because one star has darkened and no one ever since had the courage of repeating the scene or embodying his spirit.


Sources: http://afficasuccess.org