In Burkina Faso, the last week of November will be characterized by growing collective tension. The presidential and parliamentary elections will be held in a country that, in recent years, has been subject to the influences of the strong changes of power in the neighboring territories and the growing presence and threat of rebel groups in the surrounding geographical area, from Mali to Niger.
According to different analyses, a likely low voter turnout in rural areas could further undermine the state’s ability to govern, strengthening the power and legitimacy of armed groups. The proliferation of self-defense militias could also increase cases of political and social violence. The perpetuation of crisis situations has been the cause of the growing number of displaced people in the country, which today is more than one million, the vast majority of which have been displaced since the beginning of last year, making Burkina Faso the country with the most rapid increase in the number of internally displaced people worldwide. 3.3 million people are in a state of food insecurity, more than two million are in need of urgent humanitarian assistance.
Burkina Faso is facing an unprecedented situation of insecurity. The most affected regions are the North, the Center and North, the East, the Boucle du Mouhoun and the Sahel. Attacks by several armed groups and growing ethnic tensions in the country have also led to the closure of 2,500 schools, 135 health centres and 13% of municipalities. Internally displaced persons do not have adequate access to basic social services and are constantly subject to the risk of insecurity: in a similar context, protection for their physical and psychological integrity is more than ever necessary. Even more for women, for young girls and for minors under the age of 5, especially those left alone, unaccompanied boys and girls who live in conditions of extreme degradation. In fact, women and minors make up 84% of the displaced.
INTERSOS intervention in the Country
INTERSOS has been present in the country since August 2019 and operates in 3 of the regions most affected by the crisis: in the North, in the Boucle du Mouhoun and in the East, as well as in the Central Plateu. INTERSOS’s intervention focuses on an awareness-raising action, through campaigns that have gender violence, social cohesion and child protection as essential themes, which are added to integrated protection activities for the identification of cases of violence, most of which against women who have survived episodes of abuse, harassment or rape. In addition to the protection activities, INTERSOS is also operating in the drinking water supply sector through the renovation of wells and the distribution of hygiene kits in the most remote communities affected by the current crisis. We also provide educational support to hundreds of boys and girls fleeing schools destroyed or burned during the attacks of armed groups in northernmost provinces of the country, and in particular in the Boucle du Mouhoun. Finally, thanks to an emergency food distribution project, in the last 4 months alone the INTERSOS team has assisted over 10,000 displaced people in the east of the country.
The continuous internal tensions, the attacks by armed groups, the fleeing from the villages, produced in the last months a conspicuous increase of displaced persons in the reception areas. Among the people who flee, there are cases of extreme vulnerability: stories of family separation, forced and early marriages, sexual violence, psychosocial disorders, cases of abuse, minors recruited by armed groups. Those who are paying the highest price are the minors, often survivors of sexual violence, which affect 3.1% of boys and girls between the ages of 12 and 17, 38% of violence is domestic violence.
We protect the most vulnerable
INTERSOS action aims above all to create safe places where the issue of violence against women is no longer a taboo but becomes a main topic for awareness in the host community. People who have survived acts of violence are followed step by step in their process of restarting daily life. They receive psychosocial support and cash assistance for quick access to medical care, psychological support and legal assistance. A “dignity kit” is also given to widowed women with large dependent families, who are breastfeeding and / or pregnant, containing essential and extremely important goods for women’s health.
In these months so complex and suspended for the whole of humanity, with an ongoing pandemic that forces each of us to downsize everyday life, for the population of Burkina Faso, survival is even more exacerbated by the current economic consequences, which hit a country already overwhelmed by violence. Healthcare is ineffective and unable to serve all the people who need it. Local hospitals are poorly equipped, doctors and nurses struggle to complete treatment and medical examinations. In this context of enormous complexity, INTERSOS is present on the field and will continue, despite the extreme difficulty of accessing the most vulnerable population groups, attacks by armed groups and a mosaic of other local and interregional clashes that have ousted more than a million people from their land.