Reports reaching the desk of Africa Today News, New York has it that the military government in Burkina Faso has ordered French troops stationed in the West African country to vacate the country within a month.
The decision which was announced by the official Agence d’Information du Burkina (AIB) on Saturday night, is the latest sign of deteriorating relations between France and its former colony since a second military coup in September of last year.
The AIB noted that the military government had on Wednesday announced the suspension of a 2018 military accord that allowed the presence of French troops in the country.
There was no immediate comment from Paris.
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A source close to the Burkinabe military told the AFP news agency that Ouagadougou was not severing relations with France and that the ‘notification only concerns military cooperation agreements’.
France has some 400 special forces soldiers stationed in Burkina Faso, which is battling groups affiliated with al-Qaeda and ISIL (ISIS).
The West African nation is one of the world’s poorest countries and the conflict there, which had spread across the Sahel from Mali over the past decade, has killed thousands of civilians. In recent months, anti-French sentiment has spiked in the country amid perceptions that France’s military presence has not improved the security situation.
‘Despite their presence on Burkinabe soil with huge equipment and their power at the intelligence level, they couldn’t help us defeat terrorism,’ said Passamde Sawadogo, a prominent civil society activist and reggae singer.
‘It therefore was time for us to get rid of them, and that’s what the transition government is doing with a lot of boldness,’ he was quoted as saying.
Hundreds of Burkinabes also demonstrated against France on Friday, rallying in the capital, Ouagadougou, demanding the expulsion of the French envoy and the closure of its military base in Burkina Faso.