Thomas Sankara

Revolutionary, but without the idealism of Che Guevara, a fervent socialist, but without the Stalinist or Maoist drifts, third world, but without ever feeling sorry for himself, even as president of one of the poorest and most backward nations in the world, free mind, but practical and anything but utopian.

In black Africa it is very difficult to meet someone who does not know who Thomas Sankara is. The president of Burkina Faso who died in 1987 has become a symbol thanks to his example, because he showed the world that it didn’t take so many utopias to change things, but will, charisma and clear ideas.

This is why he was killed after less than four years of government, in a gloomy international conspiracy that in recent weeks is trying to define thanks, finally, to a formal trial against his killers, almost thirty-four years after that October 15, 1987. , «The day they killed happiness», as a documentary dedicated to this story goes.

In fact, on 12 April, the military court of Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, officially opened a trial against Blaise Compaoré, Sankara’s successor to the presidency, as well as a lifelong friend and companion, accused of attacking state security and complicity in the murder