Captain Ibrahim Traoré: a dramaturgy of crisis and sovereignty in Burkina Faso

Since seizing power in Burkina Faso in 2022, Captain Ibrahim Traoré has established himself as a disruptive figure in the volatile political landscape of the Sahel. The article situates his presidential style within the framework of populism as performance. It argues that his leadership exemplifies how postcolonial populist actors mobilise crisis narratives and anti-elite rhetoric to reimagine sovereignty. In contexts of perceived incomplete decolonisation, his populist performance often adopts a distinctly anti-imperialist inflexion. It recasts sovereignty as a struggle against lingering foreign domination. However, Traoré’s populist style poses a challenge to a literature that limits the significance of populism to the crisis of the liberal order. Instead, his style suggests a more serious look at African decolonial imaginaries as a breeding ground for populist rhetoric. The marches of support for his regime in Western cities and the strong digital cult on social media reflect the young African leader’s ability to appeal to the affective charge of Pan-Africanism and the wounded sense that decolonisation has yet to be complete.