Expelling the french army and cutting ties with the West were supposed to usher in a ‘second independence’ for Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. Four years after the first coups, the populist rhetoric now clashes with a grim reality: dependence has merely changed hands, insecurity is soaring and economies are suffocating.
The security mirage: the boomerang effect of the russian partnership
The first justification military regimes gave for their coups was France’s failure to eradicate jihadism. Yet the remedy they chose has proven worse than the disease. By replacing Western forces with russian paramilitaries from Africa Corps (formerly Wagner), Bamako, Ouagadougou and Niamey opted for a scorched-earth strategy.
On the ground, terrorist groups such as JNIM and EIGS have never been more powerful. They now encircle strategic towns and cut vital supply routes. Even more alarming is the terrifying human cost. Reports from independent organisations highlight a surge in atrocities against civilians during joint operations. Far from being protected, the peoples of the Sahel are caught between jihadist terror and the brutality of the new security auxiliaries, while the number of internally displaced persons hits historic highs.
Diplomatic isolation: institutional flight forward
To mask domestic failures, AES leaders have opted for a policy of permanent rupture. Their dramatic withdrawal from ECOWAS deprived the three countries of their natural economic partners. More recently, their collective exit from the International Criminal Court (ICC) and restrictions on UN agencies are turning the region into a diplomatic grey zone.
This institutional flight forward primarily serves to shield the regimes from any external scrutiny of human rights or adherence to democratic transition timelines. Elections promised to return power to civilians are repeatedly postponed sine die, turning what were meant to be temporary transitions into entrenched military dictatorships.
Stagnant economy and social regression
Economically, the toll is equally heavy. The rhetoric of monetary sovereignty and self-sufficiency collides with the harsh reality of figures. Regional isolation has triggered a dizzying rise in the cost of living and of basic goods. Local businesses are stifled by indirect sanctions, falling foreign investment and chronic power cuts that paralyse Bamako and Ouagadougou.
While national budgets are bled dry to finance war efforts and pay russian mercenaries (often remunerated through mining concessions), basic social services are collapsing. Thousands of schools remain closed, and the health system is depleted. Instead of investing in human development, national resources are confiscated by military apparatuses.
A change of masters, not liberation
Four years after the Great Divorce from Paris, the assessment is bitter. The Sahel is neither safer, nor more prosperous, nor more independent. By ousting an imperfect but predictable Western partner, AES leaders have thrown their countries into the arms of an opportunistic russian power whose sole goal is geopolitical. The promised ‘second independence’ has turned into a tragic economic and security regression, where the sovereignty brandished at the top only masks the suffocation of the people below.
