That’s what I call civilised. A ruler who had stayed beyond his sell-by date is confronted by his people who are fed up to here by his unending rule and who are now pouring onto the streets demanding to see the back of him.

The ruler tries one ruse after another, but nothing works. It calls to memory Prophet Robert Nesta Marley’s song Natty Dread Rides Again, specially the refrain:

Now the people gather on the beach
And the leader try to make a speech
But the Dreadies’ understandin’ that it’s too late
Fire is burning, man, pull your own weight
Fiyah is burning, man, pull your own weight

On the day the fire started to burn in earnest, the streets of Ouagadougou (pronounced Wagadugu), had only one message for the long serving head of state, Blaise Compaore: The people had had enough of him, and nothing he could do would save his regime.

Not that he didn’t try. The man even had the temerity to ask to be allowed to stay for only one year to prepare the transition, an impossibility he had failed to arrange in 27 years in power.

The people clamoured some more, and when they suspected the National Assembly had been bribed into giving Compaore another lease of life, they made sure it would not sit, by simply torching its hall. A meeting hall — or lack thereof — had not had that kind of relevance in the country.

With the president seriously beleaguered and the young demonstrators showing no signs of giving any quarter, the situation threatened to explode, outsiders fearing a bloody confrontation a la Assad. But the president blinked first, sought the path of exile, and for a moment an ominous vacuum beckoned.

That it was averted was thanks to an astute patriotic manoeuvre that brought together major stakeholders into a conversation — civil society, the military, clergy, opposition parties, etc — to avert an impasse. Not much time was wasted before a deal was worked out.

An interim president was soon identified from a basket proposed, and soon his premier — albeit a military man, so what? — was chosen, with a period of one year being agreed upon as the transition leading to fresh elections. Now, that is what I call civilised. Plus that the terms included a ban on the transitional leaders from running in the next election.

This last provision may not seem of such import till you consider that some people in Dodoma have been trying to write a constitution that will govern elections that they will themselves be contesting next year. That a people emerging from the dark clouds of civil disorder can manifest better sense than our representatives is too stark to require comment.

What merits comment, however, is the tendency by the African Union to condemn each and every military takeover on the continent, referring to the organisation’s firm opposition to takeover of states through unconstitutional means. This is a sound principle and one that needs strict observation. However, there is something so knee-jerk about the way the diktat is applied that it worries one.

When an African ruler has so monopolised power for so long that all governance institutions and agencies have atrophied, it may be that the military is the only one such agency that remains cohesive and coherent, sufficiently together to execute a salutary takeover. In some situations we have known, for the military to look on without taking action would amount to desertion.

It would thus be useful for the AU in any such case in the future to interrogate the situation and gather all the vital info with a view to helping said country manage its passage back to normalcy. To treat every military takeover as anathema will not always be smart.

I think cases like Burkina — and Niger before it — may contain a few lessons that could stand us in good stead when we are grappling with similar problems.

After all, it’s not for nothing that Thomas Sankara (who was murdered by Compaore) renamed Upper Volta as Burkina Faso. Land of Upright Men. And Women.

Jenerali Ulimwengu is chairman of the board of the Raia Mwema newspaper and an advocate of the High Court in Dar es Salaam. E-mail: [email protected]