Introduction

Conflict and various security threats occurring in the Africa’s Sahel region make the regional states a landscape of fragility with enhanced border insecurity (Hamidu, 2022). The Sahel region is one of the critical spheres of interest, influence, and strategic environmental resource for the developed economies. This region is made up of diverse countries richly endowed with both human and natural resources (Iwuoha 2019; Montanaro 2022; Kitissou 2014; Her Majesty Government 2021; Campbell 2017; Maslanka 2020; Baudais et al. 2021; Elbassoussy 2022; Marc and Jones 2021; Lanfranchi and De Bruijne 2022; Thurston 2022). The foreign policies of investment, collaborations, counter-terrorism, and counter-insurgency strategies of the USA, UK, France, Russia, China, and many other developed economies are evidenced in the Sahel region (Devermont, 2019; Boas, 2019; Maiga and Adam, 2018). Maiga and Adam (2018) argue that apart from official entry by major powers to fight terror, these powers also pursue primary strategic interests or agenda in the region. In view of the 2013 Malian crisis, France’s intervention in the Sahel is for the protection of its own nationals and to defend its strategic and economic interests in the region (Maiga and Adam, 2018). These lapses in the operations of external interventions of major powers in Africa and the Sahel regions, particularly in Burkina Faso and Mali, have received public criticism, agitations, and protests against the prolonged domination of France in these countries.

The Sahel region is the vast semi-arid region of Africa separating the Sahara Desert to the North and tropical Savannas to the South (Dan-Suleiman 2017). The region is a spacious land of opportunities with diverse challenges (International Peace Institute 2012; Institute for Peace & Strategic Studies 2020). Though the Sahel region has abundant human and natural resources offering tremendous potential for rapid growth, there are deep-rooted challenges giving rise to prolonged conflicts, state failure, coups d’état, jihadist challenge, devastating drought, climate change, food insecurity, violent extremism, ethnic clashes, corruption, and human rights abuses (Moulaye, 2016; Golubski, 2019). Thus, the increasing multiplications and lingering of trans-border mobility, deepening security threats, forced migration, and population displacements have affected the prosperity, development, and peace of the Sahel countries (Boas, 2019; Eizenga, 2019; African Renewal, 2022; Williams, 2019; International Centre for Migration Policy Development, 2022).

These Sahel countries (Burkina Faso, Mali, Guinea Conakry, Chad, Niger, Sudan, Gambia, Cameroon, Mauritania, and Nigeria) harvest a range of natural resources, such as gold, manganese, zinc, copper, phosphate, limestone, bauxite, marble, oil, and natural gas. Despite these rich natural resources, these countries remain largely the enclaves of western dominant powers such as France, the UK, Germany, Russia, and the USA (Paczynska, 2020). Trans-border mobility, security threats, the dynamism of forced migration, and population displacements in Burkina Faso and Mali between 2012 and 2022 are diverse, multiplied, and complex in numerous ways (Iwuoha, 2020). The establishment and implementation of good governance principles through effective leadership by the two countries in the use of public funds in constructing industries, employment, reduction of poverty, and security amongst the local population are the central points of this paper. The choice of Burkina Faso and Mali as case studies is premised on the fact that they are amongst the states in the Sahel region that are deeply impacted by the forces of security threats. These have resulted in severe conflicts that have degenerated into trans-border mobility, forced migration, and population displacement where women and children are greatly endangered (Eizenga, 2019). In 2016, jihadist groups launched large-scale attacks in major Sahel states particularly in Burkina Faso and Mali, highlighting the two countries’ tenuous security environment (Gerald, 2022). These escalated violence from Islamic Jihadists that has turned the two countries into fragile political institutions, with food and water insecurity, and armed groups operations causing serious humanitarian crisis that has displaced over 4.2 million people (Gerald, 2022). The International Rescue Committee (IRC) alarmed the world about the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian crisis in the Central Sahel States (CSS) of Burkina Faso and Mali with a record 13.4 million people in need of humanitarian assistance across the Sahel region. There is an estimated 60% increase in the number of people in need of humanitarian assistance in the regions since January 2020 in the wake of COVID-19 and these escalating conflicts (International Refugees Committee 2020; Aniche et al. 2022). With the increasing height of radical Islamic Jihadist operations in Burkina Faso and Mali such as the Al-Qaida-affiliated terrorist group, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM), Al-Shabaab, Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), and Jamaat Ansar Al Muslimeen fi Bilad Al Sudan; Ansaroul Islam, Islamic Maghreb, Al-Murabitoun, Ansar al-Dine, and the Macina Liberation Front (African Defense Forum 2022), European countries on 27 March 2020 reiterated the need to support the French Barkhane operation by forming a new task force called the Takuba. Takuba was mandated to combat terrorism in eastern Burkina Faso and central Mali, including the entire Sahel region (Kfir, 2022). Developed countries such as Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, and the UK, with the linkage of Sahel countries, contributed resources to support the operations of Takuba. Takuba was also to work in coordination with the G5 Sahel, the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), and the European Union Training Mission in Mali (EUTM). MINUSMA was established on 25 April 2013 by the Security Council resolution of 2100. The Islamic State in the Great Sahara (ISGS), Boko Haram, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), and the Al-Qaida-affiliated Jama’at Nusrat Al Islam Wal Muslimin (JNIM) have continued to exacerbate regional tensions in the Sahel region (Ghanem-Yazbeck, 2018). The stabilization and protection of civilian populations have decreased, undermining the credibility of MINUSMA. Thus, due to confusion and misinterpretation over the mission and scope of the MINUSMA, the United Nations leadership views the operation through the lens of counterterrorism versus one that needs to support the government and state. MINUSMA was established after the Tuareg rebellion in Northern Mali in 2012 (Idaewor, 2020). On 16 February 2014, five countries in the Sahel, namely Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, and Niger, formed the G5 Sahel to increase cooperation on economic policies and security issues in West Africa. The G5 Sahel has been marred by allegations of abuse and corruption, primarily centred on Chad’s military (Aljazeera, 2021a, b; Nebe, 2021). In August 2014, France launched a large counterterrorism mission, Operation Barkhane, with 3000 soldiers in the G5 Sahel.In October 2021, there were 16,598 United Nations personnel deployed to the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA, an endeavour that began in July 2013 to stabilize Mali and help restructure the government (Gerald, 2022)). Though humanitarian intervention has been the central focus of the United Nations, MINUSMA has had limited success in its peace-building and peacekeeping role in reducing conflict. Thus, the structure of the United Nations is part of the problem as it lacks a command system capable of rapid decision-making and coordination with the numerous forces and contingents involved in the Sahel. Mali’s violence has reached a high watermark over the past few years, despite the heavy concentration of forces from the United Nations, Europe, and other African countries (Gerald, 2022).

Burkina Faso has been increasingly exposed to the threats and attacks of violent armed groups, with severe consequences on civilian populations, targeted symbols, institutions, and representatives of the state such as defence and security forces, local leaders, and political figures (Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance 2021). These critical security threats and their accompanied challenges have entailed consistent attacks from violent terrorist groups since 2014. There have been serious cases of military coups d’état, poor leadership, food insecurity, community-level tensions, population displacements, over-stretched state security institutions, lack of access to state security services, weak oversight and accountability over a hybrid security landscape, weapons proliferation, election volatility, corruption, and frailties of state in different capacities (Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance 2021). The total number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) rose to more than 1.5 million by the end of 2021. In fact, six in ten of the Sahel’s IDPs are now Burkinabe (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2022). The humanitarian situation in Burkina Faso, Mali, and other countries in the Sahel region is rapidly deteriorating amid crises of insecurity, extreme poverty, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the worsening effects of the climate crisis with temperatures in the region rising 1.5 times faster than the global average. Internal displacement has increased a decade level since 2013, from 217,000 to a staggering 2.1 million by late 2021. The number of refugees in the Central Sahel countries of Burkina Faso, Mali, and other countries now stands at 410,000 (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 2022). Many civilian population refugees fled violence in Northern Mali where the conflict began in January 2012.

This crisis was enhanced during the prevailing force of post-Gaddafi Libya with the proliferation of small arms and light weapons captured by violent non-state armed groups who entered into their respective countries (Dieng, 2021; Idaewor, 2020; Onuoha et al., 2021). Therefore, understanding forced migration, population displacement, and trans-border mobility in Burkina Faso and Mali, is imperative for state-building and human development in a region already devastated by violent conflicts and diverse forms of security threats. Security threats in the two Sahelian countries manifest in many ways such as violent extremism, military coup d’état, environmental insecurity, drought, communal clashes, and fragilities of the state. In light of these crises, it is critical to interrogate and ascertain the impact of these crises on civilian populations from the human security perspectives in these two countries.

The principal objective of this paper is to unravel the critical realities of security threats in Burkina Faso and Mali vis-a-vis the challenges of trans-border mobility, forced migration, and increasing displacements of the civilian population.

Conceptual and Contextual Clarification

Conceptual and contextual clarification revolves around important four concepts. These include trans-border mobility, security in the Sahel, forced migration, and population displacements in Burkina Faso and Mali.

Trans-border Mobility

Cross-border mobility in the countries of the Sahel is an effort to curb migrant flows and forestall the spread of terrorism throughout the region (Ranieri and Ba, 2019). The aim of collaborating with this trans-border mobility architecture between Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger Republic is to observe the flare-up of conflict in the Sahel region, specifically in these three countries. This is also part of the measures to respond to and curtail cross-border security threats, especially the proliferation of small arms and light weapons (Nwanolue and Iwuoha, 2012; Onuoha et al., 2020). The Liptako Gourma region is a borderland linking Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger Republic. This borderland has become a hotspot for an unprecedented range of security threats such as various radical groups operating in the area, organized crime, banditry, and violent community conflicts (Alliance Sahel 2021). Since the Tuareg rebellion of 2012, the atmosphere of insecurity and violence has further deteriorated due to the cross-border operations of armed groups, the increase in community clashes, and the rise of violent extremism.

Importantly, a number of interventions have been made to address the security problems in the Sahel region. This includes the setting up of the G5 Sahel in 2014; the Sahel Alliance launched on 13 July 2017 by France, Germany, and the European Union; and the G5 Sahel Coalition convened at the Pau Summit on 13 January 2020. These efforts are made to protect the civilian population, defend the sovereignty of the Sahel States, prevent the terrorist threat from spreading into bordering countries, and restore stability, which all constitute an essential precondition for development in the region (France Diplomacy 2021). Thus, without adequate securitization and monitoring of the Sahel countries’ borders, fighting armed terrorist groups, building the capacities of the armed forces in the region, and supporting the return of the state and administrations in the territory, the task of improving access to basic services, and assisting development would be jeopardized (Alliance Sahel, 2021; Peace & Security Council Report, 2020).

Security in the Sahel

The present security situation in each of these Sahel countries goes beyond what any individual country can address, given the extent to which the situation has impacted the lives and property of the citizens, as well as the structure of governance. This is also because the security situation in the Sahel countries is interlinked with various aspects of the people’s lives and the environment. The security threats associated with the Sahel region include terrorist or violent non-state armed groups attacks, environmental drought orchestrated by the menace of climate change, famine, political leadership lapses, corruption, military coups d’état, and violent clashes of ethnic nationalism among others. In relation to human security aspects, the United Nations Development Programme in 1994 outlined a variety of dimensions of the human security angle, including economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community, and political security. The security crisis in the Sahel region currently affects all these angles of human security (Dieng, 2021). There has been a rapid expansion of extremist attacks in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, from around 180 incidents in 2017 to approximately 800 violent events in the first 10 months of 2019 (Devermont 2019). Burkina Faso and Mali are uniquely bedevilled by increasing violence, attacks, and killings perpetrated mostly by different extremist groups with ideological differences and allegiance to either Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State. From 2015, over 2000 people have been killed and 1.5 million displaced due to the violence attributed to extremists in Burkina Faso and Mali (International Committee of the Red Cross, 2021). Human security is all about placing humans at the centre of development. Human security is the protection of individuals in both national and international security. Human security encompasses all political, economic, and social issues enabling a life free from risk and fear (Hussein et al., 2004). Human security is the safety from such chronic threats as hunger, disease, repression, and protection from sudden and hurtful disruptions in the patterns of daily life, whether in homes, at workplaces, or in communities. Such threats in the Sahel countries, particularly in Burkina Faso and Mali, exist at all levels of national development (UNDP, 1994).

Forced Migration

According to International Organization for Migration (2013), forced migration refers to the often large-scale and unpredictable migration flows and mobility patterns caused by conflict or natural disasters. Practically in Burkina Faso and Mali, the challenge of forced migration has metamorphosed into a serial pattern beginning from 2012 to date. The armed rebellion in Northern Mali, coupled with a military coup in January 2012, led to a significant migration crisis in Mali. Large numbers of Malians have fled from the North of Mali internally to Mali’s southern regions as well as into neighbouring countries, with impacts evident within Mali, throughout the region and beyond. The divergent attacks of violent extremists in Mali, a military coup in 2012 and 2020 promoted instability, protest, and failed governance, forcing the local population to migrate internally and outside the Malian borders to Burkina Faso and Niger (Onuoha and Thurston, 2013; Cole 2022). A recent military coup d’état in Burkina Faso in January 2022 led by Captain Damiba cited the failure of the Christian Kabore administration to unite the country and control the deteriorating security situation as reasons for ousting the civilian government. This made local populations flee the country in the wake of the military coup d’état on 30 September 2022. Since 2015, Burkina Faso has been caught up in escalating waves of violence attributed to rebel fighters allied to Al-Qaeda and the ISIL (ISIS) group (Aljazeera, 2022a). With respect to terrorist attacks and killings, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (2020) asserted that the insecurity in Burkina Faso is forcing an ever-growing number of persons to flee their homes, searching for safety in other parts of the country or fleeing to Mali and other neighbouring countries as refugees. Thus, a worrying number of Malian refugees or internally displaced populations assert that it is safer to return to their home country rather than remain in Burkina Faso (UNHCR, 2020). The recent violence in Burkina Faso has also forced more than 2035 people to flee to neighbouring Mali. The insecurity also makes life much harder for Malian refugees who had sought protection in Burkina Faso, a situation that threatens to bring to halt efforts to help them rebuild their lives. Burkina Faso hosts over 25,000 refugees from Mali but many are choosing to return despite facing insecurity there. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees remains alarmed by the dramatic rise of forced migration and its displacement in the Sahel countries of Burkina Faso and Mali, and reiterates its call for the protection of civilian populations and those fleeing violence. This protection of the civilian population looks at shelter and education, as well as sexual and gender-based violence.

Population Displacements in Burkina Faso and Mali

In January 2019, the Norwegian Refugees Council reported that the displaced population in Burkina Faso has grown by 2000%, with over 1.7 million people now uprooted from their homes. Unfortunately, more than two out of three of this number are children. While a growing portion of this generation get raised away from home and with little access to schools, education funding remains harrowingly low. The overall funding for the humanitarian response is less than half of what is needed (Norwegian Refugees Council, 2022). The ongoing clashes between armed forces and violent non-state armed groups in the Sahel have forced millions of civilians to flee their homes in various countries within the Sahel region (United Nations High Commission for Refugees, 2022). Many of those who flee are farmers who can no longer till their land, thereby exacerbating already existing food instability in the region. In Burkina Faso, for example, the United Nations reports that 486,000 people have been displaced in 2019, compared to just 80,000 in all of 2018. An estimated figure of over 160,000 newly displaced Burkinabes is a record-high figure (Norwegian Refugee Council, 2022). The deteriorating situation in the Sahel and its implications for regional security, migration, criminality, and corruption have spurred foreign partners, including the USA, European capitals, Gulf states, and some West African governments to deploy soldiers, diplomats, and development experts to seek out ways of addressing the problem in the region (Devermont 2019; Iwuoha and Mbaegbu, 2021).

In June 2021, the attack in Solhan City in which at least 132 civilians died recorded the largest death toll in a single terrorist attack in Burkina Faso’s history. Throughout 2021, Burkinabe forces remained ill-equipped to address the insecurity attacks from violent extremists as it doubled in 2020 and 2021. The number of violent attacks in Burkina Faso increased in 2021 and 2021 to over 1100 attacks greater than the number of violent events recorded in Mali. The widespread instability caused by terrorist violence also triggered a humanitarian crisis, with nearly 1.5 million persons now forcibly displaced within Burkina Faso (Demuynck and Coleman, 2022). In total, over 1.5 million people are now internally displaced across the Sahel region, which amounts to a 320% increase since the beginning of 2019 and one of the fastest-growing displacements globally (International Refugees Committee, 2020). Lastly, there are reputable donors in the Sahel such as Action Against Hunger and Médecins du Monde, among others, who indicated that they would proceed to a 70% cut in their funding to the Sahel in order to be able to support operations in Ukraine.

Theoretical Framing: State Fragility Index Framework

Peace for Fund (PFF) reports countries that fall into the state fragility index every year. According to Ziaga and Fabra (2010), fragile states lack core state functions, most importantly the maintenance of security and basic administration. Arising from this deficient environment such as the states of Burkina Faso and Mali, certain aid instruments are assumed to be less effective under these circumstances and some actors like international donors or developed states argue that standard development approaches do not work well in fragile states. The scholars outlined the state fragility indices as a threat to national development. The indices or indicators of fragile states are dysfunctional, deteriorating or collapsed central authorities, including weak, failed, failing, collapsed states, corruption, poor governance and leadership, terrorist activities, and the rise of violent armed groups. The international community has recognized that state fragility is one of the most important obstacles to human development (Ziaga and Fabra 2010). The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) points out that “states are fragile when state structures lack political will and/or capacity to provide the basic functions needed for poverty reduction, development and to safeguard the security and human rights of their populations” (cited in Ziaga and Fabra 2010). Burkina Faso and Mali experienced this challenge in the face of violent Islamic terrorist activities, military coups d’état, corruption, blatant embezzlement of funds by state leadership, and rising operations of violent non-state armed groups. Grävingholta et al. (2015) believe that state fragility has become the subject of analysis and debates in international relations as it impacts on how key issues of global concern, such as climate change, poverty, and violent conflict, are addressed. They also mentioned three indices of state fragility such as authority, capacity, and legitimacy. Burkina Faso and Mali state authorities have been undermined by increasing terrorist groups and blatant military take-over of the state power. This has resulted in questioning countries’ authority, despite the encapsulation of authority in these countries’ constitutions. The two countries under consideration lack the strong capacity to curtail the activities of Islamic insurgents, corruption, and blatant leadership crises. Finally, the two countries’ leaders emerged through rigged elections and the promotion of sit-tight leadership through the elongation of tenure. These are clear indices of state fragility. Thus, Ferreira (2016) opines that incessant cases of state fragility have led to state failure. Though there are challenges in measuring divergent indices of state fragility, there is a need to ‘tame the state fragility/failure problem’ set by adopting a term in common use while simultaneously examining the diversity of the phenomenon that it assembles in various countries termed fragile state, especially in Burkina Faso and Mali (Ferreira, 2016).

According to the published report of the Fund for Peace in 2022 detailing some of the states or countries regarded as fragile states, Burkina Faso and Mali are fragile (Fund for Peace, 2022). Some of the guidelines in the fragile state index (FSI), which are used to determine whether a state is fragile or not, are social and political cohesion, a weak economy, conflict fatalities, coup d’état, rise of violent non-state armed groups and violent extremism, protest and democratic reversal, poor governance, and many others. Grimma et al. (2014) assert that the concept of state fragility was framed by policymakers to describe reality in accordance with their priorities in the fields of development and security. These scholars argue that the concept of state fragility is used interchangeably with the concept of a collapsed state, failed state, imaginary state, absent state, lame Leviathan, and soft state. State fragility refers to a state’s insufficient capacity or the unwillingness of a state to meet its obligations, generally understood as delivering core government functions of protecting the lives and property of its people, particularly in a situation where governmental structures are overwhelmed by circumstances (Grimma et al. 2014). People or local populations in fragile states are victims of persistent poverty, enduring violence, poor public facilities, deteriorating infrastructure, limited civil and political liberties, deteriorating social conditions, minimal to nonexistent economic growth, and, often, humanitarian crises (Signe, 2019). Signe (2019) argues that issues on policies on state fragility are expected to be built on the concepts of limited state capacity, legitimacy, insecurity, stability and socioeconomic, demographic, human development, environmental, humanitarian, and gender contexts to determine a state’s apparent effectiveness or ineffectiveness in fulfilling the role of the state. These fragile states are often so-called because the government of a state is unable to keep the country stable in one way or another. In light of this understanding, Ware and Ware (2014) opine that fragile states have been linked in policy discourse with the worst extremes of personal and international security risk, including cross-border violent conflict, extremism, terrorism, organised crime, smuggling, human trafficking, and pandemic diseases. While factors like poor governance, human rights abuses, weak institutions, and contested power increased in promoting the fragility of a state, Sternehall (2016) argues that for countries to be scrutinized as fragile states, elements of state authority, state legitimacy, and state capacity should be studied to assess the realities of such countries.

Islamist militants in Mali and Burkina Faso have a huge amount of firepower. Many (including Abdourahmane Idrissa, a political scientist at the University of Leiden) have argued that the warfare between an army and a clandestine routine of Islamic insurgents in large swathes of Burkina Faso and Mali makes the power of the state to stay in power glaringly difficult (Booty, 2022). The operations of violent non-state armed groups undermine state authority, legitimacy and capacities in good governance and provision of security need of the civilian populations (citizens). According to International Crisis Groups as cited by Booty (2022), in Burkina Faso as well as Mali, Islamist insurgents engage in classic asymmetric warfare where they take control of many cities. Islamic insurgents do increasingly encircle cities and cut them off in order to flex their muscles, and this makes them very rural driven especially in ungoverned spaces. During the coup in January 2022 in Burkina Faso, there was a brazen raid in which jihadists killed 57 gendarmes at a camp in Inata, in the north of the country. There was also the killing of 89 people in the northern village of Seytenga, which was regarded as one of the worst massacres in the country’s history (Aljazeera, 2022a, b). Since 2015, Burkina Faso has been embroiled in a serious wave of violence attributed to rebel fighters allied with Al-Qaeda and the ISIL (ISIS) group. Such violence has claimed more than 2000 lives and forced 1.9 million people to flee their homes.

The prevalent realities of state fragility in Burkina Faso and Mali are outlined. The operations, attacks, and killings of civilian populations, attacks on security forces, and the consequences of such attacks on state authority, legitimacy, and capacities in Burkina Faso and Mali governments highlight the challenge of the fragility of the state posed in the two countries. Booty (2022) asserts that the increasing rise of Islamic insurgency attacks on civilian populations and state security forces in the two countries escalated the upsurge of military invasion of the state corridors thereby undermining the legitimacy of the state and elected leadership in power. Widespread anger at chronic insecurity in the West African countries of Mali and Burkina Faso paved the way for military men to kick out failing governments over the past two years (Booty, 2020). Armed Conflict Location & Event Data (ACLED) asserts that in Burkina Faso and Mali, attacks by Islamist militants on civilians, deaths of civilians, and counter-attacks by the military against the Islamic militants increased the killings and deaths of more ordinary people (ACLED 2022, cited in Booty 2020). The massacre of civilian populations by the Islamic State group took place in the local branch of Menaka and killings of the civilian population by the Malian army took place in the town of Moura. International Crisis Group (2020, cited in Booty 2022) asserts that an estimated 500 Malian civilians were killed during the 3-day battle. Furthermore, Mali is the epicentre of Islamist violence in the Sahel for the past decade, after jihadists enabled ethnic Tuareg rebels to seize control of much of the north in 2012. The leadership of the Mali republic has jettisoned France’s plan of fighting an Islamic insurgency in 2021 and embraced the Russian force.

Lastly, the increasing humanitarian crisis emanating from the states’ excruciating battle against violent non-state armed groups and food insecurity in Burkina Faso and Mali truncates or jeopardizes state viability. The majority of Burkina Faso and Malian citizens are agrarian who resort to farming as a means of satisfying their livelihoods. Insecurity threats are deepening the development of farming livelihoods. The humanitarian crisis in the cross-border area between Burkina Faso and Mali continues to deteriorate. The security situation indicates an increment in the number of incidents, with 407 incidents in March alone, causing the killing of 1402 people (Reliefweb, 2022). More people are fleeing their homes seeking safety in nearby fields or villages multiple times. An estimated 2.2 million people are internally displaced in Burkina Faso and Mali, and 140,000 are refugees in neighbouring states of Chad, Niger, Nigeria, and coastal states of Benin Republics. An estimated 5.1 million people experience acute food insecurity and 13 million people are in need of humanitarian support, with 9.6 million people targeted with assistance (Reliefweb, 2022).

Security Threats, Forced Migration, and Population Displacements in Burkina Faso and Mali

Burkina Faso and Mali are overshadowed by serial cases of insecurity, forced migration, and population displacements with the specific demonstration of their peculiarity as a given country in the Sahel region. The increasing threats of attacks from violent armed groups such as the Ansarul Islam, the Group to Support Islam and Muslims (JNIM), and the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) have affected various aspects of Burkina Faso society. The violent armed group’s attacks in Burkina Faso from 2015 to 2019 show that attacks have steadily increased in frequency, lethality, and sophistication (Ben-Zur and Toole, 2020). Those affected by the attacks are civilian populations, governance symbols, the defence and security forces, local leaders, and political figures (Geneva Centre for Security Sector Governance, 2021). The activities of these armed groups are also exacerbating the increasing tensions between farmers and herders, resulting, since 2019, in the displacement of more than 1.5 million people as at December 2021 (ACAPS, 2021). From 2014 to 2018, the serial cases of terrorist infiltration and military coups d’état have resulted in undermining human security perspectives such as food insecurity, community-level tensions, population displacement, exposing the ill-equipped and security forces failures, poor access to state security service, weapons proliferation, and election volatility. The military coup d’état on 24 January that ousted President Christian Kabore by Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Henri Sandaogo Damiba saw the removal of Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Henri Sandaogo Damiba by Capt. Ibrahim Traore on 30 September 2022. These security lapses of poor governance and the influx of the military in politics deepened the rollback of democracy in Burkina Faso. Increasing violence and attacks by jihadist groups in Burkina Faso against the civilian populations and security forces have enhanced forced migration, resulting in record-breaking numbers of people forced to flee inside the country and across international borders (United Nations High Commission of Refugees, 2021).

In the first half of 2021, 237,000 people fled their homes to other parts of Burkina Faso, a sharp increase compared to the 96,000 registered during the second half of 2020; and thus, from January, more than 17,500 people have fled to neighbouring countries, thereby doubling the total number of refugees from the country in just 6 months. There are now 38,000 Burkinabè refugees and asylum seekers across the region (United Nations High Commission of Refugees, 2021). From June 2022, almost 16,000 Burkinabe, mostly women and children, arrived in Dori, northeastern Burkina Faso, after fleeing a brutal attack by armed men in Seytenga, a town 15 km from the border with Niger. Moreover, the displacement of the civilian population in Burkina Faso is one of the world’s fastest-growing, with an estimated number of internally displaced people (IDPs), reaching 1.9 million at the end of April 2022 (United Nations High Commission of Refugees, 2022). The deadliest single incident in Burkina Faso saw the number of 79 to 130 people killed in a massacre in nearby Solhan city in Burkina Faso in June 2021. Many civilian populations were displaced.

In Mali, there have been continuously increasing serial cases of insecurity, forced migration, and population displacements. The security situation remains volatile in central Mali and in the tri-border area between Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger, with a sharp increase in the activities of extremist elements affiliated with the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara. On 7 August 2022, the ISGS killed 42 Malian soldiers in Tessit, Gao region, some 22 soldiers were wounded and 37 ISGS militants were killed in the gun battle with security forces. It was the deadliest attack against the military since 2019. The northern regions of Menaka and Gao have been the strategic environment of gun battles between ISGS, the JNIM, and other armed groups on the one side, and the Malian security forces on the other side, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 1000 civilian deaths and displacing tens of thousands more.

Finally, 6 September 2022 witnessed the ISGS militants seizing the town of Talataye, killing at least 30 civilians. On 18 September 2022, Mali’s security forces and suspected mercenaries of the Russian private security company, the Wagner Group, reportedly killed 35 civilians, mostly ethnic Fulani, in the village of Gouni in the central Mopti region. Thus, in mid-July 2022, JIM-affiliated forces conducted several attacks near Bamako, including on the military garrison town of Kati, from which successful coups d’état were staged in 2012 and 2020. The attacks demonstrated the expanding reach of terrorist groups in the south and the growing threat to Mali’s capital, Bamako (Security Council Report, 2022).

Patterns of Forced Migration and Population Displacements in Burkina Faso and Mali

Human security remains a major challenge, not solely with regard to the massive increase in attacks by Islamist armed groups in the North, East of Burkina Faso and Mali but has also affected the 1994 UNDP human security principles (Bertelsmann Stiftung’s Transformation Index, 2022; UNDP, 1994). From 1987 to 2015 when President Blaise Compaore was ousted from office in Burkina Faso, the crisis of poor governance and corruption pervaded the leadership of President Blaise Compaore. This instigated the incessant cases of Islamic Jihadist insurgency and violent protests, resulting in cases of violence and attacks on the leadership and state-owned infrastructure in Burkina Faso. This incidence escalated the tides of forced migration and subsequent displacement of populations internally and externally as refugees fled to other Sahel countries of Mali, Niger, and many others. In 2013 and 2014, 10,000 people took to the streets and protested against Compaoré’s attempt to revise Article 37 of the constitution in order to enable him to run for another term (Bertelsmann Stiftung’s Transformation Index, 2022). The idea of overcoming the legacy of bad governance and corruption in Burkina Faso proved abortive under President Blaise Compaore. Bribery and bureaucratic corruption are widespread, permeating all sectors of society and affecting the daily lives of Burkinabe (Ardigo, 2019). Another factor that aided insecurity, forced migration, and the internal displacement of Burkinabes is incessant cases of military coups d’état. The Republic of Burkina Faso’s latest coup was orchestrated by Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba on the 24th of January 2022. The military coup that overthrew Burkina Faso’s President Roch Marc Christian Kaboré came amid a deepening security crisis in the country where civilians, and defence and security forces have long voiced their discontent on Kaboré’s political stewardship (Moderan and Koné, 2022). This discontent coupled with poor governance, corruption, and failure to address the increasing spate of Islamic insurgency made Burkina Faso unstable. On 30 September 2022, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Henri Sandaogo Damiba by Capt. Ibrahim Traore was removed through a military coup d’état. These security lapses resulting from poor governance and influx of the military interventions in leadership deepened the democratic deficit in Burkina-Faso. Thus, Fig. 1 shows the increasing number of insecurity and leadership crises caused by the coup d’état which has displaced the civilian population, thereby increasing the number of refugees and asylum seekers in Burkina Faso and Mali.

Fig. 1
figure 1

The forceful displacement of population and refugees in the Sahel region indicating the plight of Burkina Faso and Malian states. Source: United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) cited by Demuynck 2022

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Sahelian states of Burkina Faso and Mali are littered with centuries-old trans-Saharan trade routes, populated with important pastoralist communities, human mobility, seasonal transhumance, economic migration, and rural exodus with unprecedented levels of forced displacement (Demuynck, 2022). Figure 1 above shows the escalating wave of internally displaced persons owing to the increase of Islamic terrorist insurgency and other internal crises in Burkina Faso and Mali within the 5-year intervals. Over the past 5 years, Sahelian countries including Burkina Faso and Mali have witnessed a dramatic increase in the number of IDPs, which has risen from about 170,000 in mid-2017 to over 2.4 million in early 2022 (Demuynck, 2022). Displaced populations have also reached neighbouring Mauritania and Chad, which together host more than half a million refugees who are increasingly being forced to seek refuge southward in coastal West African states, including in Côte d'Ivoire which has seen about 7000 Burkinabe refugees entering the country since mid-2021 (Demuynck, 2022).

Furthermore, the state of Mali in the Sahel region is troubled and challenged by forced migration, population displacements, and insecurity threats of violent armed groups. Insecurity threats from violent armed groups in Mali remain the main factor behind the closure of 1700 schools in Mali. In 2020, schools in Mali were affected along with other schools attacked in Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo (National Refugees Committee, 2022). Schools in Mali remained closed due to a lack of infrastructure and school equipment emanating from poor governance and corruption by Malian political leaders. The increase in Islamic Jihadist networks over attacks and violence in Mali has threatened the stability and growth of the country (Economist Intelligence, 2022). Mali has witnessed a dramatic spike in terrorist attacks over the past decade, 2012 to 2022. From 2020, some of the most violent affiliates of Da’esh have expanded, increasing their presence in Mali, Burkina Faso, and Niger as well as southward into the Gulf of Guinea (United Nations, 2022). Finally, in the Republic of Mali, August 2020 saw President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita being removed from power by a military alliance. Due to months of unrest in Mali following irregularities in the March and April parliamentary elections and outrage against the kidnapping of opposition leader Soumaila Cissé on 18 August 2020, members of the military led by Colonel Assimi Goïta and Colonel-Major Ismaël Wagué in Kati, Koulikoro Region, began a mutiny. President Keita and Prime Minister Boubou Cissé were arrested, and shortly after midnight, Keita announced his resignation, saying he did not want to see any bloodshed. The 2021 Malian coup d'état began on the night of 24 May 2021, when the Malian Army led by Vice President Assimi Goïta captured President Bah N'daw, Prime Minister Moctar Ouane, and Minister of Defence Souleymane Doucouré. Assimi Goïta, the head of the junta that led the 2020 Malian coup d'état, announced that N'daw and Ouane had been stripped of their powers and that new elections would be held in 2022. It is the country’s third coup d'état in 10 years, following the 2012 and 2020 military takeovers, with the latter having happened only 9 months earlier (Aljazeera, 2021a, b).

Civilian Populations Affected by Trans-border Mobility and Forced Displacement in Burkina Faso and Mali

There are numerous cases of intruding forces outside Islamic insurgency that precipitated or enhanced the increasing crises in the Sahel region, particularly in Burkina Faso and Mali. The challenges include the reported cases of civilian populations negatively affected by trans-border mobility, forced migration, and internal displacement in Burkina Faso and Mali. The factors that increased the humanitarian crisis are military coups d’état, corruption, democratic reversal, poor transparency and lack of accountability, and leadership failures, with environmental stress caused by altered rainfall patterns, damaging floods, and droughts, generating conflict among the agricultural and pastoral communities in the region (United Nations Security Council, 2020). Many countries in the Sahel region between the middle of 2020 and early 2022 suffered five coups—in Burkina Faso, Chad, Guinea, Mali, and Sudan—and two failed attempts in Guinea-Bissau and Niger (Gerald 2022). According to Paul Taylor, Regional Vice President for West Africa at the International Refugees Committee, civilians in the Central Sahel of Burkina Faso and Mali were worse off in 2020 by nearly every measure and more likely to need humanitarian aid, be displaced, face food insecurity, or die from conflict than at any other point in the previous decade (International Refugees Committee, 2020). In 2019, civilian deaths in the region (particularly in Burkina Faso and Mali) rose by a staggering 1870% compared to 2016, with civilian deaths linked to militias increasing by 8500% in just 4 years from 2015 to 2019 (Gerald, 2022).

In 2018, out of Mali’s population of 18.6 million, 335,000 were forced to flee their homes. Furthermore, the number of violent attacks in Mali and Burkina Faso increased dramatically in 2021 to 2500 incidents and 6000 deaths. It is clear that the security environment has become worse (Gerald, 2022). Thus, below is a figure showing the numerical spate of forceful displacement of people in Burkina Faso and Mali as encapsulated by Demuynck in the year 2022, indicating that 250,000 and 50,000 persons were displaced in the two countries, including internally displaced persons (IDPs), refugees, and asylum seekers in neighbouring countries besides Burkina Faso, such as Niger and Chad (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2
figure 2

The forceful displacement of persons in numbers in Burkina Faso and Malian states. Source: United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) cited by Demuynck 2022

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Arising from a dramatic deterioration of its security situation, Burkina Faso hosted over 1.8 to 2 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) from 2018 to 2020, which severely impacted its socio-economic, political, humanitarian, protective, and strategic security environment. Burkinabe populations have also sought shelter in the neighbouring states of Niger, Nigeria, and Mali. Niger has continued to host a greater proportion of refugees and asylum seekers than the two other Sahel states with around 75% of the 280,000 now in Niger being nationals from neighbouring Nigeria and 20% coming from Mali. While a large share of forcibly displaced populations across Niger is located in its eastern Diffa region, bordering Boko Haram-affected Nigeria, the number of IDPs in its western Tillabéri and Tahoua regions has doubled over the recent years.

In June 2019, after a massacre of 160 people in the Muslim Fulani ethnic group in the village of Ogossagou, 30,000 protestors demonstrated against the Malian government in the capital of Bamako because of its inability to address the increasing spate of ethnic violence. The government’s tenuous hold on most of the country has weakened only over the past few years, despite international efforts to stabilize the government (Gerald, 2022). On 21 July 2020, 84,000 refugees and 570,000 displaced people returned to their homes in Mali, which on the surface suggests that the MINUSMA mission is being fulfilled. However, overall, the crisis and fatalities from armed groups in 2020 reflected a 5-year increase in Mali and Burkina Faso. According to the International Rescue Committee, as of October 2020, deteriorating conditions in the central Sahel states of Burkina Faso and Mali increased by almost 60% in the wake of the COVID-19 epidemic, with a record of 13.4 million people requiring humanitarian assistance. Other information that focuses on violence in the region was equally stark. As of 2020, the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) reported 2400 civilian deaths in Burkina Faso and Mali. Insurgent groups continue to thrive in the region and have expanded their networks and areas of operation over the past few years (Gerald, 2022). The military and the government have marginalized the people through often heavy-handed responses with military personnel. The Human Rights Watch found that security personnel allegedly killed over 250 suspected terrorists and civilians between December 2019 and August 2020. While most Malian people would prefer democracy, Afrobarometer reports that 75% of the population is frustrated with instability and graft and are willing to give anyone a chance to lead if there is a remote possibility that they are less corrupt (Gerald, 2022). According to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (2017), there were 605 deaths caused by state-based or non-state-based violence. In the three years from 2018 to 2020, the total number of deaths spiked to 4002 persons. There were reported cases of 1282 in 2018, reported number of deaths of 1227 in 2019, and an increasing spate of deaths of 1493 in 2020, far exceeding the number of deaths since 1990 (Gerald, 2022).

Conclusion and Recommendations

The study interrogated the incidences of changing security threats that have plunged the two Sahelian countries of Burkina Faso and Mali into serial cases of prolonged conflicts and state failure. These changing security threats cut across military coups d’état, Islamic jihadist infiltration, devastating drought, climate change, food insecurity, violent extremism, ethnic clashes, corruption, and human rights abuses, which have combined to cause internal displacements and forced migration in these two countries. Between 2012 and 2022, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated that more than 2.5 million people were forced to flee their homes in the two countries. Internal displacement has increased tenfold since 2013, from 217,000 to a staggering 2.1 million by late 2021. The number of refugees in both countries now stands at 410,000. In 2021, an estimated 1.5 million and 400,000 Burkinabes and Malians respectively were internally displaced, with more than 49,000 and 23,000 refugees and asylum seekers of various nationalities in the Sahel region hosted by Burkina Faso and Mali in 2020 alone.

Furthermore, this paper documented cases of civilian populations grossly affected by trans-border mobility, forced migration, and internal displacement in Burkina Faso and Mali. This helps to provide more insights into the range of factors responsible for the security threats not only in the two countries under consideration but also in the entire Sahel region. The recommendations include the conscious establishment of state-building projects in the rural areas in the countries of Burkina Faso and Mali to address the developmental needs of the local population, thereby reducing worsening security threats which have necessitated the crisis of forced migration and population displacements in both countries. The state-building efforts must focus on the implementation of good governance principles through effective leadership, industrialization, infrastructural development, creation of employment opportunities, reduction of poverty, and provision of adequate security for the local population. The countries’ organized security architecture should be properly developed and equipped with critical infrastructure. Emphasis should be placed on state-building projects via human security perspectives in these two countries. Human security principles are all about placing humans at the centre of development which looks at all political, economic, and social issues enabling a life free from risk and fear (Hussein et al. 2004). The Human Development Report of 1994 issued by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP, 1994) indicates that human security is often seen as having a variety of dimensions and these dimensions must be considered by the Burkina Faso and Malian leadership particularly in policy implementation. These dimensions are economic security, food security, health security, environmental security, personal security, community security, and political security, which would guarantee the existence of rights and freedoms to protect people from tyranny or government abuse.