Burkina Faso’s new president sworn in

A new president has been sworn-in in Burkina Faso. He is Roch Marc Kabore who was sworn-in yesterday by the country’s Constututional Court, making the former prime minister the country’s first new leader in decades following his election last month.

According to Reuters, the ceremony which was conducted in a stadium in the capital marked a pivotal moment in the country’s democratic transition after the former dictator, Blaise Compaore was overthrown in a popular uprising in October 2014.

“This is the triumph of the alternative that we have been waiting for so long. It’s the triumph of democracy,” Kabore said in a speech. Most of the country’s leaders had come to power through coups since independence from France in 1960.

The swearing-in marked the end of an interim government that held power in the wake of Compaore’s overthrow. Soldiers from the elite presidential guard staged a short-lived coup in September in which they took the transitional president hostage.

Authorities have so far arrested around 20 soldiers for plotting to free from prison a prominent general, Gilbert Diendere, charged with staging that coup, the transitional government said on Sunday.

Landlocked Burkina Faso produces cotton and gold but remains impoverished. Its economy had been slowed due to lower global commodity prices and reduced investment during the democratic transition that began after Compaore fell.