{"id":18875,"date":"2024-05-29T20:08:47","date_gmt":"2024-05-29T19:08:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/?p=18875"},"modified":"2024-05-29T20:08:51","modified_gmt":"2024-05-29T19:08:51","slug":"no-evidence-burkina-fasos-military-leader-slashed-top-government-officials-salaries-by-30-per-cent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/no-evidence-burkina-fasos-military-leader-slashed-top-government-officials-salaries-by-30-per-cent\/","title":{"rendered":"No evidence Burkina Faso\u2019s military leader slashed top government officials\u2019 salaries by 30 per cent"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Claim: An X user<\/a> claims that Burkina Faso\u2019s military leader and Head of State have slashed the salaries of top government officials by 30 per cent.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n

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Verdict: The claim is false, as no evidence exists that the government has made such a policy. No media outlet in Burkina Faso has reported such a development, and the Council of Ministers has not discussed such a policy in the last few weeks.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Full Text<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Burkina Faso, amongst a few West African countries, has, in the last three years, experienced a fierce military takeover<\/a> after a failure of its civilian leaders to battle persistent insecurity in the Sahel region.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Military leader and Burkina Faso\u2019s Head of State, Captain Ibrahim Traore, who ousted<\/a> former military leader, Paul-Henri Damiba, back on Sept 30, 2022, took over the state affairs after the latter failed to turn around the adverse security crisis in Burkina Faso, amidst scourging food starvation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a year and some months at the helm of affairs, individuals online have asserted that Mr Traore, a low-ranking officer before his dominance as Head of State, has slashed the wages of top government officials by 30%. They also stated he increased civil servants’ wages by 50% and has refused to pay himself a president\u2019s salary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DUBAWA noticed such a narrative in X user Gideon Kitheka Snr (@Gideon_Kitheka<\/a>)\u2019s post on Sunday, May 20, 2024. He wrote:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCaptain Traore Ibrahim, President of Burkina Faso, reduces ministers\u2019 and politicians\u2019 salaries by 30 (per cent).\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIncreases workers\u2019 salaries by 50 (per cent), and refuses to accept a president\u2019s salary and maintains his military captain\u2019s salary.\u201d He wrote further.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This claim was also amplified by another X user, African (@ali_naka<\/a>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was also posted on Meta\u2019s parent application, Facebook, here<\/a> and here<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The initial post on X amassed over 1,000 comments, 5,000 retweets, and 34,000 likes, and was bookmarked 524 times as of Friday, May 24, 2024. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Expectedly, people only talked about the military leader’s goodwill toward the welfare of the people of Burkina Faso and wished other African leaders would adopt such a measure. But a few believed Mr Traore was only trying to make a political impression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI wish all African leaders did this\u2026\u201d Bella (@_Nana_Kc<\/a>) commented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is what we should adopt.\u201d Samwel Wekesa (@bungomaduke<\/a>) commented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis is just political rhetoric and performative politics.\u201d Mwesigye Aarons (@AaronsMwesigye<\/a>) pointed out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Due to the sensitivity of the claim and the traction of its engagement, DUBAWA decided to fact-check it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Verification<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

DUBAWA checked the editorials of major news outlets, such as Aujourd’hue au Faso<\/a>, Burkina24<\/a>, Faso@CTU<\/a>, and Infowakat.net<\/a>, for such reports in the last four weeks. We found out that no news publication reported Mr Traore\u2019s act of reducing the salaries of top government officials, incrementing civil servants\u2019 wages, or withholding a president\u2019s wages for himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

DUBAWA further reviewed publications related to the Burkina Faso government\u2019s finance policies and administrative decisions made last month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Council of Ministers<\/a>\u2013 a weekly government cabinet meeting spearheaded by Mr Traore\u2013 discusses issues that concern the State. <\/strong>However, its recent sittings never broached the topic of either increasing or decreasing the wages of public servants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aujourd’hue au faso<\/a> reports a National Conference scheduled to take place on Saturday, May 25, 2024, and Sunday, May 26, 2024. The weekend conference, which focuses on a transitional return to civilian rule as promised by Mr Traore<\/a>, aims to discuss several subjects, including the moralisation of administration, good governance, etc. However, no indication was reported to explicitly address the budget and financial status of government employees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Faso@CTU<\/a> also reports the policies related to the Ministry of Economy, Finance, and Foresight at the last Council of Ministers meeting. Aside from acknowledging a drop in inflation from 14.1 per cent in 2022 to 0.7 per cent in 2023, the highlight of the finance-related session was the decision to nationalise the Commercial Bank of Burkina Faso. Besides that, nothing else was reviewed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, still on finance and government budgeting, Infowakat.net<\/a> reports on Mr Traore\u2019s intention to have a government seminar to meet the needs of the Burkina Faso populace via the management of public resources. To do that, Mr Traore has instructed the Ministers of every government ministry to monitor the number of civil servants employed by the Ministry, about the number of people paid by the Ministry of Economy, Finance, and Foresight. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, nothing was said concerning the salaries of government employees, in terms of salary increase or decrease. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The claim is false. Available and credible news outlets have not reported such a development, and the issue has not been broached at government official meetings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Claim: An X user claims that Burkina Faso\u2019s military leader and Head of State have slashed the salaries of top government officials by 30 per cent. Verdict: The claim is false, as no evidence exists that the government has made such a policy. No media outlet in Burkina Faso has reported such a development, and the Council of Ministers has not discussed such a policy in the last few weeks. Full Text Burkina Faso, amongst a few West African countries, has, in the last three years, experienced a fierce military takeover after a failure of its civilian leaders to battle persistent insecurity in the Sahel region.\u00a0 Military leader and Burkina Faso\u2019s Head of State, Captain Ibrahim Traore, who ousted former military leader, Paul-Henri Damiba, back on Sept 30, 2022, took over the state affairs after the latter failed to turn around the adverse security crisis in Burkina Faso, amidst scourging food starvation.  After a year and some months at the helm of affairs, individuals online have asserted that Mr Traore, a low-ranking officer before his dominance as Head of State, has slashed the wages of top government officials by 30%. They also stated he increased civil servants’ wages by 50% and has refused to pay himself a president\u2019s salary. DUBAWA noticed such a narrative in X user Gideon Kitheka Snr (@Gideon_Kitheka)\u2019s post on Sunday, May 20, 2024. He wrote: \u201cCaptain Traore Ibrahim, President of Burkina Faso, reduces ministers\u2019 and politicians\u2019 salaries by 30 (per cent).\u201d  \u201cIncreases workers\u2019 salaries by 50 (per cent), and refuses to accept a president\u2019s salary and maintains his military captain\u2019s salary.\u201d He wrote further. This claim was also amplified by another X user, African (@ali_naka). This was also posted on Meta\u2019s parent application, Facebook, here and here.  The initial post on X amassed over 1,000 comments, 5,000 retweets, and 34,000 likes, and was bookmarked 524 times as of Friday, May 24, 2024.  Expectedly, people only talked about the military leader’s goodwill toward the welfare of the people of Burkina Faso and wished other African leaders would adopt such a measure. But a few believed Mr Traore was only trying to make a political impression. \u201cI wish all African leaders did this\u2026\u201d Bella (@_Nana_Kc) commented. \u201cThis is what we should adopt.\u201d Samwel Wekesa (@bungomaduke) commented. \u201cThis is just political rhetoric and performative politics.\u201d Mwesigye Aarons (@AaronsMwesigye) pointed out. Due to the sensitivity of the claim and the traction of its engagement, DUBAWA decided to fact-check it. Verification DUBAWA checked the editorials of major news outlets, such as Aujourd’hue au Faso, Burkina24, Faso@CTU, and Infowakat.net, for such reports in the last four weeks. We found out that no news publication reported Mr Traore\u2019s act of reducing the salaries of top government officials, incrementing civil servants\u2019 wages, or withholding a president\u2019s wages for himself. DUBAWA further reviewed publications related to the Burkina Faso government\u2019s finance policies and administrative decisions made last month. The Council of Ministers\u2013 a weekly government cabinet meeting spearheaded by Mr Traore\u2013 discusses issues that concern the State. However, its recent sittings never broached the topic of either increasing or decreasing the wages of public servants.  Aujourd’hue au faso reports a National Conference scheduled to take place on Saturday, May 25, 2024, and Sunday, May 26, 2024. The weekend conference, which focuses on a transitional return to civilian rule as promised by Mr Traore, aims to discuss several subjects, including the moralisation of administration, good governance, etc. However, no indication was reported to explicitly address the budget and financial status of government employees. Faso@CTU also reports the policies related to the Ministry of Economy, Finance, and Foresight at the last Council of Ministers meeting. Aside from acknowledging a drop in inflation from 14.1 per cent in 2022 to 0.7 per cent in 2023, the highlight of the finance-related session was the decision to nationalise the Commercial Bank of Burkina Faso. Besides that, nothing else was reviewed. Finally, still on finance and government budgeting, Infowakat.net reports on Mr Traore\u2019s intention to have a government seminar to meet the needs of the Burkina Faso populace via the management of public resources. To do that, Mr Traore has instructed the Ministers of every government ministry to monitor the number of civil servants employed by the Ministry, about the number of people paid by the Ministry of Economy, Finance, and Foresight.  However, nothing was said concerning the salaries of government employees, in terms of salary increase or decrease.  Conclusion The claim is false. Available and credible news outlets have not reported such a development, and the issue has not been broached at government official meetings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18876,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"hannibal_claim_source":"","hannibal_source_label":"","hannibal_card_color":"blue","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_wpscppro_dont_share_socialmedia":false,"_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"default","_twitter_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type":"default","_pinterest_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_instagram_share_type":"default","_medium_share_type":"","_threads_share_type":"","_google_business_share_type":"","_bluesky_share_type":"","_mastodon_share_type":"","_selected_social_profile":[],"_wpsp_enable_custom_social_template":false,"_wpsp_social_scheduling":{"enabled":false,"datetime":null,"platforms":[],"status":"template_only","dateOption":"today","timeOption":"now","customDays":"","customHours":"","customDate":"","customTime":"","schedulingType":"absolute"},"_wpsp_active_default_template":true},"categories":[1571,3812,3815,16],"tags":[],"verdict":[],"ppma_author":[3699],"class_list":["post-18875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fact-check","category-headline","category-homepage","category-politics"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8R6dE-4Ur","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":3699,"user_id":0,"is_guest":1,"slug":"cole-praise","display_name":"Cole Praise","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7934b84f51e2c1f4c1e77cce93c223ac97cc2da29198aa9141fd944b0407bb2d?s=96&r=g","author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"","first_name":"","job_title":"","description":""}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/Burkina-Faso.png?fit=732%2C418&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18875"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18877,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18875\/revisions\/18877"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18876"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18875"},{"taxonomy":"verdict","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/verdict?post=18875"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=18875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}