As citizens of Burkina Faso confront mounting hardship and ever-greater difficulty accessing basic public services, the transitional government has offered a display of self-congratulation that has left many observers bewildered. By publishing a theoretical administrative performance score of 85.38% for 2025, the executive has pushed the gap between official rhetoric and everyday reality to a new extreme. Beneath the slogans about “sovereignty” and “digitalization,” these reforms do little to conceal the weaknesses of a state apparatus that appears to have lost its bearings.
The backlash: a statistic that has ignited public debate
The announcement has not passed quietly. Across Ouagadougou and beyond, the figure has sparked a wave of criticism, with citizens, civil society figures and opposition voices questioning how such a score can be justified when public offices remain empty, civil registry documents take months to obtain, and corruption continues to flourish in public procurement. The performance index put forward by the National Council for the Modernization of the Administration reads less like an objective assessment and more like bureaucratic self-praise. This self-evaluated rate captures neither the true quality of services delivered nor the legitimate frustration of rural communities that have long been left behind.
Digitalization promises collide with local realities
The executive has made the digitization of procedures the centerpiece of its agenda. Yet accelerating paperless services in a country plagued by recurring power cuts and weak internet coverage in the provinces amounts to wishful thinking. Far from being inclusive, this blind transformation risks pushing millions of citizens out of the public service system altogether — those without the necessary equipment or any access to digital platforms.
Territorial redeployment: ambitions without the means
There is no question that the return of public services must accompany the presence of the armed forces. But the announcement of an administration ready to immediately reoccupy recaptured areas looks more like a communications posture than an operational plan. Without solid security guarantees for state agents — teachers, health workers, administrators — and without an equipment budget equal to the challenge, sending civil servants into conflict zones amounts to recklessness.
What comes next: a civil service under tighter control
Finally, under the guise of building an “honest and disciplined” administration, the regime is in fact laying the groundwork for greater politicization of the senior civil service. The overhaul of appointment criteria and tighter oversight of public employees serve as a lever to sideline dissenting voices and silence trade unions. Looking ahead, the question is whether this approach will deepen the very inefficiency it claims to be correcting.
Rather than multiplying seminars and statistical self-congratulation in Ouagadougou, the government would be better advised to tackle the root causes of state inefficiency: the lack of resources on the ground, the absence of genuine accountability, and the steady erosion of workers’ purchasing power.