In a statement issued by the government on Saturday 3 December, the government said the state-run RFI broadcast a message earlier that day from a leader of an armed group in which he threatened the population.
The government said RFI also repeated a press report that Burkina Faso’s president Captain Ibrahim Traore, had said there had been an attempted coup trying to unseat him.
“Given all the above, the government has decided the immediate suspension of the broadcast of all RFI programmes across the national territory,” said the statement by government spokesman Rimtalba Jean Emmanuel Ouedraogo.
“RFI strongly deplores this decision and protests against the unfounded accusations calling into question its professionalism,’ State-owned Radio France Internationale, usually referred to as RFI, said in a statement.
It added that the decision to suspend its broadcasting was made without prior notice and the implementation of the procedures put in place by Burkina Faso’s communications regulator.
This decision comes amid a backdrop of sourced relations between France and the military junta in Burkina Faso and Mali over frustrations that France has not done enough to tackle Islamist insurgents who occupied northern Mali in 2021 and have spread to neighbouring states.
