Coup D’états in the West African Region: A Threat to Regional Human Security

Abstract

After independence in the 1960s, most West African countries began their state governance with democracies and political liberalization. However, military coups swept across the sub-region in the same period as citizen agitations, and the military's thirst for power called for them. The event of coup since then became contagious as an external factor influencing state domestic politics. In that regard, the occurrence of coups in one West African state influenced the execution of the same in neighbouring states, as the Nigeria-Burkina Faso-Ghana 1966 coups confirm. 

With the phenomenon becoming a political behaviour as people openly called for them in times of economic hardships, coups have become a menace than a panacea to human security in the sub-region. Women and children continue to suffer violations and the constant abuse of their rights. Killings have become rampant and a part of military juntas putting lives in the subregion in fear and jeopardy. With people fleeing military juntas out of fear of being persecuted or in search of political freedom, the issue of refugees has become a constant problem for all states in the region. The paper has clearly captured that the region's human security has constantly been under threat due to military coups d'états, even in the twenty-first century.