Description: Last week’s anti – government protests in Togo have claimed their first victims after the bodies of 7 people were found scattered around different locations in the capital city of Lome. Violent demonstrations broke out last week against the country’s President Faure Gnassingbe whose family has ruled the country for more than 60 years, after which he inherited the position from his father and entrenched himself in political power indefinitely. Gnassingbe recently positioned himself as President of the Council of Ministers, a role which has no fixed term, which prompted protesters to take their frustrations with the government to the streets. Togo has legislatively prohibited protests since 2022, citing security reasons and the country has disbanded the office of the presidency reformulating governance through the country’s Parliament.
Impact: Togo’s civic movement has turned towards a wholesale battle against the country’s political establishment and is nearing the boundaries of a nationwide political crisis. The country has no backstop political mechanisms controlling the outreach of individual power which enables widespread corruption and bad governance to flourish. Over the past weekend, Gnassingbe was also reported to have deployed military forces to confront the protesters on the streets which further fueled outrage amongst the civil movement. The protests are still transpiring towards a violent crackdown of the government’s ruling force and threatening to cause a substantial degree of instability.