On September 30th, 2022, Captain Ibrahim Traoré and his contingent marched into Burkina Faso’s capital city, Ouagadougou, and toppled President Paul-Henry Sandaogo Damiba. As soldiers loyal to Damiba braced to defend him, fear of an imminent confrontation overtook the country. Captain Traoré called the general population to the streets to support him. After several hours of confusion and uncertainty about Damiba’s whereabouts and who would lead the transition, the putschists suspended the constitution, dissolved the national assembly (and the government), and declared Traoré head of state on October 6th, 2022. The backdrop to this latest coup in Burkina Faso is a jihadist insurrection that has claimed 40% of the country’s national territory, coupled with a succession of popular revolts and coups that thrust the country into an unprecedented period of sociopolitical instability starting in 2014. The following is a conversation between Dr. Lassane Ouedraogo of the Université Joseph Ki-Zerbo in Ouagadougou—a former Africa Is a Country fellow—and Bamba Ndiaye of The Africanist Podcast on the general situation in Burkina Faso the day after the coup. This is an edited version of the conversation. You can listen to the original podcast interview here.