Having spent years burnishing his credentials as Africa's peacemaker, Burkina Faso's longtime ruler Blaise Compaoré did not get a chance to broker a peace deal in his own country.

The troublemaker and The peace broker

A former coup leader, Compaoré has steered an unlikely course from regional troublemaker to peace broker.

“Handsome Blaise”, as he is known to Burkinabes, was aged just 36 when he seized power in a putsch, replacing his erstwhile companion Captain Thomas Sankara, who was killed in mysterious circumstances.

Both had allegedly been trained at Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's "World Revolutionary Centre" in Libya, whose other pupils included Liberian warlord Charles Taylor and his proxy in Sierra Leone, Foday Sankoh.

Years later, Compaoré was accused of sending arms and mercenaries to fight UN peacekeepers in Sierra Leone – in exchange for diamonds.

The Burkinabe leader has also been linked to a 2002 rebellion in neighbouring Ivory Coast, which left thousands dead and split the country in two.Ultimately, the Ivorian crisis gave Burkina Faso’s strongman a chance to reinvent himself as a mediator.

Diplomatic efforts to end the bloodshed in Ivory Coast, home to three million Burkinabes, resulted in a 2007 peace deal signed in Ouagadougou.Compaoré has also been described as a point man for negotiators seeking the release of Western hostages held by Islamist groups and other rebel militia in the restive Sahel region.

In 2009, talks led by Compaoré helped secure the release of two Canadian envoys for the United Nations, Robert Fowler and Louis Guay, who were held captive in Niger for 150 days.

Incidentally, a decade earlier Fowler had penned a scathing UN report that publicly accused the Burkinabe ruler of funding Angola’s bloody 1990s civil war.

Having spent years burnishing his credentials as Africa's peacemaker, Burkina Faso's longtime ruler Blaise Compaoré did not get a chance to broker a peace deal in his own country.

France24