---

Millions of people in Burkina Faso have been displaced due to ongoing and escalating violence.  In a move to address the humanitarian crisis, ECOWAS is ramping up efforts to collect data.

It’s unclear what data ECOWAS is collecting but what is clear is that the humanitarian crisis has provided an opportunity for the UN to roll out its biometrics and digital ID agenda to refugees and displaced persons, and the communities that host them.

Is it all coincidence or has it all been planned?

Burkina Faso is a member of the United Nations (“UN”), La Francophonie and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. It is currently suspended from the Economic Community of West African States (“ECOWAS”) and the African Union.

On Thursday it was reported that in February, Burkinabé soldiers massacred over 200 civilians in a day.  Soldiers systematically forced villagers from their homes, gathered them in groups, and mercilessly opened fire, leaving no one spared, even those attempting to seek refuge. The military has justified these heinous acts as retaliation against villagers accused of aiding Islamist fighters.

Previously, Human Rights Watch has reported unlawful killings and disappearances by the army, drone strikes on civilians and the use of conscription into the army to crack down on dissent. But civilians are at even greater risk from Islamist terrorists.

Since 2015, successive Burkinabé governments have been battling an Islamist insurgency spreading from neighbouring Mali that has killed thousands of people and forcibly displaced millions. Fighting has intensified in recent years

Since late 2022 there was an upsurge of Islamist armed groups killing scores of civilians, looting and burning property, and forcing thousands to flee in attacks across the country. Jihadist groups now control over a third of the country.

But that’s not all.  Recently, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said that drug trafficking in the Sahel region – i.e., Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania, and the Niger – continues to hinder security, economic development and the rule of law while jeopardising public health.

Last week, in a move to address humanitarian crises and combat terrorism, ECOWAS announced a multi-million-dollar initiative to aid internally displaced people, refugees, asylum seekers and communities affected by conflicts across the region.

Out of the $25 million fund for the fight against terrorism in Nigeria, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, $9 million has been allocated for internally displaced people (“IDPs”), refugees and asylum seekers, as well as for the communities that host them.  $4 million of the $25 million has been reserved for humanitarian action to curb the devastating consequences of terrorism and mitigate the fallout of natural disasters.  There are not enough details provided to establish the intention of the separate $9 million and $4 million allocations.

Nor are there details on what form or items the aid or assistance will take. However, according to Punch, ECOWAS  emphasised the importance of prevention in its approach to crisis management, highlighting the implementation of a disaster reduction strategy and the utilisation of tools such as the Observation, Monitoring, and Alert Centre.”

Since 2003, ECOWAS has been implementing its Early Warning and Response Network (“ECOWARN”).  The Observation, Monitoring and Alert Centre is one of its two operational branches and has been in existence since at least 2009, as evidenced by THIS interview with the head of one of ECOWARN’s sub-region offices.

ECOWAS claims “[ECOWARN’s] systematised approach to data collection, threat assessment, and reporting enables proactive decision-making to preserve regional stability.”

As ECOWARN has obviously completely failed to preserve regional stability in recent years and the emphasis is on data collection, it makes one wonder what data is being collected.

Punch noted that by implementing disaster reduction strategies using data collection and analysis tools, ECOWAS would be able “to monitor displaced populations, anticipate potential threats and effectively manage crises.”

So, monitoring displaced persons seems to be one of the priorities.  In addition, or perhaps complimentary, to the data ECOWAS collects to enable this monitoring, the displaced persons crisis in the region has provided an opportunity for the UN to roll out its biometric and digital ID agenda to refugees, IDPs and the communities that host them.  The digital ID is linked to people’s cash and any relief items that are distributed to them.

Before we detail how events have unfolded in Burkina Faso – from violence to displaced persons to biometrics and digital IDs to early warning systems – it’s worthwhile reminding ourselves how the world shadow government or Supranational Deep State operates.  

By doing this and then detailing events in Burkina Faso, we hope to provide sufficient information that readers can use to decide for themselves whether the events in Burkina Faso are a coincidence or part of an orchestrated plan.  A plan to displace people using Islamic State and other terrorist groups – and, at times, Burkinabé military –  and then force vulnerable populations onto a digital identity system for control purposes.

How the World Shadow Government Operates

Economic Hit Men, Jackals and Military of the World Shadow Government

While he was chief economist for Chas. T. Main, John Perkins said he was an economic hitman for the world shadow government. For 10 years he helped US intelligence agencies and multinational corporations cajole and blackmail foreign leaders into serving US foreign policy and awarding lucrative contracts to American businesses.

In the documentary ‘Zeitgeist: Addendum’ Perkins is recorded in 2008 as saying: “[Economic hit men] are the first line of defence.  We go in, we try to corrupt the governments and get them to accept these huge loans which we then use as leverage to basically own them.  If we fail … then the second line of defence is: we send in the jackals.  And the jackals either overthrow governments or assassinate them.”  If that fails then they send in the military, he said.

Read more: Economic Hit Men Are the First Line of Defence for World Shadow Government

In a similar vein, Michael Rivero suggested that “all wars are bankers’ wars,” meaning all wars are fought by and for the private bankers.  “I know many people have a great deal of difficulty comprehending just how many wars are started for no other purpose than to force private central banks onto nations,” Michael Rivero wrote in 2016.

He argued that behind the propaganda and political narratives, private central bankers have significant influence over wars. He said that “war is the bankers’ richest harvest” and that politicians and the media are used to promote the interests of these financial institutions.

Read more: All Wars Are Bankers’ Wars: How private bankers have imposed their system of slavery on the world

Another example of how the world shadow government achieves its aims through public-private partnerships and war is The Carlyle Group which is seen by many as the apex of the military-industrial complex.

The Carlyle Group operates within what is called the “Iron Triangle.”  In US politics, the Iron Triangle refers to the relationship between congressional committees, the federal bureaucracy and interest groups during the policy creation process.

In the wake of the events of the attacks against the United States on 11 September 2001, commonly referred to as “9/11,” and the invasion of Iraq during the Persian Gulf War, The Carlyle Group’s power and influence became significantly stronger. The company was involved in the privatisation of Iraqi infrastructure and services, including the management of Iraqi oil fields and the provision of security services.

Read more: The Carlyle Group: An example of how the Global Public Private Partnership works

Bringing the World Government Out of the Shadows

In the build-up to the ‘Summit of the Future’ to be held in September 2024, UN Secretary-General  António Guterres has been calling for the UN to be given the power to declare a crisis and dictate the response, globally. 

As award-winning journalist Alex Newman said: “Anything could be a crisis, and when the Secretary-General declares a crisis, all power and authority would go to the UN.  This is like a blank check on the wealth and liberty on every person on the planet, and this is coming soon.  It is eminent.”

The outcome of the ‘Summit of the Future’ will be the endorsement of the ‘Pact for the Future’ which is how they plan to achieve the UN’s ‘Our Common Agenda’ and Agenda 2030. 

During a lecture in Norway last year,  Jacob Nordangård explained that the ultimate goal of Agenda 2030 is to create a “singleton” – a world order in which there is a single decision-making agency at the highest level.  During a lecture in the Netherlands last week, he explained that the Pact for the Future is a global coup d’état.

“The aim [of the Pact] is to strengthen international cooperation so it delivers fully and fairly on existing agreements while enabling us to respond effectively to new threats and opportunities for present and future generations,” Nordangård explained.

Quoting from the Pact, he said: “The goal of this Pact should be a global transition by states and non-state actors to a circular economy addressing both supply and demand in a way that achieves balance with the planet.”  This is technocracy, Nordangård said.

He continued: “They want a declaration for future generations securing the interest of future generations by identifying managing and monitoring global existential risks … They want to create foresight and data for future generations so they want to collect data … They want to take all the data [and] put it in something that we call a Futures Lab, and analyse this data.”

The Aim of Perpetual War

In George Orwell’s fictional novel ‘1984’, the concept of war is portrayed as an essential tool for maintaining control over the population. The government, known as the Party, is always at war with one of the other two superstates.  The war is constant and never-ending, with the enemy frequently changing sides. This perpetual state of war serves multiple purposes for the Party:

1. Distraction: The ongoing war keeps the population focused on external threats, diverting their attention away from the Party’s oppressive actions and policies.
2. Justification for control: The Party can justify its tight control over society by claiming that it is necessary for the war effort. This includes limiting personal freedoms, censoring information and using surveillance to monitor citizens.
3. Fear and obedience: The constant threat of attack from the enemy superstate instils fear in the population, making them more likely to obey the Party’s commands and accept its authority.
4. Economic control: The war provides a convenient excuse for the Party to allocate resources as it sees fit, ensuring that the economy remains under its control.

Read more: The aim of perpetual warfare according to George Orwell’s ‘1984’

A Digital Prison for Burkina Faso’s Displaced Persons

UN’s Digital IDs for Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons

In March 2018, the UN Refugee Agency (“UNHCR”) published its Digital Identity and Inclusion Strategy. 

Justifying the reason for the digital ID strategy, a pamphlet stated: “A legal identity for every individual is of utmost importance. However, a digital identity that give [sic] access to the internet, mobile phones and related services is equally becoming important.” 

The pamphlet also stated how UNHCR will assist in registering and documenting all residents of a country, not only refugees:

Integrated national identity systems providing a foundational identity to everybody, incl. refugees and asylum seekers, stateless persons, and other forcibly displaced, will receive UNHCR’s full support. Hence, the UN Refugee Agency will focus on refugee registration as a functional subset of a multi-sector and multi-purpose ID infrastructure and assist States to register and document all individuals living on the State’s territory, incl. those under the organisation’s mandate.

UNHCR Strategy on Digital Identity and Inclusion, March 2018

The UNHCR’s mandate is to aid and protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities and stateless people, and to assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integration or resettlement to a third country.  There is a glaringly obvious mission creep with assisting the registration of all residents in a country under the guise of aiding displaced persons.

The pamphlet also shows that UNHCR will use biometrics and digital ID to track their cash and relief items and that this personal data will be stored on a centralised global UN database:

Refugees and other forcibly displaced persons will, for example, have relief accounts that show entitlements in a transparent manner and track cash and relief items that have been or will be made available to them.

UNHCR is currently rolling out its Population Registration and Identity Management EcoSystem (PRIMES), which includes state of the art biometrics. A consolidated global database will be in place soon. In partnership with governments, academic institutions, international organisations and private sector companies, we will embark in 2018/2019 on a number of pilot projects to proof concepts, establish use cases and processes, and test IT infrastructure.

UNHCR Strategy on Digital Identity and Inclusion, March 2018

We might assume that only undocumented migrants or displaced persons are unfortunate enough to have to be registered on the UN’s system to receive assistance.  But this is not the case.  Even if a national government registers refugees, the UN is in control of the system.

In a blog post in June 2018 which claimed having a digital ID “empowered” displaced persons, UNHCR  said: “In the past, governments would often request UNHCR to undertake refugee registration and documentation on their behalf.  However, host countries were taking an increased role, in partnership with UNHCR, using shared identity management tools and registration processes.”

Key drivers of this trend for governments to be involved, UNHCR said, “include the commitment by all countries, as part of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), to ‘provide legal identity for all, including birth registration’ by 2030(target 16.9) and the 2016 New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants.”

At this stage, there must be very few people who still believe the UN’s SDGs are of benefit to anyone but the self-appointed elites.  So, it’s doubtful any countries are willingly committing, or submitting, to them.

It’s also highly unlikely refugees want their biometrics and data stored on a global database or their cash and relief items to be tracked.  In 2020, The Swedish Development Forum noted that UNHCR’s collection of biometric data extends the power of the state in rendering refugees’ lives more intervenable and more at risk, and informed consent is also a highly contested issue.

The Swedish Development Forum cited examples of discrimination against forcibly displaced Rohingya people in Bangladesh being put at higher risk of discrimination by issuing them the UN “smart cards,” and the lack of protection and risks related to tampering, loss and misuse of refugees’ personal data during registration processes in India, Thailand and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Regarding consent, whether informed or not, it seems refugees and displaced persons have little to no choice as confirmed by UNHCR’s blog which links the receiving of humanitarian assistance to a person’s digital ID:

The use of digitally enabled IDs that are interoperable across different aid agencies can greatly enhance the efficiency of humanitarian assistance delivery. Importantly, the provision of IDs that are officially recognised will facilitate the financial inclusion of refugees by, for example, allowing them to register SIM cards in their own name and to open mobile money or bank accounts. Host communities will also benefit from the extension of coverage of ID systems across the whole country, including hard-to-reach and border areas.

Empowering refugees and internally displaced persons through digital identity, UHNCR, 19 June 2018

“The extension of coverage of ID systems across the whole country.” Again, the UNHCR mission creep under the guise of assisting refugees.

UNHCR is not being charitable to vulnerable and displaced persons or the communities that host them.  What UNHCR is describing is the implementation of a digital prison much like that in Nigeria; interlinked smartphone, biometrics, digital ID and bank account, the data for which is collected and stored on a centralised database.

Read more: Nigeria’s digital prison has been built and the gates are closing

By the end of 2018, more than 7.1 million people were biometrically enrolled in the UN’s system in 60 countries across the world, meaning that 8 in every 10 refugees registered by UNHCR had a biometric identity.  UNHCR was already using biometrics to quickly and accurately verify refugees during the distribution of relief in 8 countries. 

Also, by that time, data of more than 2.4 million people were “securely hosted” in proGres v4, one of the core modules of UNHCR’s Population Registration and Identity Management EcoSystem (“PRIMES”).  PRIMES’ sole aim is to provide refugees and other forcibly displaced persons with a digital identity.

“We believe that PRIMES suites of applications will enhance the capacity of UNHCR to collect and analyse data … We also believe that in a future not so far away, PRIMES will eventually be the single-entry point for all digital interaction between UNHCR, partners and all the individuals who are registered,” UNHCR declared in January 2019.

Burkina Faso Internally Displaced Persons

At the same time that UNHCR began rolling out its digital IDs for refugees and displaced persons, Burkina Faso was becoming the epicentre of the Central Sahel displacement and humanitarian crisis. Central Sahel is a region in Africa comprising the countries of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger.

Weak governance, chronic resource scarcity, and violent non-state actors – many with affiliations to the Islamic State and al-Qaeda – continue to destabilise the Central Sahel. After nearly a decade of insecurity in Mali and Niger, violence began spreading into neighbouring Burkina Faso in mid-2018 – affecting all 13 of the country’s administrative regions.

While the small country may be the newest frontline of the Central Sahelian conflict, Burkina Faso quickly became the epicentre of the region’s rapidly deteriorating displacement and humanitarian crises.

Today [May 2021], among Burkina Faso’s population of 20 million people, rampant insecurity has left 3.5 million people in need of humanitarian assistance and forced 1.2 million Burkinabés out of their homes. The number of displaced people in the country has more than doubled compared to early 2020. Burkina Faso also hosts close to 20,000 refugees and asylum seekers from the wider region. 

Atrocities and Displacement in Burkina Faso, Refugees International, 5 May 2021

The above report was made in May 2021.  In the last few months of that year, security in Burkina Faso deteriorated. 

“State control outside of major cities has diminished and terrorist attacks by groups linked to Islamic State, al-Qaida and local bandits are going up. Increasingly, people displaced by the conflict are falling victim to terrorists in areas they had once fled to for safety,” VOA News wrote in December 2021.

At this time, it was reported that there were 1.3 million IDPs.  And the situation in Burkina Faso has only worsened over time with the number of people in need of humanitarian assistance increasing by 35% between 2022 to 2023, from 3.5 million to almost 4.7 million, according to UNHCR.

Burkinabés are not only at risk of violence and displacement from Islamic State, al-Qaida and local bandits.

On Thursday, it was reported that on 25 February military forces in Burkina Faso killed 223 civilians, including babies and many children, in attacks on two villages accused of cooperating with militants. In a statement, Human Rights Watch Executive Director Tirana Hassan said “International assistance is critical to support a credible investigation into possible crimes against humanity.”

“The once-peaceful nation has been ravaged by violence that has pitted jihadis linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group against state-backed forces. Both sides have targeted civilians caught in the middle, displacing more than 2 million people, of which over half are children. Most attacks go unpunished and unreported in a nation run by a repressive leadership that silences perceived dissidents,” France24 said.

France24’s report continued: “More than 20,000 people have been killed in Burkina Faso since jihadi violence linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group first hit the West African nation nine years ago, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project [“ACLED”], a United States-based nonprofit.”

ACLED collects information on the dates, actors, locations, fatalities and types of all reported political violence and protest events around the world in real-time.  Its data is considered to be one of the most comprehensive and reliable sources of conflict data globally and is widely used by organisations such as the United Nations and the World Bank.

As with ECOWAS, ACLED also uses “early warning and forecasting tools.”  The forecasting tool,  Conflict Alert System (“CAST”), “predicts political violence events up to six months in the future for every country in the world.” 

If violent events can be predicted with any accuracy up to six months in advance, why can’t they pre-empt it?

Instead, as the situation worsens and more people are forcibly displaced, the World Bank has taken the opportunity to fund the Burkinabé government to speed up the country’s digital public infrastructure (“DPI”) efforts.

(Related: Western taxpayers are funding the global rollout of the controligarchs’ surveillance and control system)

Burkina Faso’s Digital Public Infrastructure

In March 2024, it was announced that efforts by the Burkinabé government to speed up the country’s DPI pursuits would receive financial backing from the World Bank through the International Development Association (“IDA”).

According to Biometric Update, the funds, totalling $150 million, were approved by the Bretton Woods institution earlier in the year and will be used to improve access to infrastructure, public services and digital skills in Burkina Faso under a project labelled ‘Digital Acceleration Project’.

The Bretton Woods institution refers to the two entities created in 1944 at a conference in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, USA: the International Monetary Fund (“IMF”) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (“IBRD”), which is part of the World Bank Group.  Both the IMF and the World Bank Group are specialised agencies of the UN.

(Related: Did the Bilderberg Group orchestrate the 1973 oil crisis? and Organisations that make up the UN World Government System)

With the World Bank funding, the Burkinabé government will be able to expand digital connectivity to provide services aimed at vulnerable populations such as IDPs and underserved communities which are often cut off from accessing important public and private sector services, Biometric Update wrote.

Commenting on the project, World Bank Task Team Leader Tounwendé Alain Sawadogo said: “Recognising the potential of digital technology to address fragility and strengthen resilience in Burkina Faso, this key infrastructure project aims to increase access to broadband connectivity for the population, particularly in areas that are vulnerable to climate shocks and are hosting displaced persons.”

So, the UNHCR is collecting, managing and storing biometrics and digital ID data of displaced persons and the communities that host them and the World Bank is increasing broadband connectivity to the same people.

Displaced people, who are most likely traumatised and own nothing except for what they were able to carry from their homes on their backs, are not prioritising smartphones and broadband connectivity.  They need food, clean water and shelter.  Which, it seems, relies on them using a digital ID issued by the UN.

To explain why UNHCR and the World Bank are prioritising digital IDs and connectivity we enlist the help of Bill Gates.

In January 2023, Burkina Faso was among 10 countries running different pilots for digital ID using MOSIP, after the country signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the platform in December 2022.  MOSIP is Bill Gates’ Modular Open Source Identity Platform that he is offering to all countries, for free, so they can build their own national identity systems. “The original inspiration for MOSIP was India’s national digital ID system, Aadhaar,” the Gates Foundation has claimed.

In a one-to-one with India’s Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi last month, Gates laid out his vision for the digital public infrastructure and how digital IDs fit into the overall plan.  After listening to Gates’ plan, we will leave it up to our readers to decide if this is the real reason why the UN wants people in Burkina Faso, whether displaced or not, to have digital IDs and broadband connectivity.

Further reading:

• Bill Gates is “inspired” by digital ID and smart farming projects in India
• Digital IDs are being rolled out globally; from Europe to Ethiopia to Australia
• Bill Gates and the UN impose their digital IDs on Sierra Leoneans

Earlier this month, the Burkinabé government got a boost from Japan for its efforts in conducting biometric identity enrolment for some IDPs in the country.  The support is in the form of digital equipment worth $153,000, We Are Tech Africa reported.

What was the reason given to boost biometric identity enrolment?

The number of IDPs in Burkina Faso is said to be growing as a result of rising insecurity in the Sahel region. It is hoped that the biometric registration will help in the distribution of humanitarian assistance to beneficiaries, Biometric Update said.

UN’s Early Warnings for All Initiative

Although there is no clear indication that early warning systems are linked to the UN’s digital public infrastructure, it is being implemented at the same time so we should be suspicious.  So, we include this section at the end as perhaps, or perhaps not, a piece of the puzzle but something we should at least keep our eye on.  It demonstrates the UN’s desire to predict and respond to crises that have not yet occurred.  If this sounds like a good idea, we ask you to re-read the section above titled ‘Bringing the World Government Out of the Shadows’ to understand the UN’s motivations behind this initiative.

In March 2022 the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres announced the Early Warnings for All (“EW4All”) initiative calling for every person on Earth to be “protected” by early warning systems by 2027.

The initiative has four pillars:

• Pillar 1: Disaster risk knowledge, is led by the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (“UNDRR”).
• Pillar 2: Detection, observations, monitoring, analysis and forecasting of hazards, is led by the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation (“WMO”). 
• Pillar 3: Warning dissemination and communication, is led by the UN’s International Telecommunication Union (“ITU”). 
• Pillar 4: Preparedness to respond, is led by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (“IFRC”). 

ECOWAS is taking concrete action to ensure that West Africa meets the EW4All goal.

In June 2023, ECOWAS inaugurated its new Disaster Operations Centre in Abuja, Nigeria, to be an operational component of the African Multi Hazards Early Warning System for Early Action (“AMHEWAS”).  Multi-hazard early warning systems are a component of the UN’s EW4All initiative.

AMHEWAS is supported by the African Union Commission, the United Nations Development Programme (“UNDP”), UNDRR and the CIMA Research Foundation.  AMHEWAS was developed as an early warning system in response to “climate-related threats,” according to UNDP.

With the opening of the Abuja Disaster Operations Centre, there are now four such interlinked situation rooms in the ECOWAS region. The others are based at the African Union Commission in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; the African Centre of Meteorological Application for Development in Niamey, Niger; and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development-Climate Prediction and Applications Centre in Nairobi, Kenya.

While the Abuja Disaster Operations Centre was set up to deal with climate-related threats,  the ECOWAS Early Warning and Response Network (“ECOWARN”), also headquartered in Abuja, is designed to provide early warning and response data to support the prevention and management of conflicts in the region.

The implementation of ECOWARN began in 2003.  It is operated by the ECOWAS Early Warning Department and is made up of two operational branches; one is the Observation and Monitoring Centre based in Abuja.

In October 2023, ECOWAS and UNHCR signed an agreement to strengthen their collaboration in identifying and “protecting” refugees, stateless and internally displaced persons (“IDPs”) in the region.  The initiative spans all 15 ECOWAS member countries. 

At the time, there were 6,976,470 forcibly displaced by conflicts and violence, and stateless persons in the ECOWAS region, including 6,352,346 IDPs and 624,124 refugees and asylum-seekers. Nigeria and Burkina Faso hosted the highest displaced populations with 3,578,996 and 2,062,534 people respectively.

In a press conference last week, ECOWAS Commissioner for Human Development and Social Affairs said: “To further its peace-building efforts, ECOWAS has set up an Observation, Monitoring and Early Warning Centre based in Abuja, which works to prevent violent extremism in the region. This centre helps to ensure that humanitarian issues are properly addressed in the ECOWAS region.”

There is no mention in the press conference of when the “Observation, Monitoring and Early Warning Centre based in Abuja” was set up, although an interview in 2009 stated that it was already in operation at that time.  Also, no details on the Early Warning Department could be found.  Information is sparse and the whole project appears to lack transparency, and therefore accountability.  We were also unable to establish the relationship, if any, between ECOWARN and AMHEWAS, a branch of the UN’s EW4All initiative.

However, as we stated at the beginning of our article, the Observation, Monitoring and Early Warning Centre will enable ECOWAS to monitor displaced populations, anticipate potential threats and effectively manage crises. And despite being in operation for over two decades, ECOWAS claims “[ECOWARN’s] systematised approach to data collection, threat assessment, and reporting enables proactive decision-making to preserve regional stability.”

Unless the data being collected is on those who are perpetrating violence, it’s not clear how data collection enables proactive decision-making to preserve regional stability.   Considering their apparent failure to preserve stability so far, perhaps they are not collecting data on the perpetrators.

But, if the UN’s determination to roll out its digital public infrastructure is anything to go by, they are collecting data to monitor displaced persons.  The early warning systems will, therefore, further enable the monitoring and control of populations – particularly if biometrics and digital IDs of vulnerable populations are the data that is being collected. 

If this is the case, we could argue that the desire to monitor and manage vulnerable people through the UN’s digital public infrastructure is a threat to populations in the ECOWAS region – especially if it is being implemented through violently displacing people. 

It becomes even more chilling if monitoring and controlling people is in response to whatever they decide is an “anticipated potential threat.”  In this case, they could “herd” populations in and out of areas at will, with people losing everything they own in the process, through the use of digital IDs.

Featured image: Burkina Faso suspends BBC, Voice of America for reporting on army killings, Aljazeera, 26 April 2024