@yung "While celebrating Sankara’s achievements, this film does not ignore his tragic flaws. By 1986 Sankara’s rapid, sometimes authoritarian changes had begun to alienate larger sectors of the Burkinabe population, leaving him more isolated, even from elements in his own ruling circle. Like revolutionaries as far back as the French Revolution, Sankara was so committed to achieving his ideals, he was unwilling to give them enough time to ripen in his people. As one close friend observes, ‘Sankara was an impatient man,’ driven by the desperation of his people. As opposition mounted, Sankara attempted to repress it. He established Peoples Revolutionary Tribunals in towns and workplaces around the country where people were tried without counsel for being corrupt officials, counter-revolutionaries or just lazy workers, based not on credible evidence just private grudges. He also encouraged the formation of Revolutionary Defense Committees, gangs of armed youth who terrorized ordinary citizens. When the nation’s school teachers went on strike, Sankara dismissed all of them, leaving the education system, his country’s greatest hope for progress, a shambles. "
