1980 Upper Voltan coup d'état up against the President, which caused the 1966 Upper Voltan coup d'état, in which Lieutenant Colonel Sangoulé Lamizana took power. This marked the beginning of a long era of military rule in Upper Volta and later Burkina Faso. Lamizana would go on to rule the country as a military dictator until the Upper Voltan presidential election in 1978, when he was elected as the leader of a civilian regime. During the 1970s, the Lamizana government faced many problems, among them continued opposition from the trade unions, the rise of new political opposition groups, a strong Sahel drought, increasing desertification, and
Thomas Sankara and the Burkinabe Women's Liberation Movement control, Upper Volta won its independence in 1960 and changed its name to the Republic of Upper Volta. After the French military left, the leaders of the revolution created a bureaucracy that did not involve civilian control. The bureaucracy also welcomed foreign investments from France and other colonial powers, thus making the Republic of Upper Volta a neocolonial state. The people of the Republic of Upper Volta consisted of many rival ethnicities. Sixty percent of the country was made up of Gurunsi, Senufo, Lobi, Bobo, Mande, and Fulani people. Forty percent of the country were Mossi people, most of the