1980 Upper Voltan coup d'état similar actions, Zerbo was overthrown by the military in yet another coup in 1982, making Major Dr. Jean-Baptiste Ouédraogo President. Military rule has continued in the country since then, with numerous coups and coup attempts. 1980 Upper Voltan coup d'état The 1980 Upper Voltan coup d'état took place on 25 November 1980 in the Republic of Upper Volta (today Burkina Faso). Following a long period of drought, famine, popular unrest and labour strikes, Colonel Saye Zerbo overthrew President Sangoulé Lamizana, another military leader. Zerbo himself would be overthrown only two years later. Upper Volta had gained independence from France in
French Upper Volta the Mossi people were able to defend their religious beliefs and social structure against forcible attempts to convert them to Islam by Muslims from the northwest. When the French arrived and claimed the area in 1896, Mossi resistance ended with the capture of their capital at Ouagadougou. In 1919, certain provinces from Côte d'Ivoire were united into a separate colony called the Upper Volta in the French West Africa federation. In 1932, the new colony was dismembered in a move to economise; it was reconstituted in 1937 as an administrative division called the Upper Coast. After World War II, the