Burkina Faso’s Council of Ministers on November 5, 2026, adopted a decree setting out the modalities for transmitting a child’s name in accordance with local customs and traditions. The move gives effect to Article 131-11 of the Code of Persons and the Family of September 1, 2025, and marks a significant shift in the country’s legal approach to identity.
Under the new text, families may transmit the name of the clan, the lineage, the mother, the father’s first name or one of his given names, as well as accepted variations of the parental name.
The reform breaks with decades of legal practice that had enshrined the preeminence of paternal filiation a model inherited from colonial-era legal systems that shaped much of Africa’s civil law.
In Burkina Faso, where clan affiliations and maternal or paternal lineages structure part of the collective memory, the legal recognition of these references carries particular weight.
The government presents the reform as an act of cultural sovereignty, affirming that Burkinabe cultural references have full legitimacy in the construction of national institutions.
The decree also restores a legal place to traditions that, despite their historical depth, had long evolved on the margins of inherited administrative frameworks.
It is part of a broader drive toward what officials describe as legal decolonization touching the heart of identity.
“Sovereignty is also built in a people’s ability to define its own points of reference, protect its heritage and transmit its memory according to its own realities,” the government said in its communication following the Council.
A name may seem like a family matter. In Burkina Faso, it is also becoming a political affirmation a people’s claim to the right to keep its roots alive in law.
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