The military regime in Mali has been asked to, as a matter of urgency, conduct elections and clear out of power.
16 prominent citizens of the country made up of writers, researchers, constitutionalists, an ex-Minister of Foreign Affairs, inter-governmental resource persons and sundry activists asserted this in a May 2025 statement now circulating full blast.
Among the signatories are Boubacar Diawara of the University of Paris Sciences and Letters; Issa Diawara, an Economist with the University of Burgundy also in France; Alassane Diarra, a George Washington University political scientist; Kalilou Sidibe, a constitutionalist and professor; Djibril Boubacar, a former Programme Director with the UNDP – ILO; Koro Traore, a writer and Mohamed A. Toure, a former Malian Minister of Foreign Affairs. There are nine other signatories.
The verdict from the signatories which came in a 3-page statement is suggesting that the junta in Mali might be after French imperialism but also after others and Malians at that, what with the suspension of all political activities, the dissolution of political parties and the muzzling of voices critical of the military regime, leading to the abrogation of civic protest actions on the ground that such undermine the moral credit of the Malian State.
The signatories, spread across the world, are insisting that a culture of the ‘law of the strongest’ now prevails across Mali, “with targeted arrests and the disappearance of voices most critical of military governance”. They argue against this on the ground that brute force transgressing the law “repulses the human conscience and always ends up fading away”.
The statement thus has the potential to conscientise the world against the broad understanding of the junta in Mali as a force dedicated to checkmating French control of the former French colony. This is more so that the signatories are basically questioning the governance credentials of the military regime running the country, saying that the legacy of bad governance definitive of the country for over a decade now has reached where their own indifference would be tantamount to “complicity in the country ‘s act of governance”.
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Asserting the connection between disregard for human rights and the tendency to acts of barbarism outrageous to the conscience of mankind, the signatories specifically asks the military regime to
(1) Give priority to frank and constructive dialogue with the political players, which is necessary to unite and mobilize our people against the armed conflicts imposed on us;
(2) Release all prisoners of conscience;
(3) Respect the fundamental rights enshrined in the constitution of July 22, 2023 and the international conventions to which our country has subscribed;
(4) Agree with all components of Malian society, specifically political organizations whose legal mandate is to participate in the suffrage of citizens, a new electoral calendar exclusive to presidential elections coupled with legislative elections, in the short term to close the parenthesis of the state of exception;
(5) Reinstate Joliba TV’s broadcasting rights;
(6) Respect the independence of the judiciary and ensure the establishment of a credible and fair justice system based on the rule of law
This statement by prominent Malians must have come as a surprise to many because if it true that the junta in Mali is repressive, then it shatters the assumption that even the dumbest junta anywhere in the world has realised that the social space is discursive and the idea of arresting people because of what they say is a big waste of time. It is not what people say that matters but the ability of every protagonist to make what s/he says hegemonic or consensual and thus a frame of reference for popular action. As everyone knows, that ability doesn’t exist for many because it is costly in articulatory, organizational and financial terms, irrespective of social media. So, what is the problem of the junta in Mali?
