What’s new? After two coups d’état in the past nine months, Mali is suffering chronic instability as violence persists in rural areas. Following the president’s removal, neither Malian actors nor international partners have grasped the opportunity created by the transitional period to put the country back on track.

Why does it matter? The second coup on 24 May 2021 strengthened the military’s hold on power and raised more fears than hopes. The new coalition government appears fragile and unfit to carry out the necessary reforms.

What should be done? Malian leaders must rescue what they can of the transition by reforming the electoral system to give citizens genuine alternatives at the ballot box. The current uncertainty should not deter foreign partners from developing long-term strategies to help the Malian state rebuild itself.

Executive Summary

Nearly a decade after the 2012 putsch, Mali – a country plagued by rural insurgencies – has undergone two coups d’état in less than a year. In the first coup, on 18 August 2020, a group of army officers removed President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta. During the first nine months of a transition that was to have lasted eighteen, tensions between civilians and the army, combined with a fragile social and political base, paralysed government. A second coup on 24 May 2021 strengthened the military’s hand but ushered in a new period of uncertainty. International partners continue to put counter-terrorism above governance reforms. They have reached the limits of what they can do. Politicians still have time to make the most of the interim period: they should initiate electoral reforms, organise elections, rally the political class and civil society behind change, and carry out national consultations to identify and overcome obstacles.

In the aftermath of the 2020 coup, officers from the junta that removed Keïta, the Committee for the Salvation of the People (CNSP), skilfully manoeuvred to occupy key positions in the transitional government. In parallel, they weakened their rivals, particularly the 5 June Movement-Rally of Patriotic Forces (M5-RFP), the main civilian grouping that opposed Keïta. These machinations undermined the transitional government, which lacked a social and political base solid enough to push through the promised reforms on its own. Despite drawing up an ambitious roadmap in September 2020, Moctar Ouane’s government could not undertake significant reforms. As the insurgencies continued, the transitional government quickly proved unable to make major decisions, paralysed by struggles with the CNSP, which remained active behind the scenes despite having been officially dissolved.

The May 2021 cabinet reshuffle brought to the surface tensions that obstructed governance and set the stage for a second coup led by ex-CNSP officers. For months, Ouane’s government worked to free itself from the army’s meddling and to broaden its base through consultations with politicians and civil society representatives. By excluding several ministers who had been CNSP members or had close links to the group, the reshuffle backfired on the leading civilian government authorities when army officers arrested them.

A few days later, Colonel Assimi Goïta, leader of the ex-CNSP and vice president of the original transitional government, was sworn in as president of the new interim authority. The army officers from the former CNSP who plotted the “coup within a coup” could not take full control of a civilian government and so brought in M5-RFP spokesman Choguel Maïga to form a new cabinet. This new alliance between civilians and military officers remains fragile; the M5-RFP is divided and has lost its moral figurehead, Imam Mahmoud Dicko, former leader of the High Islamic Council of Mali, who has adopted a lower profile. The alliance with the military officers also seems anomalous given that Maïga protested the militarisation of power following the 2020 coup. The June 2021 government composition leaves no doubt that the coup’s leaders are the ones in power, since they control the executive. They will give civilian authorities little room for manoeuvre. Nine years after President Touré’s overthrow and one since Keïta’s fall, it seems that Mali is going back to square one.

After the 2021 coup, Mali’s main partners have attempted to closely monitor the transition, mainly to prevent the country’s collapse, but their influence has remained limited. Despite succeeding in stopping the army from usurping power completely, they continued to prioritise the implementation of the 2015 peace agreement and to push for a short, eighteen-month transition period. Even with thousands of foreign soldiers on the ground and millions of dollars in financial aid, the country’s outside partners have been unable to help the civilian authorities lay the foundations for positive change in governance. Many actually doubted that transitional authorities would have enough time or legitimacy to undertake extensive reforms.

” Bamako’s highly volatile political situation … makes most observers pessimistic about the outlook for the coming weeks and months. “

Bamako’s highly volatile political situation, combined with insecurity in rural areas, makes most observers pessimistic about the outlook for the coming weeks and months. Tensions within the security forces have so far been kept in check, but they still represent a real risk to the country’s stability. Senior government officials’ attempts to find a new political equilibrium seem precarious.

It remains possible to keep the transition on track. Foreign partners have a role to play, but Malian politicians and civil society representatives will have to take primary responsibility for extricating Mali from this predicament and the reliance on foreign powers that led the country into it. During the May 2021 events, Malians mobilised little, appearing weary of infighting in the capital. Mali’s new authorities need to complete the transition period with transparent and fair elections. Above all, citizens should be free to elect candidates offering genuine solutions to the crisis. Malian actors and international partners should plan for the long term to restore the health of democratic governance.

To prevent further setbacks for the transition, Mali’s political and social forces and international partners should:

Persist in efforts initiated by the former interim president to rally support from civil society representatives and political actors behind the transition’s priorities. Malians need to reach a broad consensus over necessary reforms to ensure smooth progress.

Continue applying pressure on the interim authorities, particularly President Goïta, who have promised to reduce state spending and to manage public funds more effectively, including in the defence and security sectors, which have been embroiled in scandal in recent years.

Create the right conditions for a consensual adoption of a new electoral law and a new parties charter – two of the roadmap’s objectives that are still achievable – in order to clean up the electoral process, notably by reducing the territorial administration’s control over organisation of elections and by preventing the proliferation of political parties without a genuine program of government.

Within the framework of the more ambitious reforms included in the roadmap (particularly the constitutional amendments), encourage the transitional government to carry out national public consultations to identify obstacles and to give democratically elected authorities responsibility for organising a referendum on a new draft constitution.

Remain vigilant in monitoring possible violence against political adversaries, to ensure that the coup’s leaders are not tempted to take that route.

Finally, international partners should worry less about concluding the transition within the agreed-upon timeframe and concentrate more on ensuring continued interest in efforts to reform the state, an ambition that met with strong public interest after Keïta fell. They should plan for the long term and identify the Malian forces best able to advocate for change. Mali’s international partners should avoid imposing an ideal model of the state and instead give more support to initiatives from the present administration to produce more effective services that meet the country’s needs.

Bamako/Dakar/Brussels, 21 September 2021

I. Introduction

Eight years after the March 2012 putsch, the overthrow of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta by a coup d’état on 18 August 2020 revived political tensions amid unrest and violence in rural areas.

But this development also gave hope for change in a country seemingly paralysed by corruption and poor governance. When it came into power, the Committee for the Salvation of the People (CNSP) – the junta led by young army officers that removed Keïta – promised to combat corruption and restore national unity. Nine months later, halfway through a transition period planned to last eighteen months, the new Malian authorities had made many promises but followed through on none.

On 24 and 25 May 2021, officers from the CNSP, officially dissolved that January, staged another coup, ejecting the civilians with whom they had been forced to share power since the preceding September.

Although they swiftly appointed a new civilian prime minister from the coalition that had led the charge against Keïta, Bamako’s new masters appear more interested in consolidating their control over the state than carrying out necessary reforms.

This report analyses the first year of Mali’s transition, focusing on the inability of the country’s leaders and main international partners to put it back on track. Taking into account these partners’ pessimism about Mali’s situation and the shifting foreign military presence in the country, the report identifies the main threats to a transition that has been derailed once before. It also makes recommendations for how to make the most of present circumstances. The analysis is based on dozens of interviews conducted in Mali between September 2020 and June 2021 during three research visits, as well as several online conversations over the course of 2021.
II. A Mislabelled Transition

The CNSP’s colonels justified their decision to overthrow Keïta in August 2020 by accusing him and his inner circle of being primarily responsible for Mali’s state of decay. They began by calling upon civil society and socio-political movements to join them in setting up a “civilian political transition” and preparing the ground for the country’s reconstruction. In reality, however, the CNSP’s officers wanted to shunt aside a previous generation of political leaders who had monopolised power. They negotiated with outside partners to secure key positions in the transitional government at the same time that they undermined potential rivals, particularly the 5 June Movement-Rally of Patriotic Forces (M5-RFP) coalition, the driving force behind the anti-Keïta protests between June and August 2020. The first months of the transition therefore produced a fragile and divided government, one that lacked a solid base and was incapable, despite its good intentions, of delivering the promised reforms.

A. Army Officers Pulling the Levers of Power

From the outset, the formation of transitional institutions generated significant tensions among the CNSP, which wanted to maintain control of government, the M5-RFP, which suspected the colonels of wanting to keep power permanently, and Mali’s international partners, particularly the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which pushed for a short transition period.

The CNSP kept a tight grip on the national consultations held in early September that led to the creation of the transitional bodies, the interim president and vice president, a prime minister in charge of a 25-member government, and the National Transition Council (CNT), which consists of 121 members from the defence and security forces, the M5-RFP, political groupings, parties and a wide range of civil society organisations. The CNSP introduced a committee of around twenty experts to persuade social and political actors to participate in this dialogue and to legitimise the transitional bodies in the eyes of outside partners.

Negotiations continued over the text of the transitional charter that would set up interim institutions to run the country until constitutional order was restored. The charter made symbolic concessions to M5-RFP after the text was approved on 12 September 2020 at a popular assembly controlled by the CNSP and signed by Colonel Assimi Goïta, then serving as the CNSP’s president.

But M5-RFP members protested in vain after reading the charter and discovering that most of their proposed amendments had been left out. The text made more substantial concessions to Mali’s international partners by agreeing to a transition period of eighteen months instead of the three years first proposed by the CNSP. ECOWAS was also ostensibly granted its wish for a civilian to be appointed leader of the transition. Nevertheless, the CNSP imposed its own choice, Bah N’Daw, a retired colonel-major and briefly Keïta’s defence minister in 2014. N’Daw was designated president of the transitional authority on 21 September by a board assembled by the CNSP.

The charter gave the CNSP enough room for manoeuvre to keep a strong grip on power while not taking over the government completely. Goïta was named vice president, a post no Malian government has had before, by CNSP officers who imposed the decision on the other participants. In theory, his mandate was limited to defence and security issues.

But in practice, he became a deputy president who made official trips and received ambassadors. A decree signed by President N’Daw on 9 November 2020 also gave Goïta the authority to appoint members of the CNT, the legislative body replacing the country’s national assembly, a prerogative without any clear connection to security matters.

On 27 September 2020, Moctar Ouane – a diplomat who had been foreign affairs minister under President Amadou Toumani Touré – was named prime minister. The government he formed on 5 October gave several important positions to the military. Four officers, three from the CNSP, occupied key ministerial roles, including the defence and national reconciliation portfolios.

By contrast, the M5-RFP appeared sidelined. Its leaders protested the “repeated attempts at marginalisation” and joined the opposition’s complaints about feeling left out of the new government.

The CNT’s composition also reflects the CNSP’s strong influence on the new institutions. The transitional charter defined the CNT as an inclusive assembly, but a decree signed by Bah N’Daw on 9 November stipulated that individual candidacies must be sent to Vice President Goïta for him to appoint its members.

The CNSP reportedly assigned several people to approach candidates individually to assess their loyalty to the “young colonels” as much as to their own organisations.

As a symbol of this influence, CNT members elected Colonel Malick Diaw, the CNSP’s first vice president, as president of their assembly by an overwhelming majority.

In parallel, CNSP officers and others closely associated with the group were appointed by decree to influential posts within the transitional government. In the first weeks after the coup d’état on 18 August, Assimi Goïta renewed the hierarchy of the country’s defence and security apparatus.

A month after the government was formed, the council of ministers approved the appointment of seventeen (out of a total of nineteen) new governors, eleven of whom were military officers who were members of the CNSP or directly connected to it. In short, many army officers were appointed to positions of responsibility usually held by civilians.

” By awarding posts to military officers, the CNSP could reward its allies for their loyalty at the time of the coup d’état. “

As one Malian political observer put it, “the CNSP members took over power, and now they also want to take over government”.
By awarding posts to military officers, the CNSP could reward its allies for their loyalty at the time of the coup d’état.

It consolidated its power base within an army that in the past has been beset by serious and violent divisions. The appointment of officers to key posts also helped the CNSP expand its influence within the state apparatus and become less dependent on civilians.

More broadly, the presence of senior officers (or other figures appointed through their intervention) in the two nerve centres of the Malian state – the Koulouba presidential palace and district of government buildings – gives them a large say over all important decisions taken there.

Therefore the army officers, using their strong presence in the territorial administration ministry and governorates, positioned themselves to influence the organisation and hence the outcome of the elections that are to conclude the transition period.

The CNSP officers have shown undeniable political skill in retaining their influence over the transitional institutions while weakening the M5-RFP coalition.

A decree on 18 January 2021 officially dissolved the CNSP, as demanded by ECOWAS in August 2020, but this measure should not be taken at face value: the dissolution only took place after a process that allowed CNSP members to position themselves in command of the Malian state. Although internal and external actors may have forced a degree of responsibility-sharing, the five main CSNP members who appeared on state television on the night of 18-19 August had a strong influence on every major decision taken by the transitional authorities.

By working to undermine their civilian rivals and to maintain their influence, the CNSP’s officers thwarted the development of a broad-based movement of political actors and civil society in support of the transition. This lack of a strong political base placed Moctar Ouane’s government in a fragile position.

B. A Rapidly Derailed Transition

The popular mobilisation that led to the ouster of President Keïta and his government carried with it a vast aspiration for change, which was only barely heard. The transitional authorities had proposed to follow up on these hopes of laying the foundations for a new Mali, the “Mali Koura” called for in the anti-Keïta protests of mid-2020. The roadmap for the transition, adopted at the same time as the charter, consisted of six ambitious components, subdivided into separate objectives.

But the first transitional government failed to achieve this roadmap’s far-reaching aims.

” Senior officials have little motivation to translate these aspirations for a better management of government funds into concrete actions. “

President N’Daw and Prime Minister Ouane were unable or unwilling to put the country’s finances in order. From the outset, N’Daw proclaimed an unstinting attack on the “scourge of corruption”, a promise also made by Keïta during the first year of his rule as president.

In the transition’s nine months, no substantial progress was made (or even started) in this regard. The country does not lack the mechanisms to combat high-level corruption and the embezzlement of public funds.

But senior officials have little motivation to translate these aspirations for a better management of government funds into concrete actions, because by doing so they would risk upsetting powerful political and economic interests.

The first transitional government also reopened discussions about reforming Mali’s political institutions, particularly the electoral law, the law on political parties and the thorny issue of revising the 1992 constitution. But again, few advances were made. After months of hesitation, President N’Daw and his prime minister realised that they lacked a political base strong enough for such a large-scale project as revising the country’s constitution. In April 2021, a new strategic steering committee comprising 50 members from political parties and civil society, as well as traditional and religious authorities, represented a positive step toward consultations designed to create such a base. But this process turned out to be painfully slow. The government’s timetable for submitting a new draft constitution to the CNT on 2 July 2021 and organising a national referendum on 31 October 2021 was also overly ambitious.

Under pressure from outside partners to keep the interim period within an eighteen-month period, the transitional authorities still hope to reform the electoral system within this short time frame. This system has sparked political disputes in recent years, notably the electoral crisis that led to the emergence of the M5-RFP. In 2019, the Inclusive National Dialogue (DNI) recommended the implementation of a “single and autonomous body in charge of organising elections”, a recommendation later taken forward by the M5-RFP.

The electoral issue caused several clashes between army officials and politicians, as well as mutual mistrust among the transition’s civil and military authorities. Little was achieved despite President N’Daw’s initiative to consult political and social actors in early 2021.

In public, however, N’Daw still seemed serious about keeping to the commitments and respecting the schedule set out in the transitional charter. On 16 April 2021, the minister of territorial administration and decentralisation announced the electoral calendar: the referendum on the revised constitution was planned for 31 October 2021, to be followed by presidential and legislative elections, with the first round taking place on 27 February 2022. Even before the second coup on 24-25 May, many observers considered this timetable unrealistic. CNSP officers, many of whom pushed for a three-year transition, seem in less of a hurry to go to the ballot boxes and may be hoping that they will find a better way to consolidate their power in the meantime.

On security issues, by contrast, the transitional authorities have been bolder. In particular, they accelerated the adoption, on 18 December 2020, of an updated roadmap to implement the peace agreement signed in 2015 after a ministerial meeting of the Agreement Monitoring Committee – the body in charge of monitoring the agreement’s implementation – was held in Kidal on 11 February 2021. Colonel-Major Wagué, an ex-CNSP officer and minister for national reconciliation, represented the government at this meeting. The nomination in October of ministers from the two coalition groups that signed the peace agreements was in itself remarkable given preceding governments’ more fearful approach.

” The transitional authorities proved incapable of substantially improving the security situation or reconsolidating a state presence in the regions affected by armed uprisings. “

Even so, the transitional authorities proved incapable of substantially improving the security situation or reconsolidating a state presence in the regions affected by armed uprisings.

The agreement monitoring meeting in Kidal did not clear any significant deadlocks to speed up implementation of the 2015 peace agreement. In April 2021, the assassination in murky circumstances of Sidi Brahim Ould Sidat, president of the Coordination of Azawad Movements, the main rebel coalition, also threw the agreement’s implementation into disarray.

Moreover, even at the level of the security apparatus’ reform, significant progress remains pending, such as the rollout of a computerised human resources management system for defence and security forces, something outside partners have been requesting for years. Clashes in areas that had previously been spared armed violence, such as the Bougouni region to the south east of Bamako, have raised questions about ex-CNSP officers’ ability to contain the spread of jihadism.

Nine months after the coup d’état of August 2020, the transition seemed stuck in a rut while security in the country also remained fragile. The May cabinet reshuffle laid bare the tensions paralysing government, which also gave the ex-CNSP officers an opportunity for another brutal intervention on the political scene.

III. The Coup within the Coup

Ouane’s transitional government was put in check by rivalry between its civilian elements – essentially consisting of the team directly appointed by Ouane – and ex-CNSP officers. Distrust gradually built up between these two camps.

The young colonels suspected that President N’Daw and Moctar Ouane were seeking to sideline them. From the transition’s early days, they reproached the civilian leaders for failing to stand up to ECOWAS on several major issues stipulated in the charter adopted on 12 September but withdrawn from the version published in the official gazette after negotiations with the regional organisation. Vice President Assimi Goïta allegedly also complained that President N’Daw did not invite him regularly to attend the council of ministers’ meetings where decisions were taken on appointments for senior administrative posts.

For their part, government members close to Ouane grew annoyed that certain ministers, whom they suspected had been nominated not for their merit but for their proximity to the CNSP, showed little solidarity with the government and hindered its Government Action Plan with their inertia.

A. From a Political Display of Force to a Military Coup d’Etat

Its hands increasingly tied, Ouane’s government tried to rid itself of military meddling in its plans and to consult with the country’s political and social forces to broaden its base. Though chosen by the military, President N’Daw had become an ally of convenience. Clearly disinclined to militarise political power, N’Daw was eager to keep the eighteen-month transition on track. Therefore, he supported efforts to break deadlocks in government and to respect the agreed-upon timetables, particularly the dates set for elections.

Faced with the difficulties encountered by the government, the transitional authorities agreed to go ahead with a cabinet reshuffle. In a bid for greater political openness, N’Daw brought back his prime minister who had just offered his resignation and asked him to reform a government on 14 May 2021. This decision sparked immediate tensions with ex-CNSP officers; some already had sour relationships with Ouane’s team and wanted to get rid of them.

This time, Ouane and N’Daw played their best cards and used a prerogative outside the army’s reach: the power to make official ministerial appointments and dismissals.

Moctar Ouane’s second government was named on 24 May. As expected, representatives of the main political parties entered the scene. Meanwhile, two of the three CNSP members, Colonel Sadio Camara (defence minister in Ouane’s first government) and Colonel Modibo Koné (national security minister) – both members of the National Guard – were replaced by two generals, one from the air force and the other from the infantry. The ministers of economy and mining, both reputedly very close to the ex-CNSP, were also removed from government.

The ex-CNSP’s officers reacted to President N’Daw’s political manoeuvre by staging a second coup d’état.

In the hours after the new government’s announcement, they arrested President N’Daw, his prime minister and other government figures including the new defence and national security ministers, the presidential office’s secretary general, the head of state security and his predecessor, who had been exiled after Keïta’s overthrow and was back in Bamako for personal reasons.

In a televised statement on 25 May, Vice President Goïta took responsibility for the arrests and announced that the president and his prime minister “had been relieved of their duties.”

Their resignation – undoubtedly made under duress – was made public in the following hours. On 28 May, the Constitutional Court took note of the power vacuum and declared Goïta head of state and president of the transitional authority. The court ruling took no account of the circumstances surrounding the president’s resignation, further eroding the credibility of Malian institutions subjected to the military’s use of force.

A certain opacity surrounds these events and the forces involved. President Bah N’Daw received numerous warnings from Western foreign ministries and his West African counterparts. They alerted him that the young colonels in charge of the junta that toppled Keïta in August 2020 were unhappy about the impending reshuffle.

Many encouraged N’Daw to hold on to young officers who had until then showed little brutality.

Sources suggest that Bah N’Daw, confident in the support of part of the army, decided to forge ahead with the reshuffle regardless of the opposition.

Anticipating that the eviction of ex-CNSP ministers would cause frictions, Ouane proposed other government portfolios for ministers Koné and Camara, offering them transport and national security, respectively. They declined. Many sources also refer to how the reshuffle triggered infighting within the security forces and in particular within the ex-CNSP’s inner circle. On 24 May, for some hours, unsubstantiated rumours circulated about an attempt by members of the National Guard to arrest Vice President Goïta.

B. Back to Square One

With the exception of small-scale, staged protests in support of the military uprising, the Malian public did not take to the streets following the events of 24 and 25 May. Social networks buzzed with talk of the coup, but no mass movement coalesced to support either the ousted civilian authorities or the young colonels. The public’s acquiescence benefits those who seize power by force. So far, however, these actors have refrained from using excessive force against civilians. Indeed, the two putsches of August 2020 and May 2021 claimed very few victims.

Nevertheless, the officers cannot rule the country on their own. International actors are demanding the return of a civilian head of government (see next section). Mali’s political establishment, while not calling for N’Daw and Ouane to be reinstated, is not prepared to leave power solely in the young colonels’ hands.

Sworn in as president on 7 June, Assimi Goïta had little choice but to appoint a civilian prime minister. His choice was Choguel Maïga, an old hand in Malian politics and member of the M5-RFP’s executive committee. The alliance seems fragile, almost anomalous: after the August 2020 coup, Maïga protested against the “militarisation” of the transitional government. But he and the young colonels have a common adversary: the generation of politicians who came to power after the 1991 coup and subsequently monopolised control of Mali for many years. It is difficult to know whether the shared animosity will be enough to keep the alliance from falling apart.

The ex-CNSP officers have now publicly demonstrated their control over the levers of political power. They probably hope to consolidate their presence even though they continue to refer to ending the eighteen-month transition in late February 2022. The civilian prime minister has limited room for manoeuvre. The transition’s civilian component is mainly a fig leaf to protect the military from sanctions and conceal their direct control of government affairs. The M5-RFP does not seem to be united in support of the new prime minister, and the movement’s former moral leader, Imam Mahmoud Dicko, though he has not entirely lost influence, is no longer the central political figure he was in June-August 2020.

Choguel Maïga’s newly formed cabinet reveals the military’s influence on the executive branch. Despite including some M5-RFP members, it mainly reinstates in positions of authority ex-CNSP members and allies, who had been sidelined by Ouane’s second government.

On 30 July 2021, the prime minister submitted a new Government Action Plan to the CNT, in which he denounced the lack of legitimacy ahead of his appointment. Developed around four main axes instead of the six provided by the previous government, this plan still seems highly ambitious for the seven months remaining before the presidential election, though Maïga is determined to respect the timetable.

Despite reassuring intentions, the new government’s action plan appears unrealistic in such a limited timeframe, adding to the sense of stalemate in the transition.

During a meeting with diplomats on 9 September 2021, the prime minister emphasised “the immediate need to organise national consultations on reforming the state in order to agree on a broad national consensus, accompanied by a precise and detailed timetable as an initial step toward holding general elections as soon as possible”.

Despite the delay in organising these forums, which should have taken place between July and August 2021 according to the government’s timeframe, this statement serves as a justification for the de facto postponement of general elections. Following this declaration, some political actors have expressed their refusal to participate in these consultations and demanded that elections be held in February 2022.

The delay in holding elections is a divisive issue for both the political class and civil society. It will be a major challenge for the end of 2021, though at the time of publication, neither side seemed willing or able to mobilise enough popular support to back its cause.

IV. The Declining Ambitions of Regional and International Partners

A. International Partners and the August 2020 Coup

When President Keïta was overthrown, the main partners engaged in Mali displayed a certain ambivalence toward the transitional authorities and CNSP officers in particular. On the one hand, most of them condemned the overthrow of Keïta from the outset. To a greater or lesser extent, each of these actors pushed for a return to constitutional order following a transition that everyone hoped would be short.
On the other hand, partner organisations and states such as France tried to be pragmatic. Without expressing it publicly, they believed that the military represented a potential alternative to a corrupt political class.

They hoped the new configuration would bring about change in what they considered to be priority issues, such as security.

ECOWAS initially took a firm stance toward the military officers and the transition.

Starting in August 2020, the sanctions it imposed had a real impact on negotiations with the CNSP, which conceded several points. The organisation secured the appointment of a civilian as transitional president and a commitment that the transition would last no more than eighteen months, whereas the CNSP sought to extend it over three years. Nonetheless, the CNSP was also able to manipulate the situation and preserve a central influence over the transition. To counterbalance the military’s influence, ECOWAS could have relied more heavily on internal actors such as the M5-RFP, but relations with the latter had deteriorated too much since July.

In October, once the transitional charter was adopted and the interim civilian authorities appointed, ECOWAS lifted its sanctions.

A Monitoring and Support Group for the Transition in Mali (GST) was set up, chaired by the African Union, ECOWAS and the UN mission in Mali (MINUSMA). The group aims to place Malian authorities under scrutiny and hold them to their commitments. It continues to prioritise the acceleration of the Algiers peace agreement’s implementation and the return of constitutional order following an eighteen-month transition. Yet the GST does little to guide transitional authorities toward a virtuous change in governance in Mali, for example through better control of public finances.

Other mainly European partners saw the transition as an opportunity to break with the inertia of the Keïta era and adopted a more open attitude toward the new authorities.

While partnering with previous governments had proven to be difficult, the interim authorities, in particular the military elements of the CNSP, were initially considered proactive actors, particularly on issues that Mali’s partners viewed as a priority, such as maintaining security and implementing the peace agreement.

France, for example, has largely assessed the transition’s progress in terms of the criteria it considered important, better cooperation on security issues being foremost among them.

At the N’Djamena summit in February 2021, French President Emmanuel Macron said: “I must say that these transitional authorities have given more guarantees in the space of a few months than the previous authorities did in three years. This realignment with the new Malian transitional authorities […] offers a window of opportunity for military, civilian and political breakthroughs”.

French authorities congratulated the transition’s leaders, even though the latter had made little progress on improving governance or fighting corruption.

” Malian transition leaders would rather risk losing part of the aid – sometimes tens of millions of euros – than undertake certain reforms. “

Partners including the European Union (EU) and the World Bank have pursued efforts to develop a “transactional” approach with Malian authorities, but even its advocates concur that so far it has not paid off.

This term corresponds to an old practice, by which financial support is conditioned on compliance with criteria intended to measure progress, notably in the field of governance. But Malian transition leaders would rather risk losing part of the aid – sometimes tens of millions of euros – than undertake certain reforms. Financial backers find it difficult to make sense of this attitude. In the eyes of the Malian authorities, the risk is moderate, since international partners generally end up disbursing the bulk of the aid to support a state whose collapse they fear will weaken regional stability and bear heavy consequences for the Malian population.

At the time of the August 2020 coup, the vast majority of partners seemed committed to lowering their ambitions regarding the transition and focused on helping organise elections within eighteen months.

Many had accepted that the transitional authorities, dominated by the military, had neither the room for manoeuvre nor the legitimacy to undertake fundamental governance reforms. The May 2021 coup further damaged partner relations and dampened the hopes of those who sought a short transition.

B. International Partners and the May 2021 Coup

Compared to that of August 2020, the May 2021 coup resulted in more moderate sanctions from international partners and particularly ECOWAS.

They were, of course, unanimous in condemning the events of 24-25 May. But they merely called for the appointment of a civilian prime minister and reiterated their demand that the transition should last no more than eighteen months from the date of the first coup in 2020, which appears to be an increasingly unlikely prospect. Since 27 May, the EU mission dedicated to training Mali’s armed forces announced that it was maintaining its activities despite the coup, making an unconvincing distinction between political events and their training of the defence forces as the latter overthrew civilian authorities for the second time in nine months. Partners including France and the United States suspended all or part of their military cooperation. On 2 July, however, France announced that it was resuming the cooperation.

It was patently difficult to keep French soldiers in Mali without maintaining a relationship with local troops.
” In terms of economic sanctions, few bold decisions have been made thus far. “

In terms of economic sanctions, few bold decisions have been made thus far. On 4 June, the World Bank announced that, in accordance with its procedures, it was suspending disbursements for its programs in Mali while it conducted a review of the situation – as it had already done after the August 2020 coup – before resuming its activities.

The European Union had announced the disbursement of a new installment of budgetary aid whose status is now uncertain, although it is not yet officially suspended.

Russia’s position sparked many reactions.

In late May, CNSP supporters organised small pro-Russian demonstrations calling on President Vladimir Putin to deploy troops and replace France. Such demonstrations are not new, but they strike a chord following Emmanuel Macron’s announcement of the downsizing of Barkhane operation. Russian diplomacy was then quick to set up a ministerial visit to Bamako in June. Negotiations are reportedly under way between the transitional government and the Wagner Group, a Russian mercenary company close to the Kremlin, to organise the arrival of military instructors whose missions could include protecting vulnerable sites and figures as well as training troops. If such a relationship were to come about, it would be a major shift in Mali’s alliances.

This announcement, made just as Malian authorities are seeking approval to extend the transition, may well be a way of forcing Western partners’ hand.

As for France, President Macron appears to have seized the second coup as an opportunity to justify the reconfiguration of the French military presence that had been planned for months. This event allowed France to blame the international failure to stabilise Mali partly on the country’s authorities, saying they are more concerned with competing for power than finding a solution to the security crisis.

In reality, international players have lessened the pressure they exerted in August-September 2020. They seem to have accepted Goïta and the CNSP’s stranglehold on power. While partners may thus be acknowledging that there is little they can do to force actors such as the CNSP from power, they are now raising many more questions about their necessary level of involvement in a country rocked by a security crisis of regional scope.

As international pressure and sanctions have lessened over time, external partners have unwittingly sent the wrong signal to military authorities. Despite their declarations, Mali’s partners have little leverage to prevent the military from remaining in power in the long term if they attempt to do so. A few days after Bah N’Daw and Moctar Ouane’s arrest, a close adviser to Colonel Goïta already suggested in veiled terms that the May 2021 crisis would undoubtedly make it difficult to strictly respect the electoral calendar that had been set a few months earlier.

V. Taking Action in a Time of Doubt

Many of Mali’s foreign partners have privately expressed dismay in the face of a political and military elite that still appears unable to provide an effective response to the crisis facing the country. After the second coup, this elite seems increasingly entrenched in internal quarrels over the privileges that come with control of the central state.

International partners also bear some responsibility for the mistakes made in the transition so far. They continued providing aid for too long despite high levels of corruption. In recent years, they have always favoured security approaches that they believed would help stabilise the country, rather than investing in actions that could improve governance.

In this context, many partners are tempted to provide a minimal service, namely to continue disbursing aid funds to avoid the Malian state’s complete collapse. Nevertheless, it is still possible to derive benefits from the transition period and, above all, to avoid swerving off course once again.

The transitional government should leave it to the democratically elected authorities to submit a new draft constitution to a referendum, and focus on launching national dialogues on this very constitution. The new Malian authorities should recognise that they have neither the capacity nor sufficient legitimacy to carry out such reforms. In this sense, the national reconstruction forums (Assises nationales sur la refondation de l’Etat) announced by the prime minister in July 2021 are a step in the right direction, provided that these meetings do not merely generate a list of empty promises. They should aim to identify the obstacles that have previously thwarted major reform initiatives and discuss ways of bypassing them.

As the prime minister has implied, these meetings will postpone the elections. Rather than oppose this, Mali’s politicians and partners should ask in return that the interim president make a solemn pledge to limit this postponement to a few months and refrain from standing for election, as required by the transitional charter. A former military officer could, however, stand for president, as long as his resignation dates back to six months before the launch of the presidential campaign, as per the 2016 electoral law.

” The transition period should not be limited to organising new elections; it can serve to lay the groundwork for a lasting change in governance. “

The transition period should not be limited to organising new elections; it can serve to lay the groundwork for a lasting change in governance. From this perspective, the present authorities should pursue efforts undertaken by Bah N’Daw, the previous transitional president, to unite more political and civil society actors around the transition’s priorities. The choice of reforms to be carried out requires a broad consensus among Malian actors so as to avoid the roadblocks that could obstruct a smooth transition.

Among these priorities, two can still be achieved within the allotted time. First, Mali’s political and civil forces should take the transitional authorities, and in particular President Goïta, at their word. Goïta has promised to improve the management of public funds by reining in the state’s spending habits.

While this promise has been made in vain many times in the past, the proliferation of anti-corruption organisations within civil society – such as Clément Dembélé’s Platform Against Corruption and Unemployment – is a dynamic that should be further encouraged. Bilateral partners, but also Malian political parties, should support these organisations and build on their work to offer citizens new proposals.

Secondly, while elections should theoretically be organised for late February 2022, adopting a new electoral law and revising the political parties charter could help clean up the electoral process. On the one hand, electoral reform, which notably involves setting up a single electoral management body, is a priority of the Government Action Plan. The independence of this single body must be guaranteed in order to reduce the Malian territorial administration’s excessive control of the organisation of elections.

On the other hand, a revision of the political parties charter, which the government is considering but has not yet committed to, could check the fragmentation of political groups in a country with over 200 official parties. To this end, the authorities should first demand a more rigorous application of Article 30 of the political parties charter, which lays out the obligations imposed on parties in exchange for public funding.

They could also revise this charter – for example, by granting substantial support to political groups that devote a real part of their activities to the training of citizens – and increase support to groups that include not only elected women (as provided for in Article 29) but also young elected members.

In the coming months, Mali’s civil society, political actors and international partners must remind the transitional authorities that they do not have free rein to govern Mali on their own. External partners can maintain pressure on the authorities, notably by continuing to insist on respect of the rule of law with regard to opposition forces and of the electoral calendar (requiring a firm commitment from the interim president before agreeing to a postponement). Civil society and international partners should report cases of misconduct and use of violence against the political opposition, something the coup leaders have thus far refrained from doing. The action of external partners will remain limited, however, if Mali’s politicians and civilian forces do not mobilise themselves to regain at least some control over the governing body, notably by speaking out in public, just as organisations such as the Malian Human Rights Association are doing.

” International partners should help curtail the army’s politicisation and keep an eye out for internal tensions within Malian security forces. “

International partners should help curtail the army’s politicisation and keep an eye out for internal tensions within Malian security forces to help prevent them and try, if necessary, to defuse them through diplomatic pressure.
Until now, ex-CNSP members who were mid-ranking army officers have managed to win the loyalty of the security apparatus, partly by distributing positions of influence to other military actors. But not everyone has benefited from this, and some generals have lost the influence they had under Keïta. The August 2020 and May 2021 coups have alarmingly intensified the security forces’ politicisation. The examples of neighbouring Guinea and Burkina Faso show that coups often open the door to violent dissent within the security forces. The 20 July attempt upon the transitional president’s life, while still unexplained, is a worrying signal in this regard.

Finally, while the vast majority of Mali’s political actors and foreign partners are focused on the transition’s short timeframe, they must not forget that the Malian political system requires far-reaching reforms which will take time to carry out. Mali’s transitional authorities must prepare the groundwork for the government that will emerge from the forthcoming elections. For their part, international partners cannot be the instigators of the change that Mali requires. They should invest more energy into better supporting the domestic forces likely to give momentum to that transformation, including – despite their reluctance – those that stem from political Islam.
VI. Conclusion

Mali suffers from structural problems of which insecurity, mainly affecting rural areas, is merely one of the most visible consequences. Following the 18 August 2020 coup, the transition intended to last for eighteen months could not possibly solve all of the country’s problems single-handedly. Nonetheless, many Malians and external partners no doubt hoped that it would lay the groundwork for real change. From this perspective, the new Malian authorities have up to now been a disappointment, and the transition is setting up to be another missed opportunity.

Nevertheless, all is not lost. The new Malian authorities can still strive to round off the transition with free and fair elections, which will allow citizens to select candidates offering real solutions to end the crisis. In addition, the fall of President Keïta coincided with strong public interest in efforts to rebuild the state. It is now up to Mali’s political and civilian forces to ensure that this momentum is not lost, but rather is sustained beyond the February 2022 elections, by following through with the programs on which they base their candidacy. For their part, Mali’s international partners, who are often disillusioned with the roadblocks in the Malian political system, cannot be the driving force behind state reform. They should better support those Malian actors who can respond to the popular call for a more virtuous state and resolve the country’s crisis.