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Ever heard of that quote, "From here to Timbuktu?" Well, this week we arrived in Timbuktu, a city in Mali.
The West African nation bordering the Sahara
Desert with a population of about 20 million people has received a lot of bashing
from many global leaders.
This comes in the wake of a bloodless coup that led to the
ouster of its President Ibrahim
Boubacar Keita who has been in power since September 2013.
IBK as he is
famously known also served as Mali's prime minister from February 1994 to
February 2000.
All the regional bodies like ECOWAS and even the G8
have all condemned the military takeover that took place on 18 August 2020 urging
an immediate return to civilian rule.
Meanwhile, the military leaders are reportedly working on
setting up a transitional government in preparation for a legitimate election
in the near future.
These sentiments of censure have been made with the
understanding that there must be legitimate means to power especially where a
country enjoys political democracy.
However, Mali is not entirely a proven democratic success
story.
The French colony previously known as French Sudan attained independence
on 22 September 1960 with Modibo Keïta as President.
The founding father of Mali soon moved quickly to
consolidate his power by declaring a single-party state and pursued a socialist
agenda.
However, this did not go down well with the Malian
population and in November 09, 1968 a group of young officers staged a
bloodless coup and set up a Military Committee for National Liberation (CMLN),
with Lt. Moussa Traoré as president.
A new constitution, approved in 1974, created a one-party
state and was designed to move Mali toward civilian rule but the military
leaders remained in power.
Legislative and presidential elections held in 1979, saw Gen.
Moussa Traoré remain as president.
His efforts to stabilize the country and run the
single-party state were challenged by student-led protests in 1980 that led to
three coup attempts that were violently crushed.
And so in retrospect, Mali has been an unstable nation
established by coups!
In fact, the footage of the recent coup on 18 August 2020 is
telling of the Malian attitude amidst the gun fire and the military hardware.
But most importantly is our response to this coup especially
without a historical perspective!
Africa as a whole has a number of regional blocs whose
agenda among others is economic and political.
These bodies include IGAD, SADC, COMESA and ECOWAS just to
name a few.
However, the challenge comes in when a nation is in dire
straits like the one Rwanda found itself in during the 1994 genocide in which 800,000
people are estimated to have died.
Nations watched as men, women and children were slaughtered.
Even the international community sat on the fence as innocent blood ran down
the slopes of Rwanda.
It was a ghastly scene that should never be repeated in any
nation. But do we ever learn?
It is easy sitting back in our places of comfort to condemn
Mali for this coup but have we bothered to offer a solution before the crisis
happened?
Coups are not things to be celebrated! In fact, Mali is
lucky to have had a blood-less takeover.
Other nations across the globe have not been that lucky.
However, democracy in Africa has never been an absolute
solution for peaceful transition of power.
The power of the
incumbent still reigns supreme and most of the time they decide to remain
in power in total disregard of the rule of law.
This attitude of seeming to act above the law after having
sworn to protect and safeguard the constitution is always the beginning of
bigger problems.
Africa today is littered with many cases of the strongman
who has had to be removed from power through other means.
Zimbabwe’s the late Robert Mugabe and Algeria’s Abdelaziz
Bouteflika are recent cases in point.
The issue is that many of these leaders
overstay their welcome and bring to ruin the very countries they were meant to
build.
The late Mugabe left Zimbabwe reeling in debt,
unemployment and currency depreciation.
If leadership is about inspiring a people
towards a certain course and a time comes when that course has been achieved,
why can’t we say goodbye and go do something else?
Yes, we must not celebrate coups and violent
takeovers to power. They must never be an alternative in a civil society.
However, we must also begin a consistent
journey of obedience to the established laws!
I wish Mali all the best and hope this is
not that calm before the big storm!
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