Iwas born in 1954 in the town of Kirchamba in the north of Mali, around sixty kilometres from Timbuktu. My family were pastoralists by tradition, from the Fulani ethnic group. I completed my schooling in Timbuktu, and then went to the Ecole Nationale d’Administration in the capital, Bamako, specializing in law. After graduating in the late 1970s I went to Bordeaux for my doctorate, before returning to Mali, where I initially spent two years working on a rural development project near the border with Mauritania, and ultimately went back to the ena to teach. I was director of studies there for six years, in 1985–91, and then after the democratization of Mali in the early 1990s, I twice served as Minister of Labour under President Konaré: the first time in 1994—I resigned after a massive devaluation of the currency brought a political crisis—and again in 1997–2000. Since then I’ve served as Commissioner for Institutional Development, working to coordinate reforms to public policy and institutions across a variety of spheres.

In the north, in Timbuktu and Gao, the majority is Songhai, with a large Fulani minority, and smaller numbers of Tuaregs and Arabs. The further south you go, towards Mopti, the larger the proportion of Fulani. In the country as a whole, though, the largest ethnic group is the Bambara, who make up perhaps 35 per cent of the total, which is around 14 million. Together with the Soninke and Malinke, also part of the Mande language family, they account for more than half the population. The Fulani are around 15 per cent, then there are the Senufo, the Dogon and the Songhai, each between 7 and 9 per cent, and a number of smaller ethnic groups. The Tuaregs and Moors each contribute between 1 and 2 per cent.

Keita was a former school teacher, trained at the Ecole Normale Supérieure William Ponty in Dakar, which was an elite institution—the future presidents of Côte d’Ivoire and Togo also went there, for example. He was from the Malinke ethnic group, which straddles the border between Guinea and Mali—Sékou Touré was also Malinke. Sundiata Keita, the founder of the Mali Empire in the thirteenth century, was Malinke, a historic lineage they proudly assert to this day; Modibo Keita even claimed to be descended from the first Mali emperor, though this was totally untrue. He had only eight years in power before being toppled by a military coup. One of the most striking aspects of his rule was his political independence from the former colonial power. He sought to take a distance from France; instead, as a socialist, he moved closer to the ussr, China and the Eastern Bloc. He was a real pan-Africanist, with great influence on the continental scene—for example, in 1963 he mediated in the conflict between Morocco and Algeria, hosting talks in Bamako. He became close to Kwame Nkrumah, with whom he shared the pan-Africanist vision. Relations between Ghana and Mali were very good at the time—if we had shared a border, the two countries might have merged—and many of the trade links forged then remain.

During his eight years in power, Keita also laid the foundations of the national economy, based on public enterprises—for example, the national airline, Air Mali, was a source of great pride. He adopted a policy of import substitution in agriculture, food processing and to some extent in textiles. He accomplished a great deal by the standards of the time. His administration was characterized by a notable honesty: there was very little corruption. But towards the end of his period in office, he began to rely increasingly on a popular militia, somewhat on the Chinese model, which created a lot of problems. Keita was very suspicious of the army, seeing it as a colonial legacy, but the militia began to infringe people’s human rights, and also to obstruct the movement of goods. This created a lot of privation in the country: in a state-run economy, people weren’t free to sell their goods, which served to block production. The national currency he introduced in 1962 also ran into difficulties, as rising inflation pushed down living standards. By the end, his regime had become unpopular.

Traoré is a Bambara from the Kayes region, near the border with Senegal. He was trained at Fréjus, a colonial garrison in southern France, rather than in one of the major military academies, and went on to become an instructor in the Malian army officers’ school. He was an honest, disciplined officer. He was one of fourteen officers who carried out the coup, and was soon placed at the head of the junta, which called itself the Military Committee for National Liberation. Within the junta, to begin with there were officers who had more influence than him, so for a certain period of time Traoré did not have a free hand. Each member of the junta had their own ministry or institution that they ran as their personal fiefdom. Gradually, Traoré managed to purge the ranks of the junta and consolidate his power. In 1974 he created the Union Démocratique du Peuple Malien (udpm), the country’s sole legal party. From then on, one could say that he really had Mali in his grip.

When the coup took place in 1968, the junta arrested a lot of leftists and trade unionists who opposed it. Many were imprisoned and sent to the north; some of them died there. So in that sense, yes, it was a military dictatorship. But it was not as bloody as others. Within the junta there were people who committed abuses—for example Tiécoro Bagayoko, the head of the security services; people were very pleased when Traoré got rid of him.footnote² Traoré himself was not really that kind of person: there are no indications that he committed any abuses himself or stashed away funds. There was another difference in the Malian case: although it was a military dictatorship, Malians never lost freedom of speech under Traoré. In other countries, one had to hide if one wanted to talk about the regime. In Mali, the press was not free, but one could speak freely—even in Traoré’s presence. He would hold general assemblies in various towns, where the public would come and criticize his government’s policies right in front of him. This is perhaps a peculiarity of Mali: whoever the president may be, he remains in some ways close to the population. Whether it’s Traoré or someone else, when the president makes a public appearance, even a peasant out in the sticks can speak to him and say what he thinks.

There has been no official enquiry, but everyone agrees that Keita was poisoned. Who did it? There are many versions circulating, and there was even a case against a doctor. It’s a murky affair. But Keita’s fate was fairly typical for prisoners at the time.