Mali: Guns And Butter

MALI

Guns and Butter

More than five years ago, French soldiers defeated Islamic militants in Mali, paving the way for the central government in Bamako to reassert control over the country.

But as Malians prepare for a presidential vote on Sunday, the jihadist threat remains real and violence along communal lines is metastasizing.

Jihadists have killed almost 300 people in the landlocked West African nation this year. Most of the deaths were related to fighting between Dozos, or traditional hunters, Dogon and Bambara farmers, and Fulani herders who are vying for the same land for water and grazing, reported Agence France-Presse, citing United Nations figures.

Al Jazeera noted that the Al Qaeda-affiliated Group for Support of Islam and Muslims, which has ties to the Fulani community, is among those perpetrating the violence. That group has been recruiting Malians and using the country as a launching pad for incursions into Burkina Faso and Niger, too.

On July 16, for example, gunmen killed 14 people in Menaka, a village in eastern Mali near the border with Niger. “The assailants came and opened fire on people,” Mayor Nanou Kotia told Reuters. “One truck and three other vehicles were burned.”

Attacks near the same village in April and May resulted in 50 deaths.

Worryingly, the attacks come despite the presence of troops from France, the US, the UN and a coalition that includes Mali and four neighboring countries. Rather than curbing the violence, these troops have themselves been targeted by jihadists, the Local explained.

Malian troops have also alienated local populations by cracking down on jihadists, wrote Caleb Weiss in FDD’s Long War Journal, a blog published by the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. That’s not good news.

“Jihadists can also exploit anti-government or anti-French sentiments which have been further exacerbated by the eye-for-an-eye killings which continue to take place in the Menaka region,” Weiss argued.

As for Sunday’s election, Britain-based online news platform African Arguments predicted low voter turnout and triumph for incumbent President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, or “IBK” as he is called, resulting in little change.

The website pointed out how a French profile of IBK depicted him as a “‘do-nothing king,’ a bright but vain figure who sleeps in late, keeps dubious company, and makes fine speeches while assiduously avoiding decisive action.”

But IBK must do something. The UN has sounded alarms over 1 million people in Mali who need emergency food aid and 4.3 million people who face food insecurity this summer and early fall, Africanews reported.

Earth to IBK: Governing is often described as a choice between guns and butter. Mali needs both.