Mali: Analyzing the Legislative Results from Kidal

On March 29 and April 19, Mali held legislative elections. Among the results, the outcome in the northern region of Kidal is worth a close look, given Kidal’s centrality to the peace process and the ongoing conflict.

Mali’s National Assembly has 147 seats, and some 22 of those (I’ve seen various counts) were won outright in the first round. That category included the four seats in Kidal, won with what RFI (French) calls “North Korean scores.” Here are the winners and their reported vote totals and percentages (French):

• Abeïbara: Ahmada ag Bibi, 2,724 votes (91.53%)
• Kidal: Choghib ag Attaher, 11,592 votes (74.6%)
• Tessalit: Aicha Belco Maiga, 10,070 votes (87.3%)
• Tin-Essako: Mohamed ag Intalla, 2,384 votes (97%)

Reported turnout (French) was over 85% in Kidal, in contrast to reported turnout of less than 13% in the capital Bamako.

Here is a map of Kidal’s administrative cercles, which double as electoral constituencies:

These four deputies from Kidal (see here, French) include three incumbents who won re-election – Ahmada ag Bibi of Abeïbara, Mohamed ag Intalla of Tin-Essako, and Aicha Belco Maiga* of Tessalit. The first two figures are particularly well known. In addition to their long careers in electoral politics, they are both prominent hereditary leaders within the Ifoghas clans of the Kel Adagh Tuareg confederation; ag Intalla is, in fact, the aménokal or head of the confederation. Such combinations of electoral capital and hereditary capital have been common in the north since the advent of multiparty politics in the 1990s. Both men are also, moreover, senior leaders within the ex-rebel coalition the Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA); ag Intalla’s brother Alghabass is the Secretary General of arguably the most important bloc within the CMA, the High Council for Unity of Azawad (HCUA). Both ag Bibi and ag Intalla won massively in the previous elections in 2013 (see here, pp. 46-47).

The only upset this year, then, was in the city of Kidal itself. In 2013 (see previous link, p. 47), the CMA did not yet exist but its components did, and their preferred candidate lost; the winner that year was Ahmoudène ag Iknass, who hails from the Imghad (former “tributary” or “vassals,” considered free but not “noble” within the Kel Adagh) Tuareg. The Imghad likely represent the majority of voters in Kidal, and so ag Iknass’ victory could be interpreted as demographic destiny coming to fruition after years of Ifoghas dominance. Yet the (future) CMA leaders also felt that ag Iknass was installed by their political enemies, namely the antecedents of the movement that since 2014 has been called the Imghad Tuareg Self-Defense Group and Allies (French acronym GATIA). Ag Iknass has been seen as close to GATIA’s leader El Hajj ag Gamou, who is himself Imghad; for example, ag Iknass was one of two main representatives (French) for the coalition of movements called the Plateforme, of which GATIA is the leading member, in negotiations with the CMA in 2015.

One crude but plausible reading of this year’s election in Kidal is that CMA forces wrested the seat back from GATIA. I have not been able to find much information yet about the incoming deputy, Choghib ag Attaher, but if he is the same man mentioned here (French), he was a Vice President of the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (French acronym MNLA, another key bloc of the CMA) as of 2014. And if he is the same man described in these leaked U.S. Embassy Bamako cables (here and here), then he is a hereditary ruler within one fraction of the Idnane, another prominent Tuareg clan sometimes considered to be nobility. A writeup (French) after his election victory describes him as a tribal chief from a major family, a local RPM official, and “a product of the youth of Kidal.”

Notably, the electoral power struggles in the north do not really play out along party lines – all four of the deputies from Kidal belong to President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta’s Rally for Mali (French acronym RPM) – but ag Iknass, the outgoing deputy from Kidal city, previously did too. This year, however, ag Iknass ran (French, p. 108) on the list of ASMA-CFP (Alliance for Solidarity in Mali-Congress of Patriotic Forces, led by former Prime Minister Soumeylou Boubèye Maïga). It seems the real contest was over who would be the RPM candidate for Kidal rather than which party would win. Party affiliations play out differently in different parts of Mali – in contrast to Kidal, the RPM was nearly wiped out in Bamako (French) in these elections.

What does all this mean for the future? For one thing, ag Attaher’s victory would seem to further consolidate the CMA’s position in Kidal, with a corresponding weakening of GATIA’s position. Beyond that, another obvious conclusion is the relative continuity among key actors – the CMA’s deputies will remain key interlocutors with the government in Bamako, and being from the same party has not and does mean that the Kidal elites are always positively disposed toward the government. Finally, the CMA’s seemingly regained ability to dominate the elections in Kidal underscores that the demographic majority will not always buck the preferences of the long-time elite.

*Who is Songhai, for what it’s worth, while the other three are Tuareg. Her Facebook page is here.

The Death of a Northern Malian Shaykh, and a Few of My Analytical Blindspots

On April 2, northern Malian sources reported the passing of Shaykh Hamdi Ould Muhammad al-Amin (Romanized spellings vary), the chief judge (qadi al-quda) of Kidal.

رحمك الله يا الشيخ #خمدى ولد #محمد #الأمين أحد علماء منطقة أضاغ في اماسين. اللهم اغفر له وارحمه وعافه واعف عنه ووسع مدخله واكرم نزله.
Décès du Cheikh Hamdi Ould Mohamed-Lamine le grand juge Islamique de l'Adagh. Une grande personnalité pacifique. Paix à son âme. pic.twitter.com/V0pm4c8Uit

— Inkinane (@Inkinane1) April 2, 2020

In a Facebook post (Arabic), one spokesman for the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (French acronym MNLA) traced the shaykh’s genealogy back to Sidi al-Mukhtar al-Kunti (1729-1811), one of the most influential religious scholars (.pdf) in the Mauritania-Mali sub-region in the past several centuries.

The shaykh appears to have been more than just a learned man. He also seems to have had strong relationships with tribal and political leaders in northern Mali; for example, he was one prominent attendee at the installation (Arabic) of the Kunta confederation’s new ruler Muhammad al-Amin Ould Baba in 2015. The Nord Sud Journal, in its report (French) on the shaykh’s death, notes that his passing was announced by the prominent northern Malian politician and hereditary ruler Alghabass ag Intalla, sectary-general of the High Council for the Unity of Azawad (HCUA), over WhatsApp. The journal describes the shaykh as a “consensus” figure in northern Mali, writing that he “judged all the disputes between armed groups after the Anefis accords of 2015.” (See background on those accords here.)

The MNLA and HCUA eulogies for the shaykh are another reminder that neither of these movements should be understood as secular. In interviews, MNLA leaders have stated to me that they and the rebellion they launched in 2012 received support from prominent shaykhs and jurists in the region – including another prominent northern Malian shaykh who died in 2017, Al-‘Atiq bin Sa’d al-Din (Arabic).

Identifying the senior Muslim scholars of northern Mali has been a consistent blind spot for me, and with both Ould Muhammad al-Amin and Ibn Sa’d al-Din I became aware of them only upon their deaths. In part, this is simply a weakness of my own research, and a sign that I have not yet found the right sources and interviewees, or have not asked the right questions of the politicians I’ve interviewed. On another level, though, I think the task is objectively harder than, say, identifying prominent clerics in Bamako or Nouakchott. Perhaps this difficulty reflects a center-periphery split, with the ulama (religious scholars) of the capital much more visible than those in the north. Yet there is essentially no difficulty in identifying major political or military figures in northern Mali: such individuals are routinely profiled and interviewed by Jeune Afrique, for example, and they have proven relatively easy to meet in Bamako and even in Washington.

So there are a few questions that have occurred to me over the years:

1. Has there been a disruption in scholarly reproduction in northern Mali? In other words, do senior scholars have clear successors – from within their families or from among their senior students? From what I’ve read on Ould Muhammad al-Amin and Ibn Sa’d al-Din, scholarly authority appears strongly hereditary in the region – but that does not mean that it will be reproduced automatically, or that sons will have the same status as their fathers. The eulogies for Ould Muhammad al-Amin indicate that there are clear successors in his place, but I have wondered about the wider picture.
2. Are northern Malian ulama reticent to step into the media spotlight given the conflict in the region, or because of the local scholarly culture? In Bamako, even when I know the names of major scholars and seek out interviews with them, I have found it much harder to have productive interviews with shaykhs than with politicians, including politicians from the north. Is there even more reticence in the north about interacting with foreigners and/or journalists?
3. How much did the rise of Tabligh in the 1990s and 2000s, and the rise of Salafism and Salafi-jihadism in the region, affect the wider religious field? How were traditionalist – i.e., Maliki-Sufi-Ash’ari – scholars in the north affected? Is it even correct to assume that someone like Ould Muhammad al-Amin, from a family famously identified with the Qadiriyya Sufi order, still identified as Sufi? What is the position of someone like the jihadist(-leaning?) judge Houka Houka ag Alhousseini within the wider religious field – an outlier, a representative of a minority trend, a representative of a growing trend, etc.? Is someone like that only infamous because he is associated with jihadists, while the truly influential religious scholars in the region shun the spotlight?
4. When the 2015 Algiers Accord, meant to bring peace to northern Mali, refers to the role of cadis/qadis (Islamic judges) in local governance (.pdf, p. 13), do northern leaders have a list of specific people in mind to fulfill these functions – or who are already fulfilling these functions? Or is this more aspirational?

Obviously I welcome any insights that readers may have. The answers to these questions potentially have major import for how one understands the situation in northern Mali. A situation where senior, traditionalist scholars are dying without being replaced could mean that the politicians are the ones dominating the scene and/or that jihadists face less resistance within the religious field. On the other hand, if the senior traditionalists are still present but reticent, that could mean that there are powerful religious influences on politicians and powerful counterweights to jihadists, in complex dynamics that lie outside of my view.

Mali: An AQIM/JNIM Assassination in Timbuktu and Its Aftermath

On 9 September, a commander of the Operational Coordination Mechanism (French acronym MOC) was assassinated in Timbuktu, northern Mali, killed in his car. The commander’s name has been transliterated various ways – Salim Ould M’Begui, Salim Ould Nbekhi, Salim Baghi, and Saloum Ould Becki. From the Arabic spellings that have been given (see here), I would transliterate it Salim Imbighi.

In any case, he was a member of the Coordination of Movements of Azawad (CMA), a coalition of northern Malian armed movements that all played some part in the rebellion of 2012 against the Malian state. The CMA has three major components – the High Council for the Unity of Azawad (HCUA), the Arab Movement of Azawad (French acronym MAA), and the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (French acronym MNLA). M’Begui belonged to the MAA and was further, as we will see below, a member of the Awlad Idris/Oulad Idriss, an Arab tribe in northern Mali.

For further background, the MOC – and the patrols it runs – are a key element of the 2015 Algiers Accord, the peace agreement that aimed to prevent a resumption of war in the north following the 2012 rebellion. There are three signatories to the accord: the Malian government, the CMA, and a cluster of pro-government northern militias called the Plateform. The patrols through the MOC are meant to help these diverse groups work together and, by working together, stabilize the north. The Timbuktu MOC was only set up this May, with only around fifty fighters. The MOC there has yet to start its patrols, and the CMA was earlier accused of dragging its feet regarding patrols in both Timbuktu and Kidal.

Mali’s jihadists are, of course, not part of the accord and they have consistently attempted to sabotage the accord generally and the MOC/patrols specifically. This is key background for understanding M’Begui’s murder. On 17 September, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wa-l-Muslimin (JNIM) claimed responsibility for the assassination in Timbuktu. JNIM tied the Timbuktu assassination to other assaults on MOCs in the north, including the massive suicide bombing on the Gao MOC in January 2017.

JNIM, a Mali-centric jihadist coalition formed in March 2017, is an official branch of al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM). JNIM’s leadership includes both Malians (its overall leader is Iyad ag Ghali, the infamous Tuareg rebel-turned-jihadist) and non-Malians. JNIM’s largely Malian character contributes to its sophisticated understanding of the political and tribal/ethnic landscape of northern and central Mali. The non-Malian members also have deep experience in the country, though, due to the relationships that some of AQIM’s Saharan commanders and units developed in the years leading up to the 2012 rebellion.

The political dimension of JNIM’s approach helps explain why the claim of responsibility was not a generic public statement but rather a letter to the Awlad Idris. The letter takes pains to soften any outrage on the tribe’s part over the assassination, using three rhetorical techniques:

1. Religious framing: The letter implicitly asserts that Islam constitutes a common ground of Islam between the tribe and JNIM. More explicitly, the letter argues that M’Begui had apostatized by joining the MOC. The MOC, in JNIM’s framing, targets legitimate “mujahidin” and works with “unbeliever” forces, namely the Malian army, the United Nations’ MINUSMA, and the G5 Sahel’s joint force. The letter presents the assassination as a form of religious justice and even self-defense on the part of the “mujahidin.”
2. Framing the assassination as a last resort: The letter refers to JNIM’s repeated warnings to “all the sons of the tribes and the Muslims generally” not to join the MOC. The letters also references JNIM’s distribution of “numerous audio, video, and written statements warning about this critical matter.” In other words, the letter suggests that M’Begui had many chances to avoid being killed.
3. Conveying respect for the tribe: The letter not only addresses the tribe, the author even offers to “arrange a direct meeting” to address any remaining concerns the tribe may have. In general, JNIM is keen to win over northern Malian Muslims (courting “the popular embrace” or al-hadina al-sha’biyya), and some AQIM leaders have long argued that jihadists need to woo the tribes rather than alienating them.

Various commentators noted that the statement was signed not by ag Ghali but by Algerian national and longtime AQIM senior official Yahya Abu al-Hammam. For some commentators, the statement reflected Abu al-Hammam’s ambitions to displace ag Ghali within JNIM (and therefore more an AQIM action than a JNIM one). I’m not sure I would go that far, but it does seem to me that there are various questions to pursue here about (a) internal coalition politics within JNIM and (b) geographical variations in how JNIM operates, not just between northern and central Mali (a theme I explored a bit here), but also within northern Mali. In this case, there are questions to pursue about differences between JNIM’s approach in Timbuktu as compared with its approach in Kidal – although Kidal witnesses its own share of violence, including two even more recent assassinations.

Here it is worth rewinding the tape to 2012-2013, to recall that ag Ghali’s Ansar al-Din (especially the Tuareg politicians who were part of it at that time) was the dominant force in Kidal during the jihadist occupation of northern Mali, while AQIM was most visible in Timbuktu (though it was present elsewhere, and ag Ghali, who was closer to AQIM than some of the other Ansar al-Din leaders at the time, traveled between northern Mali’s different cities and regions throughout that period). Here it is also worth revisiting Rida Lyammouri’s 2016 post “AQIM Never Really Abandoned Timbuktu, Mali,” which includes some interesting detail on Abu al-Hammam and the Awlad Idris. Adam Sandor’s 2017 report for Centre FrancoPaix is also highly relevant here, particularly pp. 16-17. Variations in the jihadist landscape within northern Mali, in other words, are not at all new.

Moreover, we should note that JNIM’s assassination of a CMA leader is a reminder that amid recurring rumors of behind-the-scenes contact between ag Ghali and the HCUA, the two movements – JNIM and CMA – are sometimes violently opposed. The CMA quickly and strongly denounced the murder in Timbuktu and promised to track down the assassins, and the CMA/MAA’s remarks concerning jihadist “infiltration” in Timbuktu sounded none too friendly.

This and other assassinations, finally, are a reminder that northern Malian politics is not just an intra-elite game in which politicians play with other men’s lives, but also a deadly competition for influence and power in which elites’ own lives are very much at stake. As this incident demonstrates, JNIM walks a fine line by assassinating people – on the one hand, it sends a clear message about the costs of working with the MOC, the peace process, and anti-jihadist forces; on the other hand, JNIM risks antagonizing a wide swath of extremely important northern Malian constituencies, and in that way undercutting its own long-term political strategy.

Notes on the August 2018 UN Panel of Experts on Mali Report

This week, the latest report from the United Nations’ Panel of Experts on Mali came out. The big headline coming out of the report has been allegations that some signatories to the 2015 Algiers Accord are implicated in terrorism and drug trafficking.

I learned a ton from the report and I salute the panel for what must have been an extremely intense amount of labor and travel.

Here are some of the passages that stood out to me from the report:

p. 2, “Antiterrorist operations conducted by the Malian army in northern and central Mali, as well as by ‘compliant’ armed groups — those who are part of the Plateforme or CMA or have declared that they will observe the Agreement — have led to civilian killings and amplified intercommunal violence.” This is Mali’s core challenge, now, I would say – to find a way out of the violence that does not lead to more violence.

p. 4, “The Panel began its work on 1 February 2018. During the reporting period (February to June 2018) the Panel visited Mali on four occasions and travelled to the northern regions of Gao, Kidal, Timbuktu and Ménaka and the central region of Mopti…In addition to its visits to Mali, the Panel also visited Belgium, Burkina Faso, France, Mauritania, the Netherlands and the Niger. Visits proposed by the Panel to Algeria in April and June were not accommodated.” I’ll just leave that there.

p. 6, “The current Malian conflict started in January 2012…” I don’t blame the panel for this phrasing and this is probably the most comprehensible way to put things. But on another level, the current conflict started in 1990, in the sense that many of the same faces from the early 1990s are still key actors today: Iyad ag Ghali, El Hadj ag Gamou, etc. Experts would do well to remind the lay audience that the roots of this conflict are deep indeed.

p. 7, “Regional and local elections that would have replaced interim measures were scheduled for December 2017 and April 2018, but both were postponed. A revised road map of actions adopted by signatory parties on 22 March 2018 has not provided a date for those elections but rather puts them after a revision of the decentralization legislation, which is to take place in 2019. Though it confirms the extension of the interim period until sometime in 2019, or even beyond, international mediation team members have generally welcomed the March road map. Several of them mentioned to the Panel that the engaged role of the Prime Minister, Soumeylou Boubèye Maïga, as well as the start of the work of the independent observer and the Mali sanctions regime — both mechanisms envisaged in, respectively, articles 63 and 64 and article 54 of the Agreement — have given new impetus to the Agreement.” The role of Maïga remains crucial and fascinating, as always. I am thinking about a post that would try to look at him in some kind of structural sense, rather than just as an individual (one often discussed as hyper-competent). But in any case he is clearly a key link between the administration and the politicians in the north.

p. 14, “The single priority action under the economic development component of the Agreement concerns the creation of a development zone for the northern regions. According to the Agreement, the development zone is based on a development strategy and financed through the sustainable development fund. A concept note for the development zone has been drafted by the Government and transmitted to the signatory armed groups, but at the time of a meeting of a subcommittee of the Agreement Monitoring Committee on 21 June a formal response was still pending. A legislative text is foreseen by November 2018, as indicated in the March road map.” It will be worth keeping an eye on this, although I will not be holding my breath for November.

p. 17, A whole section on Ménaka, the Daoussak, the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (referred to by its French acronym EIGS throughout the report), and the Kidal elite begins here. It is probably too complicated to summarize, but it makes for an important case study of how many fault lines cut through different communities and how those can play out in terms of who fights whom. Here is one key quote from p. 18: “The main political actors in the newly created region of Ménaka are: the aménokal (traditional leader) of the Oulemiden (Iwllemmeden) and Member of Parliament Bajan Ag Hamatou, traditionally close to the fraction Idoguiritane of the Daoussaks; the Governor, Daouda Maïga, who originates from Tidermene and was instrumental in the constitution of the GATIA/MSA-D alliance and the return of GATIA in Ménaka on 27 October 2017 (Daouda Maïga is reportedly close to GATIA General Gamou, also born in Tidermene); and Abdoul Wahab Ag Ahmed Mohamed, President of the interim authority, known to be close to Moussa Ag Acharatoumane of MSA-D.”

p. 22, Getting deeper into the question of who is coordinating with whom, there is a fascinating but inconclusive section dealing with a visit by Alghabass ag Intalla, one of the most prominent politicians in Kidal and the secretary-general of the CMA, the umbrella group for ex-rebels who signed the 2015 Algiers accord, to Menaka. A relevant quote: “Despite allegations that a shared strategy was being implemented following Alghabass’s visit to the Ménaka region in December 2017 and reported meetings with members of terrorist armed groups, the Panel found no evidence documenting a connection between CMA and terrorist armed groups in the Ménaka and Gao regions.”

p. 25 and 27-30, Here is where some of the most explosive assertions about the participation of certain armed factions in terrorist/jihadist activities appear. Since it has been covered a lot in the press, I won’t get into it here.

p. 33, Here are further allegations that the major government-aligned militia GATIA (Self-Defense Group for Imghad Tuareg and Allies) is involved in smuggling illicit drugs, as well as further data on how conflict over drugs fuels clashes between armed groups: “In Mali, the Panel obtained further information about the role of GATIA associates in securing drug (cannabis) convoys. Malian authorities, a diplomatic source and an armed group representative referred to Ahmoudou Ag Asriw of GATIA as having led a convoy transporting cannabis resin in April 2018, together with a member of MAA-Plateforme. The convoy was heading from Tabankort to the Tamesna desert, presumably on its way to the Niger. On 13 April 2018, near Amassin, south of Kidal, it came under attack from MNLA and unidentified armed elements from the Niger. The assailants were reported to have taken part of or the entire 4-ton shipment of cannabis resin north to cross into Algeria at Tinzawaten. The confrontation reportedly claimed three victims.” And from further down the same page, a key quote: “The legitimacy of both the Plateforme and CMA as signatory armed groups has motivated drug traffickers to seek protection from their members rather than members of terrorist armed groups in order to be less exposed.” on p. 35, there is some discussion of GATIA, the CMA (namely one of its components, the HCUA) and migrant smuggling.

p. 43, There is some good detail here on operations by the G5 Sahel Joint Force.

p. 46, The recommendations begin here. They lead with this: “Proceed without delay to consider the designation for targeted measures of individuals and entities engaging in or providing support for actions or policies that threaten the peace, security or stability of Mali.” I certainly understand the logic, but I don’t think I would take this path unless you are confident that you can really squeeze these actors in changing their behavior – if you can’t accomplish that, though, then “targeted measures” might simply alienate people whose participation will be key to any eventual (hopeful) political solution.

The main body of the report ends on p. 47, but sixteen annexes follow, including social media posts from armed/political groups, official documents, correspondence, and other interesting sources.