Revolutionary Events in Mali, 2020–2021

Abstract

On August 18, 2020, Malian Army officers led by Col. Assimi Goïta seized power in the country and arrested President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta alongside with several government officials. The President Keïta resigned the same date and dissolved the government. He was later allowed to leave the country for the UAE. The coup followed 11 weeks of protests in Bamako, and was welcomed by most protesters regardless the fact that their leaders did not receive any direct access to power. On 24 May 2021, another coup took place, which proved the fact that the new military regime in power still had capacity to control the current political trends. Meanwhile, the revolutionary instability in the late second decade of the twenty-first century in Mali cannot be separated from the instability period that started in the 1990s in the country, subsequently grew into the destabilization of 2011 and resulted into the events mentioned above. Also, taking into account events in Egypt in 2011 and 2013, as well as similar events in other countries of MENA and the Sahel, it is highlighted that the revolutionary events which happened in Mali in 2020–2021 may be classified as “coup-volution”.