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Mali : an “inclusive political dialogue” to redress the security situation in the center

To stem the spiral of insecurity in Mali’s central regions, President Keïta is calling for an “inclusive political dialogue”. For more than two years, these regions have been plagued by inter and intra-community conflicts, terrorism …

During the Council of Ministers which he presided on Friday, January 5, the President of Mali, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, addressed his ministers with instructions on several sectors. “The security situation in the central regions remains a major challenge for which adequate responses are expected by the populations”, said President Keïta, who asked the government to accelerate “without delay the effective operationalization of the Integrated Regional Security Plan of the Center (PSIRC)”.

This plan, adopted in February 2017, defined security, development, governance and communication measures to address the growing insecurity. But the security environment has continued to deteriorate in the central regions, where the men of the jihadist Hamadoun Koufa sow terror. The worrying escalation of terrorist attacks in early November, during a visit by a government delegation led by Prime Minister Abdoulaye Idrissa Maïga to “comfort the terrorized population” testifies this.

“500 closed schools half of which are in the center”

For President Keïta, it is the responsibility of the Malian government “to guarantee the return of tranquility in this part of the country to allow the effective return of the administration, allow children to go to school in all peace and people to go about their business with serenity”. In a report, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that by the end of 2016-17, about 500 schools were closed in Mali, half of them in central regions.

A situation that would be related to the climate of insecurity, “but also to the hostility of terrorist armed groups vis-à-vis the so-called “formal educational offer” according to the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), which in an analysis published in October 2017 on the situation of schools in the center, said that “the importance for the Malian government to regain control is no longer to be demonstrated, because there is a need for the State in the center of Mali. This is a prerequisite for stability, which in turn is crucial for the proper functioning of schools”.

Beyond that, the 2016 communal elections could not be held in several localities of the center, because of the growing insecurity. The government plans to organize partial communal elections in April 2018, while according to many observers, the same reasons that prevailed at the last postponement still remain.

“Inclusive political dialogue”

Faced with this precarious security situation in these regions, where the headquarters of the new G5 Sahel joint force (in Sevare) is based, the president said that an “inclusive political dialogue must be conducted without delay”. He also pointed out the need to focus on the implementation of the Peace and Reconciliation Agreement, the fight against terrorism, the implementation of the Military Orientation and Programming Law (LOPM) and the Security Orientation and Programming Law (LOPS) to, mainly, “contribute to strengthening the national and international structures and mechanisms put in place, including the G5 Sahel …”

Since 2015, the security situation has deteriorated considerably in the central regions. The dignitaries, threatened, fled at the same time as the local elected officials and the State agents. Some village chiefs and elected officials have been murdered there.

Sahelien.com