From Colonialism to Keita: Comparing Pre- and Post-Independence Regimes (1946-1968)

Lecocq, Baz

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Title:	From Colonialism to Keita: Comparing Pre- and Post-Independence Regimes (1946-1968)
Author:	Lecocq, Baz
Year:	2003
Periodical:	Mande Studies
Volume:	5
Pages:	29-47
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Mali
Subjects:	Tuareg Maures decolonization neocolonialism socialism Politics and Government colonialism History and Exploration Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups)
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/44078821
Abstract:	On 22 September 1960, Modibo Keita announced the formal break-up of the Mali Federation and the birth of the Malian Republic out of the former République Soudanaise. He used the following phrase in his speech: 'All Malians should consider themselves mobilized to construct the Malian Republic, home to all those who set great store by the realization of independence and African unity.' But who did Keita consider to be Malians, and what did freedom mean to people who now found themselves to be Malian? What did independence mean? This article answers these questions with respect to the Tuareg and Moorish communities inhabiting the extreme northern part of the country. Did independence really mean a caesura for them? What were the continuities with colonial times? To what extent did things change for the Tuareg after independence under the Keita regime? Can we speak of decolonization of the Tuareg world in Mali after 1960, or should we speak, as Tuareg separatists did in the 1960s and 1990s, of neocolonialism? Relying on administrative material on taxes, chieftaincy, education, economic development and security and politics, the article examines these questions through a comparison of the late colonial State with the Keita regime between 1960 and 1968 in the Adagh n Ifoghas or present-day 'région' of Kidal. The article concludes that, in practice, after independence, policies and administration remained the same as before. Thus, the answer to the question 'can we speak of a form of recolonization of the Tuareg world by the Keita regime' is affirmative. Bibliogr., notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract]

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