Following months of anti-government protests and calls for his resignation, President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita of Mali was overthrown in a coup last month. Since then, the Economic Community of West African States, or ECOWAS, a regional bloc of 15 countries that includes Mali, has been pressuring the ruling military junta to quickly hand power back to a civilian government. But last weekend, the junta defied ECOWAS by releasing a plan that would allow a military leader to oversee an 18-month transitional period before elections are held. On the Trend Lines podcast this week, WPR’s Elliot Waldman was joined by Alex [...]
After the unpopular president of Mali, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, was ousted by the country’s military last month, the leaders of the coup promised to set up a transitional civilian government and eventually hold elections. That came as a relief to the crowds of anti-government protesters who had been in the streets for months, demanding Keita’s resignation. Since the coup, however, things haven’t exactly gone according to plan. Following three days of talks with opposition groups and representatives from civil society, Mali’s ruling military junta recently released its blueprint for a transition plan back to civilian government. But the plan was [...]
Editor’s Note: Every Friday, Andrew Green curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Facing record floods that have killed more than 100 people and displaced tens of thousands more, Sudan’s government just declared a three-month state of emergency. Already contending with COVID-19 and a flailing economy, a faltering response to this natural disaster threatens to further destabilize the country’s fragile transitional government. Unusually heavy seasonal rains across the region have caused the Nile River to rise nearly six feet in some parts of Sudan and brought floodwaters to 16 of the country’s 18 states. At [...]
