Fake It Until You Make It: Mali Abandons Elections

Mali’s junta leader, Assimi Goïta, will remain in power for five more years, after a national political conference recommended the extension this week, making Mali the third West African junta-led country to delay or abandon its promised return to civilian rule, Bloomberg reported. 

Goïta, who has been Mali’s interim leader since a 2021 coup, should be appointed as president and be allowed to govern until “peace is restored,” the government said Tuesday after the two-day conference in the capital, Bamako. 

The conference, organized by the junta, also recommended the dissolution of all political parties and the tightening of requirements for the creation of new ones, according to Reuters. 

Mali has been led by a military junta since August 2020, one of numerous countries in the West and Central African “coup belt” to experience military takeovers after overthrowing governments, often democratically elected ones, Business Insider Africa noted. 

Goïta, 41, as an army colonel, led coups in 2020 and 2021 before becoming the “President of the Transition” of Mali. In October 2024, he was promoted to five-star general. 

Pressured by the United Nations Security Council, Mali’s junta had promised elections in February 2022 to transfer power to a civilian-led interim government. However, the deadline was repeatedly postponed until, eventually, the transition plan was abandoned completely. 

Last year, the junta suspended all political party activities and “associations of a political nature” until July. 

Similar to other countries in the Sahel region, such as Burkina Faso and Niger, Mali’s junta said it was taking over to restore security: These countries have seen a rise in deadly jihadist insurgencies over the past few years, usually linked to Islamic State or al Qaeda.