Mali

History

• Pre-history

  The history of West Africa began with the first human settlements around 4,000 BCE. It has been commonly divided into its prehistory, the Iron Age in Africa, the major polities flourishing, the colonial period, and finally the post-independence era, in which the current nations were formed. West Africa is west of an imagined north-south axis lying close to 10° east longitude, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean and Sahara Desert. Colonial boundaries are reflected in the modern boundaries between contemporary West African states, cutting across ethnic and cultural lines, often dividing single ethnic groups between two or more states.

  Early human settlers arrived in West Africa around 12,000 BCE. In the fifth millennium, as the ancestors of modern West Africans began entering the area, the development of sedentary farming began to take place in West Africa. The Iron industry, in both smelting and forging for tools and weapons, appeared in Sub-Saharan Africa by 1200 BCE, and by 400 BCE, contact had been made with the Mediterranean civilisations, and a regular trade included exporting gold, cotton, metal, and leather in exchange for copper, horses, salt, textiles, and beads. Culture developed further with the Nok culture (1000 BCE to 200 or 300 BCE), Serer people’s ancient history, and construction of the Senegambian stone circles (between the third century B.C. and the sixteenth century C.E.).

  This civilization was located in the Niger River Valley in the country of Mali and is considered to be among the oldest urbanized centers and the best known archaeology site in sub-Saharan Africa. This archaeological site is located about 3 kilometres (1.9 mi) away from the modern town, and is believed to have been involved in long distance trade and possibly the domestication of African rice. The site is believed to exceed 33 hectares (82 acres); however this is yet to be confirmed with extensive survey work.

  With the help of archaeological excavations mainly by Susan and Roderick McIntosh, the site is known to have been occupied from 250 B.C. to 900 A.D. The city is believed to have been abandoned and moved where the current city is located due to the spread of Islam and the building of the Great Mosque of Djenné. Previously, it was assumed that advanced trade networks and complex societies did not exist in the region until the arrival of traders from Southwest Asia. However, sites such as Djenné-Djenno disprove this, as these traditions in West Africa flourished long before.

  The Sahelian kingdoms were a series of kingdoms or empires that were built on the sahel, the area of grasslands south of the Sahara. They controlled the trade routes across the desert, and were also quite decentralized, with member cities having a great deal of autonomy. The Ghana Empire may have been established as early as the 7th century CE. It was succeeded by the Sosso in 1230, the Mali Empire in the 13th century CE, and later by the Songhai and Sokoto Caliphate. There were also a number of forest empires and states in this time period.

• The Ghana Empire

  The Ghana Empire (c. 700 until c. 1240), properly known as Awkar (Ghana or Ga’na being the title of its ruler), was located in the area of present-day southeastern Mauritania and western Mali. Complex societies based on trans-Saharan trade with salt and gold had existed in the region since ancient times, but the introduction of the camel to the western Sahara in the 3rd century A.D. opened the way to great changes in the area that became the Ghana Empire. By the time of the Muslim conquest of North Africa in the 7th century the camel had changed the ancient, more irregular trade routes into a trade network running from Morocco to the Niger river. The Ghana Empire grew rich from this increased trans-Saharan trade in gold and salt, allowing for larger urban centres to develop. The traffic furthermore encouraged territorial expansion to gain control over the different trade-routes.

  The Ghana Empire grew wealthy by taxing the trans-Saharan trade that linked Tiaret and Sijilmasa to Aoudaghost. Ghana controlled access to the goldfields of Bambouk, southeast of Koumbi Saleh. A percentage of salt and gold going through its territory was taken. The empire was not involved in production. In the 10th century, however, Islam was steadily growing in the region, and due to various influences, including internal dynastic struggles coupled with competing foreign interests (namely Almoravid intervention). By the 11th century, Ghana was in decline. It was once thought that the sacking of Koumbi Saleh by Berbers under the Almoravid dynasty in 1076 might have been the cause. One important reason is the transfer of the gold trade east to the Niger River and the Taghaza Trail, and Ghana’s consequent economic decline. Another reason cited is political instability through rivalry among the different hereditary polities. The empire came to an end in 1230, when Takrur in northern Senegal took over the capital

  As the empire declined it finally became a vassal of the rising Mali Empire at some point in the 13th century. When the Gold Coast in 1957 became the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to regain its independence from colonial rule, it renamed itself in honor of the long-gone empire. Ghana was first mentioned by Arab geographer Al-Farazi in the late 8th century. After 800, the empire expanded rapidly, coming to dominate the entire western Sudan; at its height, the empire could field an army of 200,000 soldiers.

  Ghana was inhabited by urban dwellers and rural farmers. The urban dwellers were the administrators of the empire, who were Muslims, and the Ghana (king), who practised traditional religion. Two towns existed, one where the Muslim administrators and Berber-Arabs lived, which was connected by a stone-paved road to the king’s residence. The rural dwellers lived in villages, which joined together into broader polities that pledged loyalty to the Ghana. The Ghana was viewed as divine, and his physical well-being reflected on the whole society. Ghana converted to Islam around 1050, after conquering Aoudaghost.

• The Songhai Empire

  The Songhai Empire (also transliterated as Songhay) was a state that dominated the western Sahel in the 15th and 16th century. At its peak, it was one of the largest states in African history. The state is known by its historiographical name, derived from its leading ethnic group and ruling elite, the Songhai. Sonni Ali established Gao as the capital of the empire, although a Songhai state had existed in and around Gao since the 11th century. Other important cities in the empire were Timbuktu and Djenné, conquered in 1468 and 1475 respectively, where urban-centered trade flourished. Initially, the empire was ruled by the Sonni dynasty (c. 1464–1493), but it was later replaced by the Askiya dynasty (1493–1591).

  During the second half of the 13th century, Gao and the surrounding region had grown into an important trading center and attracted the interest of the expanding Mali Empire. Mali conquered Gao towards the end of the 13th century. Gao would remain under Malian hegemony until the late 14th century. As the Mali Empire started to disintegrate, the Songhai reasserted control of Gao. Songhai rulers subsequently took advantage of the weakened Mali Empire to expand Songhai rule.
  Under the rule of Sonni Ali, the Songhai surpassed the Malian Empire in area, wealth, and power, absorbing vast areas of the Mali Empire and reached its greatest extent. His son and successor, Sonni Bāru (1492–1493), was a less successful ruler of the empire, and as such was overthrown by Muhammad Ture (1493–1528; called Askia), one of his father’s generals, who instituted political and economic reforms throughout the empire.

  A series of plots and coups by Askia’s successors forced the empire into a period of decline and instability. Askia’s relatives attempted to govern the empire, but political chaos and several civil wars within the empire ensured the empire’s continued decline, particularly during the brutal rule of Askia Ishaq I (1539–1549). The empire experienced a period of stability and a string of military successes during the reign of Askia Daoud (1549–1582/1583). Ahmad al-Mansur, the Moroccan sultan at the time, demanded tax revenues from the empire’s salt mines.

  Askia Daoud responded by sending a large quantity of gold as gift in an attempt to appease the sultan. Askia Ishaq II (1588–1591) ascended to power in a long dynastic struggle following the death of Askia Daoud. He would be the last ruler of the empire. In 1590, al-Mansur took advantage of the recent civil strife in the empire and sent an army under the command of Judar Pasha to conquer the Songhai and to gain control of the Trans-Saharan trade routes. After the disastrous defeat at the Battle of Tondibi (1591), the Songhai Empire collapsed. The Dendi Kingdom succeeded the empire as the continuation of Songhai culture and society

• The Mali Empire

  The Mali Empire (Manding: Nyeni or Niani; also historically referred to as the Manden Kurufaba, sometimes shortened to Manden) was an empire in West Africa from c. 1230 to 1670. The empire was founded by Sundiata Keita and became renowned for the wealth of its rulers, especially Musa Keita. The Manding languages were spoken in the empire. It was the largest empire in West Africa and profoundly influenced the culture of West Africa through the spread of its language, laws and customs. Much of the recorded information about the Mali Empire comes from 14th century North African Arab historian Ibn Khaldun, 14th century Moroccan traveller Ibn Battuta and 16th century Moroccan traveller Leo Africanus. The other major source of information is Mandinka oral tradition, through storytellers known as griots.

  The empire began as a small Mandinka kingdom at the upper reaches of the Niger River, centred around the town of Niani (the empire’s namesake in Manding). During the 11th and 12th centuries, it began to develop as an empire following the decline of the Ghana Empire to the north. During this period, trade routes shifted southward to the savanna, stimulating the growth of states. The early history of the Mali Empire (before the 13th century) is unclear, as there are conflicting and imprecise accounts by both Arab chroniclers and oral traditionalists. Sundiata Keita (c. 1214–c. 1255) is the first ruler about whom there is accurate written information (from Ibn Khaldun). Sundiata Keita was a warrior-prince of the Keita dynasty who was called upon to free the Mali people from the rule of the king of the Sosso Empire, Soumaoro Kanté. The conquest of Sosso in c. 1235 gave the Mali Empire access to the trans-Saharan trade routes. Following the death of Sundiata Keita in c. 1255, the kings of Mali were referred to by the title mansa.

  Sundiata’s nephew Mansa Musa made a Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca during the reign of the Mamluk Sultan Baibars (r. 1260–1277). Following a series of usurpations of the throne of Mali, in c. 1285 Sakoura, a former royal court slave, became emperor and was one of its most powerful rulers, greatly expanding the territories of Mali. Following this period, a period of weak emperors, conflicts and disunity began in Mali. Ibn Khaldun died in 1406, and following his death there was no continuous record of events in the Mali Empire.

  It is known from the Tarikh al-Sudan that Mali was still a sizeable state in the 15th century. In 1542, the Songhay invaded the capital city of Niani but were unsuccessful in conquering the empire. During the 17th century, the Mali empire faced incursions from the Bamana Empire. After unsuccessful attempts by Mansa Mama Maghan to conquer Bamana, in 1670 Bamana sacked and burned Niani, and the Mali Empire rapidly disintegrated and ceased to exist, being replaced by independent chiefdoms. The Keitas retreated to the town of Kangaba, where they became provincial chiefs.

• Colonial France 

  Most of the 19th century was characterized by French colonial expansion from Senegal in the west and by Islamic jihads (religious wars) that led to the establishment of theocratic states. Shehu Ahmadu Lobbo (Cheikou Amadou), a Fulani Muslim cleric, successfully overturned the ruling Fulani dynasty in Macina in 1810 and established a theocratic state with its capital at Hamdallahi. In the west, political events were dominated by al-Ḥājj ʿUmar Tal, a Tukulor Muslim cleric who led a series of jihads. ʿUmar conquered the Bambara kingdom of Ségou in 1861 and the Fulani empire of Macina in 1864. After ʿUmar was killed in a skirmish with the Fulani in 1864, his vast domains were divided among his sons and commanders. His eldest son, Amadou Tal, who had been installed at Ségou, unsuccessfully attempted to exert control over the whole Tukulor empire in a series of civil wars. He became head of the Ségou Tukulor empire, whose predominantly Bambara inhabitants mounted constant revolts against his rule.

  The French, who established a fort at Médine in western Mali in 1855, viewed the Ségou Tukulor empire as the principal obstacle to their acquisition of the Niger River valley. Fearful of British designs on the same region, they engaged in a series of diplomatic overtures and military operations to push the limits of their control eastward. Between 1880 and 1881 the French succeeded in expanding their control from Médine 200 miles (320 km) east to Kita, primarily through the diplomatic efforts of Capt.

  Joseph-Simon Gallieni, who signed protectorate treaties with chiefs at Bafoulabé and Kita.
  In 1883 Gustave Borgnis-Desbordes launched a series of military campaigns against the Tukulor and the forces of Samory Touré, a Dyula Muslim leader who had founded a state to the south in the late 1860s. Borgnis-Desbordes captured Bamako during that year, giving the French a presence on the Niger. Between 1890 and 1893, Col. Louis Archinard launched a series of successful military operations that led to the final conquest of Ségou in 1893. Samory was driven into the Côte d’Ivoire colony and captured in 1898, the same year that the small Dyula kingdom of Kenedougou around Sikasso was conquered by French forces under Col. H.M. Audeod. Timbuktu was conquered in 1894 by the French officers Gaston Boiteaux, Eugène Bonnier, and Joseph-Jacques-Césaire Joffre, and the southern Sahara was finally brought under French control by méharistes (camel corps) by 1899.

  By the early years of the twentieth century the French held most of what would come to be their colonial territory in West Africa (including present day Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Benin, Guinea, Ivory Coast and Niger). A governor-general of French West Africa was appointed to administer the federation and was based in Senegal, the only place where African people had even minimally been assimilated under the original French plan. This dynamic was due most likely to the increasing awareness by the French of the unlikelihood that the African peoples they were colonizing would be ‘suitable` French citizens. When the original federation of the French West African colonies was achieved there was no strong statement of the program for assimilation. The French began to install a very centralized federalist administration in their new territory, a system of direct rule.

• Independent Mali

  By 1905, most of the area was under firm French control. French Sudan was administered as part of the Federation of French West Africa and supplied labor to France’s colonies on the coast of West Africa. In 1958 the renamed Sudanese Republic obtained complete internal autonomy and joined the French Community. In early 1959, the Sudanese Republic and Senegal formed the Federation of Mali, which gained full independence from France as part of the French Community on June 20, 1960. Following the withdrawal of Senegal from the federation in August 1960, the Sudanese Republic became the independent nation of Mali on September 22, 1960, with Modibo Keïta as president. Keïta quickly established a one-party state, withdrew from the French Community in 1962, adopted an independent African and socialist orientation with close ties to the Eastern bloc, and implemented extensive nationalization of economic resources.

  Following a progressive economic decline, however, Mali was forced to rejoin the Franc Zone in 1967. One-Party Rule: In November 1968, a group of junior army officers led by Lieutenant Moussa Traoré overthrew the Keïta regime in a bloodless coup and established a 14-member Military Committee for National Liberation with Traoré as president. The military-led regime attempted to reform the economy, but its efforts were frustrated by both political turmoil and a devastating drought in the Sahel lasting from 1968 to 1974. Under the provisions of a new constitution approved in 1974, the Second Republic of Mali became a single-party state under the Democratic Union of the Malian People (Union Démocratique du Peuple Malien—UDPM). In subsequent single-party presidential and legislative elections held in June 1979, Traoré (now a general) garnered 99 percent of the votes cast. The Traoré regime faced student unrest beginning in the late 1970s as well as three coup attempts, but it successfully (and harshly) repressed all dissent until the late 1980s.

  In 1990 cohesive opposition movements began to emerge, including the National Democratic Initiative Committee and the Alliance for Democracy in Mali (Alliance pour la Démocratie au Mali—Adema).
  A national conference, including representatives of political groups, labor unions, student organizations, and other social groupings, was held in August 1991. It produced a draft constitution (approved in a national 3 Library of Congress – Federal Research Division Country Profile: Mali, January 2005 referendum in January 1992) that created a multiparty democracy, officially the Third Republic. he 2002 election was a milestone, marking Mali’s first successful transition from one democratically elected president to another, despite the persistence of electoral irregularities and low voter turnout. In the 2002 legislative elections, no party gained a majority; Touré then appointed a politically inclusive government and pledged to tackle Mali’s pressing social and economic development problems.

  On 11 January 2013, the French Armed Forces intervened at the request of the interim government. On 30 January, the coordinated advance of the French and Malian troops claimed to have retaken the last remaining Islamist stronghold of Kidal, which was also the last of three northern provincial capitals. On 2 February, the French President, François Hollande, joined Mali’s interim President, Dioncounda Traoré, in a public appearance in recently recaptured Timbuktu.

• Source

  http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mali/overview

  https://sites.google.com/a/tcd.ie/mali-mdp/education-1

  https://www.usaid.gov/mali/agriculture-and-food-security

  http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/economies/Africa/Mali-INDUSTRY.html#ixzz5JrrUbbAOElectricity

  http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/economies/Africa/Mali-INDUSTRY.html

  https://www.mfw4a.org/mali/financial-sector-profile.html

  http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/Africa/Mali-BANKING-AND-SECURITIES.html

  https://www.islamawareness.net/Africa/Mali/mali_article002.pdf

  http://www.everyculture.com/Ja-Ma/Mali.html

  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-13881978

  https://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/cs/profiles/Mali-new.pdf

  https://www.britannica.com/place/Mali/Independent-Mali

  https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ml.html

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mali#History