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The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights should take urgent action to stop the Malian junta’s crackdown on the political opposition and dissent, Human Rights Watch said today in a letter to African Union officials. The Commission should give immediate attention to the cases of several political figures who are or were presumed forcibly disappeared by the Malian authorities or have been detained for politically motivated reasons.
“The Commission should request an invitation from the Malian government to visit the country at the earliest possible opportunity,” said Allan Ngari, Africa advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “Such a visit would send a clear message to the authorities that the Commission takes the enforced disappearance of leading political figures and the respect for the rights of other Malian political opponents and activists as matters of the utmost seriousness.”
Since it took power in a 2021 coup, Mali’s military junta has been on a relentless assault against the political opposition, peaceful dissent, civil society, and the media, shrinking the country’s civic and political space. The authorities have dissolved political and civil society organizations, forcibly disappeared political figures and whistleblowers, arbitrarily arrested journalists and political opponents, and forced scores into exile.
According to credible sources interviewed by Human Rights Watch, on February 5, 2025, Daouda Magassa was abducted by men in civilian clothes in Bamako, Mali’s capital. Magassa is a critic of the military junta and a member of the Coordination of Movements, Associations and Supporters of Imam Mahmoud Dicko (Coordination des mouvements, associations et sympathisants de l’imam Mahmoud Dicko, CMAS), a political organization that has been calling for presidential elections as part of restoring civilian democratic rule in Mali.
Magassa’s family and colleagues have not had contact with him and the authorities have failed to officially respond to their requests for information. On February 11, Radio France Internationale reported that Magassa was being held at the National Agency for State Security (Agence nationale de la Sécurité d’État, ANSE), the Malian intelligence services.
In March 2024, the government dissolved the CMAS, accusing it of “destabilization and threat to public security.” Magassa’s enforced disappearance comes as the group’s supporters have been calling for the return of Mahmoud Dicko, head of the CMAS and an influential religious figure, who left Mali for Algeria in December 2024.
On December 28, 2024, at least two men in civilian clothes, claiming to be gendarmes, abducted Ibrahim Nabi Togola, the president of the opposition party New Vision for Mali (Nouvelle vision pour le Mali, NVPM) and a critic of the military junta, off a street in Bamako. A witness said he was beaten before being taken away in a truck without license plate. The night before, Togola and other political leaders had cancelled a news conference for the next day to announce a new opposition coalition, out of fear of arrest or other repressive government actions.
Togola’s whereabouts remained unknown until February 10, though relatives and colleagues said that the authorities had not responded to their or their lawyers’ inquiries.
In June 2024, Human Rights Watch documented that gendarmes had arrested 12 members of the country’s main opposition coalition, known as the March 31 Declaration’s Opposition Platform (Plateforme d’opposition de la Déclaration du 31 mars). One of those arrested, Mohamed Ali Bathily, a lawyer and former minister, was released on June 21. The 11 others face charges and were released on bail.
Lawyers and members of political parties told Human Rights Watch that at least 11 people are currently detained across Mali for politically motivated reasons. Among them are three members of the opposition party African Solidarity for Democracy and Independence (Solidarité Africaine pour la Démocratie et l’Indépendance, SADI) who were arrested in June 2023 in Bamako for exposing military abuses. In October 2024, the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights ordered the Malian authorities to release the three men, but their lawyers said they remain in prison.
On November 13, 2024, men in civilian clothes arrested Issa Kaou N’Djim, a political commentator, in Bamako, after he made critical remarks about the military rulers in Burkina Faso during a show aired on local television station Joliba TV News. N’Djim was sentenced to two years in prison and Mali’s national communications regulator withdrew the license of Joliba TV News.
On January 2, 2025, security forces arrested opposition member Seydina Touré in Segou, central Mali. He is charged with “incitement to public disorder” and “attempting to discredit the state,” among other charges. His trial is scheduled for March 7.
“What we see is either a complete denial of any legal procedures or the flagrant misuse of the law for political ends,” said a leading member of the SADI party. “By disappearing or arbitrarily arresting outspoken political opponents and activists, the government aims at crashing all forms of dissent.”
Mali is party to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance. Enforced disappearances are defined as the arrest or detention of a person by state officials or their agents followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or to reveal the person’s situation or whereabouts. Families of people who have been forcibly disappeared live with the uncertainty of not knowing whether their loved ones are safe and their conditions in captivity. Forcibly disappeared people are vulnerable to a wide range of abuses, including life threatening.
Mali is also party to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (African Charter), which guarantees the right to liberty, security, and freedom from arbitrary detention, the right not to be tortured or subjected to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, and the right to express and disseminate opinions within the law.
“The junta in Mali has gone to extreme lengths to stifle the political opposition and any forms of criticism,” Ngari said. “The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights should press the Malian authorities to abide by their human rights obligations, to respect, protect, promote, and fulfil the rights to freedoms of expression, opinion, and association.”
Distributed by APO Group on behalf of Human Rights Watch (HRW).