Legal Framework on freedom of religion and actual application
The Constitution of Mali declares Mali to be a secular state that guarantees all citizens the same rights, regardless of their religious affiliation. The secular nature of the state is enshrined in the Preamble. Article 2 stipulates that “All Malians are born and live free and equal in their rights and duties. Any discrimination based on social origin, colour, language, race, sex, religion, or political opinion is prohibited.” Mali’s constitution guarantees the right to freedom of worship and the right to profess one’s faith through individual or communal acts of worship. As Article 4 states: “Every person has the right to freedom of thought, conscience, religion, worship, opinion, expression, and creation in respect to the law.”
Mali’s penal code also follows a fundamentally liberal approach. Nevertheless, discrimination based on religion, or acts that impede freedom of religious observance or worship, can be punished with up to five years in prison or a 10-year ban from the country. Furthermore, “any religiously motivated persecution of a group of persons constitutes a crime against humanity” for which there is no statute of limitations.
Concerning education, Article 18 of the Constitution states that “public education is mandatory, free and non-religious.” Public schools cannot offer religious instruction, but private schools may do so. Privately funded Islamic religious schools (Madrasas) teach Islam but are required to follow the standard government curriculum. Non-Muslim students are not required to attend Islamic religious classes. The same rule applies in Catholic schools which teach both the government curriculum and religious classes.
All religious organisations are required to register within the Ministry of Territorial Administration and Decentralisation. This does not apply to those groups practising indigenous religious beliefs. Registration confers no tax preferences or other legal benefits, and there is no penalty for failure to register.
Mali is predominantly Muslim Sunni. Almost 13 percent of the population belongs to other religions. Christians constitute just over two percent, with two thirds being Catholic and one third being Protestant. Mali is also home to traditional African religions (almost nine percent of the population); some Muslims and Christians also incorporate African traditions into their ritual observances.
Statutory national holidays include the Christian festivities of Christmas and All Saints’ Day, and the Muslim feasts of Mawlid (Birth of the Prophet) and Eid al-Fitr (end of Ramadan).
In September 2020, following a military coup in August, the transitional government adopted the Transition Charter, approving the validity of the 1992 Constitution, which “defined the country as secular and prohibited religious discrimination under the law.” The law penalises violations of religious freedom.
A second coup d’état took place in May of 2021, led by the newly appointed Vice President Assimi Goita, who also led the previous coup in August. He was proclaimed Interim President in May of 2021. In June of 2022, President Assimi Goita declared that there would be a two-year transition period to civilian rule, resulting in a two-year delay for the implementation of democracy.
Incidents and Developments
For the past nine years, Mali has witnessed a rise in jihadist insurgency. In the period under review, Mali’s northern and central regions saw a series of violent national and regional terrorist attacks. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, “violence linked to militant Islamic groups Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims—JNIM) and the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS) rose 70 percent in 2021 compared to 2020.”
The drivers fuelling the violence in Mali are often confused between religious-based and ethnic-based bias. Central Mali, despite the presence of French and UN troops, has become a main arena for the insurgency between armed groups and the government. The conflict has also spread to neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger, especially within the border area between these countries known as the Liptako Gourma region, a focal point of the fighting.
Despite Mali’s deteriorating security, the military junta has jettisoned France and its international partners, instead relying on Russia’s Wagner group (a Russian private military company, unofficially tied to the Kremlin) to counter the threat posed by jihadists. The governments of Mali’s neighbouring countries are concerned that France's withdrawal could further destabilise the region. In the hopes of defusing the current tension, these governments worry that Mali might start negotiations with the jihadists and that this strategy would be welcomed by the Malian population.
The presence of unrestrained mercenary/private security firms supporting the local military appears to have fuelled the violence. In the Central African Republic (CAR), for example, Wagner troops are suspected of having committed a wide range of crimes and human rights abuses, including excessive use of force, rape, indiscriminate violence against civilians, torture, looting, and occupation of schools. These acts of violence would “have occurred both in the context of combat operations and as a component of daily life, particularly in towns located near operating bases.”
Catholic and Muslim religious leaders have continued to condemn the rise of jihadist violence. Particularly, Muslim leaders have criticized the extreme interpretations of Sharia law and extremists have not discriminated in their aggression with JNIM targeting Christians, Muslims, and traditional religious communities in attacks across multiple towns in the region of Mopti. Christian missionaries have also “expressed concern regarding the increased influence in remote areas of organizations characterized as violent and extremist, with Caritas representatives explaining how armed groups impose bans on alcohol and pork and force women of all faiths to wear veils.”
Furthermore, Christians in some parts of Mali are prevented from religious worship (particularly celebrating Holy Mass) due to some Malian imams who launch verbal assaults against Christians in their preaching, worsening the already precarious situation. These verbal attacks combined with “frequent direct personal threats, for example anonymous threatening telephone calls”, have developed “a psychosis within the Christian communities.” Moreover, jihadists “are attempting to impose Sharia law”, which has resulted in an increasing number of refugees. According to a report by the UNHCR, “the number of internally displaced Malians” […] “exceeded 400,000 by the end of September 2021.” With the almost omnipresent violence, the incidents indicated below are only representative.
On 21 June 2021, Fr Léon Dougnon was kidnapped by an unidentified armed group along with four other lay faithful in Mopti (central Mali). A few hours later, the four lay people were released, while Fr Dougnon was still detained by the jihadists. He was finally released three weeks later.
In August of 2021, more than 51 people were killed in northern Mali by unidentified terrorists who attacked three villages near the border with Niger, “killing indiscriminately and burning and ransacking homes.” A military officer stated that “More than 40 civilians were killed by terrorists on Sunday in the villages of Karou, Ouatagouna and Daoutegeft.” In response, the “Malian army patrol was sent to the affected communities.”
In September and October 2021, three attacks against military forces were registered in the Mopti region. On 2 September, four soldiers were killed by explosive devices (IEDs), characteristic of jihadi groups; on 12 September, five soldiers were killed in an IED ambush; and on 6 October, 16 soldiers were killed and another 10 injured in an ambush also involving an IED.
On 8 October 2021, a Colombian nun, Gloria Cecilia Narvaez Argoti of the Franciscan Sisters of Mary Immaculate, was freed after almost 5 years as a captive of Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslim (JNIM). She was kidnapped on 7 February 2017, in the village of Karangasso in the southerly Sikasso region, a reportedly safe part of the country, where she was ministering to the poor. In an interview with ACN Sr Gloria she said she used to pray: “My God, it is hard to be chained and to receive blows, but I live this moment as you present it to me […] And in spite of everything, I would not want any of these men (i.e., her captors) to be harmed.” She added: “They asked me to repeat bits of Muslim prayers, to wear Islamic-style garments, but I always let it be known that I was born in the Catholic faith, that I grew up in that religion, and that for nothing in the world would I change that, even if it cost me my life.”
On 3 December 2021, 31 civilians were killed during a terrorist attack which targeted a bus in Mopti transporting people to a local market. On the same day, in the northern city of Gao, “two explosions rocked a UN camp.” Reportedly, there was damage but no deaths. Still, the blasts “shook the barracks of the UN mission,” forcing people “to take refuge in nearby shelter for two hours.”
On 3 December 2021, there was an attack in the Bandiagara region that killed at least 32 persons. According to the Barapreli Catholic priest, terrorist and other armed groups continued to ban Catholicism, and instead taught Islam, imposing Shari‘a on Catholic faithful in the area. He added that they forced the local Christian community in Didja to learn the Qu’ran and perform prayers as prescribed by Islam. Nevertheless, Caritas representatives indicated that most Catholic churches in the country were still able to remain open.
In December 2021, ACN received reports that jihadists in the Ségou region were stepping up efforts to seize swathes of land and to establish Shari‘a law in the territory under their control. A local source told ACN that Katiba Macina, an Islamist group with links to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, burnt rice fields and attacked farmers attempting to harvest crops. According to the source – which ACN could not name for security reasons – Katiba Macina were trying to intimidate the local populace into joining the militants or abandoning their land, so the Islamist extremists could take it. The source said: “The desire to impose Islamic Shari‘a law is proof that the jihadists, especially those of the Katiba Macina, are working for the expansion of a radical Islam of a kind that many other Muslims do not share”. The source added: “The jihadists are acting in the name of religion. Everything that does not conform to their own ideology suffers as a result. That is why there are so many refugees”.
On 13 February 2022, an unidentified armed terrorist group attacked the Niafunke post (northern Mali) resulting in two deaths of the Malian Armed Forces and five deaths among the attackers.
On 17 February 2022, France and its European partners, as well as Canada, announced their military withdrawal from the country stating that, “There are no longer the political, operational and legal conditions” necessary to continue the military operations.
Since 2013, France had been militarily present in Mali to “contain and the repel the jihadist advance of radical Islamist groups threatening Bamako.” In April 2022, after two military coups in less than a year, Paris accused the Malian military of “relying on Russian mercenaries.” France also accused Russian mercenaries of burying bodies outside a military base and blaming French troops for the killings to discredit its departing force. For its part, Mali has “continually denied working with Russian mercenaries, claiming to only work with official Russian instructors.”
On 24 April 2022, unidentified jihadist groups simultaneously attacked three military bases in the cities of Sévaré, Niono, and Bapho (central Mali), resulting in the death of six soldiers and the wounding of 20 others. Following the attacks, violent demonstrations were witnessed throughout the country between 10 - 12 June 2022. Muslim and Christian religious leaders launched a joint appeal for peace. Cardinal Jean Zerbo stressed that “in this difficult situation, we religious are left with only two behaviours: being sentinels and acting as mediators to encourage dialogue and a return to calm.”
On 3 August 2022, Islamist militants killed four civilians and 42 members of the Malian Armed Forces in the city of Tessit (northern Mali). According to government statements, drones and explosives were used in the attack, and the aggressors carried out “clandestine overflight operations” and have “benefitted from major support, including external expertise.”
On 31 August 2022, one of the main armed groups operating in northern Mali, the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), “reaffirmed its commitment to a merger of the ex-rebel armed groups that agreed to a peace accord with Bamako in 2015.” The announcement was made by the Movement at a gathering in the northern city of Kidal. Just a few days prior, the Malian authorities had announced their plan to incorporate 26,000 ex-rebels into the national army.
On 9 September 2022, dozens of civilians (different sources have estimated between 30 and 40) were killed in Talataye (northeast Mali), which is located at a “crossroads of influence for rival terrorist groups.” The main suspects were the EIGS group, the al-Qaida-affiliated Group JNIM/GSIM, as well as other armed organizations, including the Tuareg-dominated Movement for the Salvation of Azawad (MSA).
Prospects for Freedom of Religion
Mali is ensnared in a web of violence between the combatants of the transitional government, mercenaries including the Wagner group, and the onslaught of attacks by jihadists. It remains to be seen whether Mali will return to a “pluralistic democracy” at the end of the two-year transitional period in 2024, as originally intended in its Constitution. Overall, the present situation depicts a bleak future for all human rights including freedom of religion.
Mali