{"id":181713,"date":"2021-03-29T12:00:54","date_gmt":"2021-03-29T11:00:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=181713"},"modified":"2021-03-25T10:46:13","modified_gmt":"2021-03-25T10:46:13","slug":"adam-thiams-death-reminds-us-how-europe-harms-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2021\/03\/adam-thiams-death-reminds-us-how-europe-harms-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Adam Thiam\u2019s Death Reminds Us How Europe Harms Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"

25 Mar 2021 – <\/em>Mali\u2019s greatest journalist and political analyst, Adam Thiam, has died of COVID. I mourn a friend whom I greatly admired.<\/p>\n

How did COVID reach Morocco and Mali? From China, of course, but passing through France and Spain. Most of the bad influences in West Africa come from Europe. Writing about Adam Thiam\u2019s death at the age of 67, reminded me dramatically how Europe has exploited Africa for the past 200 years, and is still doing so. Even the Colombian cocaine smuggling across the Sahara Desert is a form of European exploitation of West Africa: the Medellin Cartel\u2019s main markets are not in Mali, but in London, Paris, Naples and Amsterdam.<\/p>\n

REMEMBERING MY FRIEND ADAM THIAM <\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Honoring the memory of a brilliant journalist.<\/p><\/div>\n

I first met Adam Thiam in 1981 in the small river port of Youvarou, deep in Mali\u2019s Interior Delta region where visitors no longer roam for fear of kidnapping. Adam was working for Save The Children Fund as a researcher, which gave him unrivalled insights into rural Mali, particularly in the Fulani cultural zones where his ancestors came from, and where he knew every village and every nomadic camp.<\/p>\n

Adam moved to London HQ where he honed his English language and writing skills for SCF, and gained a Master\u2019s degree in food security at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.<\/p>\n

Coming back to Mali as a journalist, Adam founded a newspaper Tariq-Hebdo <\/em>for which he recruited me to write a weekly column \u2026. But the cost of production was too high and he joined Le R\u00e9publicain<\/em> founded in 1992 by his friend Ti\u00e9bil\u00e9 Dram\u00e9, who was working for Amnesty in London when Adam lived there. At this period in the early 1990s, Adam also spent time at Harvard University – following the classic route of major African intellectuals.<\/p>\n

Dram\u00e9\u2019s Le R\u00e9publicain<\/em> became Mali\u2019s leading independent newspaper, in part thanks to Adam Thiam\u2019s brilliant editorials. He had the gift of critical analysis and biting wit, combining them with literary elegance to push issues as far as is reasonable in a country where military and religious conservatives hold enormous power.\u00a0 He once suggested that police uniforms should be sewn without pockets, as a way to limit petty extortion. Ti\u00e9bil\u00e9 described Adam\u2019s\u00a0 death as \u201cle Mali perd un de ses esprits les plus brillants\u201d \u2026. One of Mali\u2019s most brilliant minds.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

It is sad that Mali did not follow Adam\u2019s insights to reinforce democratic governance and keep social peace. Many of Mali\u2019s political leaders have been too timid, constrained by French, religious and military pressures. Some politicians were unable even to understand what Adam Thiam and others were saying, as the Bamako elite became ever more remote from le Mali profond<\/em>. And throughout Mali\u2019s history since Independence, the pressures of military ambition, corruption and \u2013 more recently \u2013 the evils of drug money \u2013 have distorted Mali\u2019s political life.<\/p>\n

So has the desire of France to control and exploit its ex-colonies.<\/p>\n

Adam\u2019s expos\u00e9 of Air Cocaine in November 2009<\/strong><\/p>\n

Adam Thiam\u2019s reported on the Air Coca\u00efne scandal involving a Boeing 727 that crashed on take-off near the town of Tarkint in Northern Mali at the beginning of November 2009. \u00a0This transport aircraft, with the registration mark HZ-SNE, had airworthiness certification that expired on March 11, 2009. The Boeing 727 flew into North Mali from Venezuela carrying Colombian-origin drugs. Landing in Mali, it was met by a convoy of 4WD vehicles that removed the cargo of up to 10 tons of cocaine, and disappeared. No investigators were allowed near for at least three days after the crash. \u00a0The air crew was actually found and imprisoned \u2026. then allowed to depart. Even though people in North Mali knew that the Mayor of Tarkint was involved, the Malian justice system failed to hold any Malian accountable.<\/p>\n

Big Power Politics are at play here: not only the governments of Algeria and Libya, as well as Mali, allowed the drugs to pass through their frontiers; but also NATO Member States were complicit. NATO controls international airspace, and air traffic controllers follow all aircraft crossing the Atlantic Ocean. Some of European political parties and security services must be involved in sharing the cocaine profits, which run into billions of euros each year.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Boeing 727-200 aircraft, with the registration mark HZ-SNE crashed near Tarkint.<\/p><\/div>\n

Why does no government act to stop the drug trafficking?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Even if Mali wanted to stop the powerful Medellin Cartel in Colombia supplying the Italian Mafia in Europe, Mali\u2019s resources are inadequate to police the vast length of its Sahara Desert frontiers. Only international cooperation between governments could break the supply chain.<\/p>\n

Around 2004-2006 I personally tried very hard to get European participation in fighting the Colombian cocaine cartels in Guinea Bissau and across the Sahara desert. The EU ambassador in Mali received me kindly, but had no interest. Various European embassies in Bamako and in Brussels seemed bemused, although their military attach\u00e9s were interested in my ideas. France\u2019s President Sarkozy refused to help Mali\u2019s President Tour\u00e9 (ATT) limit smuggling, because the latter would not support Sarkozy\u2019s desire to expel Malian residents from France. Later, after President Hollande defeated Sarkozy in the April 2012 election, I received back an informal message from the French Ministry of Defence that \u201cWe are happy to watch the cocaine coming through Guinea Bissau, because it allows us to know where it is and can follow it.\u201d \u00a0I took this to mean: \u201cWe will do nothing to stop the flow of cocaine, which covertly supplies billions of euros to our military allies in Algeria, and to our French allies here in France.\u201d<\/p>\n

No matter what Adam Thiam wrote, the Powers-That-Be have financial and military interests that far outweigh matters like Peace, Development, Honesty, or Mali.<\/p>\n

Impunity (and military impunity especially) undermines Malian justice; but this is true of NATO countries as well. Everyone remembers President George H.W. Bush extending a presidential pardon to Ronald Reagan\u2019s former Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, Colonel Oliver North and a number of other very senior officials who were convicted felons involved in illegal arms sales (and importing drugs) in cahoots with the CIA. Similar actions continue around the world, often using US military contractors. The cases of Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and Julian Assange, prove that whistle-blowers are persecuted by the USA, while the perpetrators of war crimes are not even investigated, let alone charged with a crime.<\/p>\n

Adam Thiam was a literary journalist of great talent<\/strong><\/p>\n

Adam Thiam made plenty of caustic comments about such corruption in Mali and elsewhere. I shall miss Adam\u2019s wit. Sitting under the stars in Adam\u2019s garden in Kalaban Koro, eating Djeneba\u2019s delicious food, I would laugh out loud at Adam\u2019s stories. Because I am British, Adam concocted a saga around his son Mohamed who was born England. \u201cYou are always with me, Poulton. Every time my son smiles, I see your eyes looking at me,\u201d he would state in a serious voice. I would explode with laughter, while Djeneba smiled tolerantly. I hope his young son did not understand the joke.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Adam Thiam beside the French Ambassador to Mali after being decorated Chevalier de l\u2019Ordre national des Arts et des Lettres.<\/p><\/div>\n

Adam was first and foremost a writer, un homme de lettres<\/em>. A great reader as well as a great writer, he was proud to have been awarded France\u2019s m\u00e9daille de Chevalier de l\u2019Ordre national des Arts et des Lettres. <\/em>He was also decorated by his own country as Chevalier de l\u2019Ordre national du Mali. <\/em>He honored me on one occasion at the Journ\u00e9es Litt\u00e9raires de Bamako<\/em> when chairing a session, by saluting me as a \u201cMajor Malian Author\u201d- all the young Malians, who had never heard of me, turned and stared.<\/p>\n

Adam contributed regularly and brilliantly to international media such as Radio France International, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Africable, Jeune Afrique<\/em> \u2026. His work for peace and clean government included expos\u00e9s of cocaine smuggling from Colombia, and Malian peace building with his essay Centre du Mali : enjeux et dangers d\u2019une crise n\u00e9glig\u00e9e <\/em>(2017). Several presidents of Mali called upon his services to run their press offices. Alpha Oumar Konar\u00e9 took Adam to Addis Ababa (2003-2005) when he served as President of the African Union Commission. In 2019 Adam became head of the press office for President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita; and following the August 2021 coup d\u2019\u00e9tat, the new Transitional President Bah Ndaw kept him in the same post.<\/p>\n

That is what killed him: on an official mission to Morocco, Adam contracted the covid-sars-2 virus. Rest In Peace.<\/p>\n

Farewell, my dear old friend.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

__________________________________<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Robin Poulton <\/em>is a member of the TRANSCEND Network<\/a> who has been working in West African peace and development since 1980. A researcher with UNIDIR Geneva <\/em>(United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research)<\/em>, <\/em>School of World Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University, West Africa Research Association and elsewhere, he is author most recently of <\/em>Peace Is Possible about peace building and disarmament in Cambodia with the Khmer Rouge. <\/em>Website: \u00a0https:\/\/robinpoulton.com\/<\/a>. Email: <\/em>repoulton@epesmandala.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

25 Mar 2021 – Mali\u2019s greatest journalist and political analyst, Adam Thiam, has died of COVID. I mourn a friend whom I greatly admired.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":181714,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[226],"tags":[237,378,1739,234,1142],"class_list":["post-181713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-obituaries","tag-africa","tag-journalism","tag-mali","tag-media","tag-obituary"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=181713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/181713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/181714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=181713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=181713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=181713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}