The Bamako media buzzes with speculation about a potential presidential challenge from onetime IBK protégé and premier Moussa Mara – perhaps with a bid for mayor of the Bamako metro-conurbation as a career way-station and helped by the cultivation of influential religious figures...
SBM took responsibility for the disastrous loss of the Saharan town of Kidal to Tuareg separatists in May 2014 and resigned as Defence Minister though many lay the blame on the President IBK and the then Prime Minister Moussa Mara (AC Vol 55 No 11 IBK ducks the blame for Kidal & Vol 55 No 12 Ripples from Kidal)...
Moussa Mara Prime Minister for nine months until January 2015 is pressing for the regional polls to go ahead...
President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta is failing to take a strong political lead or resist the clannish family and vested interests that convinced him to dismiss his already weakened modernising Prime Minister Moussa Mara in January...
Then in January both Sissoko and Prime Minister Moussa Mara were sacked...
Then the army without alerting the French military or UN peacekeepers attacked the rebel MNLA's positions during a visit by the then Prime Minister Moussa Mara (AC Vol 55 No 12 Ripples from Kidal)...
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Back in Bamako Prime Minister Moussa Mara has plans to divide Mali into 23 or 24 regions based on traditional communities and under directly elected governments...
N'Dao replaces Soumeylou Boubèye Maïga who was sacrificed to deflect blame for the disaster from President Ibrahim Boubacar Keïta and Prime Minister Moussa Mara many in Bamako believe...
The Prime Minister of less than two months' standing Moussa Mara has also tried to deflect responsibility although few in Bamako are convinced by either man's story (AC Vol 55 No 8 Keïta's six-month itch)...
Keïta's decision to appoint Moussa Mara the 39-year-old urban Development Minister (AC Vol 54 No 15 Wanted a winner for all) as Prime Minister surprised insiders in Bamako who see it as a further strengthening of presidential power...