The ruckus comes against the backdrop of civil unrest at the electricity crisis – Malians are reduced to a few hours of current per day if any at all – and a new opposition movement around the influential imam Mahmoud Dicko which on 17 February lambasted the junta for failure to deliver in terms of security basic services and the cost of living and demanded an election date...

President Abdelmadjid Tebboune compounded the insult as seen from Bamako by granting an audience to the prominent Malian imam Mahmoud Dicko a frequent critic of the junta...

A draft went to Goïta in October but after the opposition parties and the prominent imam Mahmoud Dicko rejected it no more has been heard...

There are fears that not even Mali's three most influential religious leaders may be able to stop the tide be it the widely respected and normally reserved Cheik Chérif Ousmane Haidara who released a pessimistic video in December; the firebrand imam Mahmoud Dicko; or the discreet and wealthy businessman and political broker Mohamed Ould Hamahoulah who also goes by Bouyé Haïdara but is universally known as Chérif de Nioro (AC Vol 62 No 14 Paris makes up with the junta)...

The influential imam Mahmoud Dicko recently accused Goïta's junta of arrogance – a hint at the domestic political pressure that could pile up as long as there is little progress on security...

But enthusiasm for it was feeble – even the firebrand imam Mahmoud Dicko stayed away...

Perhaps highest on the Prime Minister's agenda will be the need to stay on the right side of the powerful imam Mahmoud Dicko...

Pro-Westerners and European security experts see the beliefs of firebrand religious leaders like the Bamako-based imam Mahmoud Dicko as complementary to the military tactics of the armed extremists in the field even though his own followers and the inhabitants of the Sahel at large overwhelmingly disapprove of their methods (AC Vol 61 No 14 Keïta clings on)...

Other wannabes included Issa Kaou N'Djim (a prominent M5-RFP spokesman from the ranks of imam Mahmoud Dicko) the celebrated filmmaker and politician Cheick Oumar Sissoko and a host of other politicians eager to reinvent themselves as opposition activists...

For now that won't include its influential clerical ally Mahmoud Dicko who has announced his retreat from politics although he is likely to remain influential behind the scenes...