Tribute to Salif Keita, a veteran of African football
On Wednesday, Mali paid its last respects in Bamako to Salif Keita, the former Saint-Etienne and Marseille player and African football star who died at the age of 76.
Hundreds of people, including children, former team-mates, childhood friends, anonymous people and officials from Mali and elsewhere, including Prime Minister Choguel Kokalla Maïga, crowded into the Place du Cinquantenaire on the banks of the River Niger to bid farewell to Africa’s first Ballon d’Or winner in 1970, who died on Saturday of illness in a private clinic in Bamako.
Tributes filled with emotion and memories followed: to his extraordinary talent, then to his work as a national sports executive, and to his role as a father.
«He gave everything to Mali: player, coach, minister, Malian football federation. His football centre gave Mali geniuses» said Idrissa Maïga, a friend and former team-mate at AS Real Bamako and in the national team, where Keita made his debut at the age of 16. «Djo, go in peace», he concluded.
Giant posters of the deceased were erected around the body, which was covered in the green, yellow and red flag of Mali and arrived in the square carried by former team-mates and relatives.
Delegations came from neighbouring Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire and Guinea, as well as from France.
«Salif Keita is a monument, he took nothing lightly, and every Mali-Guinea match (was) a challenge for him» hailed former Guinean player Chérif Souleymane. «Salif no longer belongs to Mali» he said.
Nicknamed «Domingo» by his mates, Salif Keita was one of the greatest strikers of his generation, a slender, feline-looking player with unrivalled technique and a keen eye for goal.
In five years with The Greens de Saint-Etienne, he won three league titles (1968, 1969, 1970) and two French Cups (1968, 1970). His goal tally: 143 (in 186 matches), including 42 in the 1970-1971 season, when he finished second in the scoring charts behind Croatia’s Josip Skoblar (44, a record that still stands).
After playing for Les Verts, he moved to Marseille in 1972. He went on to play for Valencia (Spain) and Sporting Portugal before ending his career in the United States, in Boston.
After his sporting career, he invested in the hotel business before founding his country’s first football training centre, which produced talents such as Mahamadou Diarra (Lyon, Real Madrid) and his nephew Seydou Keita (Lens, Barcelona). He was Minister Delegate in the early 1990. He headed the national federation in the 2000.
Andréas KOBA
