Mali: The authorities postpone the 2024 presidential election
In Mali, the presidential elections due to be held in February 2024 as part of the return to civilian rule have been postponed. The Malian authorities have made the announcement and given the reasons for the postponement.
«The dates initially set of 4 and 18 February 2024 for the two rounds» will be postponed slightly for technical reasons», said government spokesman Colonel Abdoulaye Maïga in a statement read out to journalists in Bamako.
The “technical” reasons revealed were explained by «the hijacking of the civil status administrative census (RAVEC) database by the service provider IDEMIA, a French company».
IDEMIA specialises in digital security and is considered to be one of the world leaders in biometric recognition.
According to the government spokesman, it is involved in the census process and is demanding payment of more than 5.2 billion CFA francs (8 million euros) from the Malian authorities, while refusing to «transfer ownership of the system, including the transmission of the password».
Colonel Abdoulaye Maïga went on to say that the Malian authorities did not intend to pay the sum demanded by the French company after it became clear that there were irregularities in the contract that had been signed.
In other words, says the press release read out by the government spokesman, «the contract signed with this company in 2018 related to a proprietary solution, for which Mali does not have the access code».
As a result, the authorities are announcing that « On the instructions of His Excellency Colonel Assimi Goïta, President of the Transition and Head of State, administrative steps will be taken as soon as possible to switch our database to another system that will be exclusively controlled by Mali, without any risk of data theft or hostage-taking».
Bouba Djibrill
