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RMT helpline 0800 3763706 :: october 2008 :: RMTnews
28
Mali is one of the poorest
countries in sub-Saharan Africa,
probably best known for its
unique musical tradition
personified by stars such as Salif
Keita, who started his career as
lead singer of the Super Rail
Band founded in 1970 by Mali's
national railways.
In fact, the railway is a
central part of life in the
landlocked country and the
campaign to renationalise the
network, following privatisation
by the Malian and Sengalese
governments in 2003, has taken
centre stage.
The Dakar-Niger Railway
connects the Malian capital
Bamako, the river Niger and the
Senegalese port of Dakar. Built
under the French colonial
regime, it was the focus of a
legendary strike by African
railway workers in 1947,
fighting for equal pay and the
same rights as French
railworkers.
Following independence in
1959 the railway workers' strike
was celebrated as a turning
point in the anti-colonial
struggle by Senegalese writer
Ousmane Sembène in his
seminal novel God's Bits of
Wood.
However, since the early
1990s Mali, along with many
other poor countries, has been
forced to implement so-called
structural adjustment
programmes at the behest of the
International Monetary Fund
aimed at attracting foreign
investment through
privatisation.
A French-Canadian
conglomerate, Canac-Getma
won the concession to operate
the Malian Railway Company in
October, 2003 under the name
‘Transrail’, which led to large-
scale job losses, wage cuts,
falling health and safety
standards and the closure of
about a third of the rail
network.
Redundant railway workers
and their supporters founded the
Citizens' Collective for Taking
Back and Developing Malian
Railways'(Cocidirail) and the
struggle to wrest their railway
out of private hands began.
Assets valued at more than
105 billion francs (£127 million)
were sold for seven billion
francs (£8 million). This led to
the dismissal of nearly 700
railway workers, the closure of
26 out of 36 local railway
stations, condemning villages,
towns and orchards bordering
the railway line to economic
death and desolation. Senegal
and Mali themselves became
FIGHTING RAIL
PRIVATISATION IN MALI