Mali: Baseline Study March 2020 PROJECT : « ANW KO HÊRÊ ! » (PEACE NOW !) Strengthen the resilience of communities RENFORCER LA RESILIENCE DES COMMUNAUTÉS DU CENTRE DU MALI in central Mali Contact: Dr Amadou Bocoum Martine Djoubmanga Country Director DM&E Coordinator Search for Common Ground – Mali Search for Common Ground – Mali Phone : +223 74 54 32 96 Phone : +223 72 46 47 91 Email : [email protected] Email : [email protected] Acknowledgements Search for Common Ground (Search) Mali thanks the Department of State of the United States of America (USA) for funding of the "Anw Ko Hêrê (Peace now)" project and its baseline. We also thank the administrative and local authorities of the 12 target communes for their collaboration as well as community leaders and all those who agreed to be interviewed to share their experiences and points of view on the security and social situation of their respective municipality. I Search for Common Ground | Mali Contents Acknowledgements ____________________________________________________________ I Contents ____________________________________________________________________ II Abbreviations and acronyms ____________________________________________________ IV List of tables and figures _______________________________________________________ V Executive summary ____________________________________________________________ VI I. The project _______________________________________________________________ 1 II. The baseline study _______________________________________________________ 2 III. The methodology of the baseline ___________________________________________ 2 1. Scope of the study _______________________________________________________________ 2 2. Methodological approach and methods _____________________________________________ 2 a. Literature review ______________________________________________________________________ 2 b. Qualitative methods ___________________________________________________________________ 3 c. The survey and target communities _______________________________________________________ 4 3. The research team _______________________________________________________________ 5 4. Difficulties and limitations ________________________________________________________ 5 IV. The results of the study ___________________________________________________ 6 1. Security context and social environment in target areas ________________________________ 6 a. Security environment __________________________________________________________________ 6 b. Conflict dynamics in target municipalities __________________________________________________ 7 i. Conflicts and their manifestations and causes _____________________________________________ 7 ii. The factors that divide populations _____________________________________________________ 8 iii. Collaboration and relationships between key actors ______________________________________ 9 2. Situation of violence in the target municipalities ____________________________________ 10 a. Types of violent actions committed ______________________________________________________ 10 b. Scope of the violence _________________________________________________________________ 11 c. Triggers of the violence ________________________________________________________________ 13 3. Identification of risk factors for atrocity crimes at the local level _______________________ 14 a. Situation of armed conflict or other forms of instability ______________________________________ 16 b. Record of serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law and weakness of State structures ______________________________________________________________________________ 16 c. Risk Factor 5 Capacity to commit atrocity crimes ___________________________________________ 17 d. Risk Factor 6 Absence of mitigating factors ________________________________________________ 17 e. Other risk factors ____________________________________________________________________ 17 4. Community measures to mitigate risk factors for atrocity and peace opportunities ________ 18 a. Mitigating factors ____________________________________________________________________ 18 II Search for Common Ground | Mali b. Conflict analysis, information management and sharing ______________________________________ 18 c. Peace opportunities and cohesion factors _________________________________________________ 18 Conclusion __________________________________________________________________ 20 Recommendations ___________________________________________________________ 20 For community activities ___________________________________________________________ 20 For media and communication activities _______________________________________________ 21 Annexes _____________________________________________________________________ X III Search for Common Ground | Mali Abbreviations and acronyms AJCET: Association of Youth Against Enrollment in Terrorism CSO: Civil Society Organization FGD: Focus Group Discussion IED: Improvised Explosive Device KII Key Informant Interview MINUSMA: United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali NGO: Non-Governmental Organization SDF: Security and Defense Force Search: Search for Common Ground UNMAS: United Nations Mine Action Service USA United States of America IV Search for Common Ground | Mali List of tables and figures Figure 1: Distribution of key actors interviewed by category ____________________________________________ 3 Figure 2 : Distribution of respondents by gender _____________________________________________________ 5 Figure 3 : Distribution of respondents by age group __________________________________________________ 5 Figure 4 : Number of internally displaced people in the target prefectures _________________________________ 8 Figure 5 : Percentage of respondents affirming the occurrence of violence per category _____________________ 10 Figure 6 : Severity level of violence by target municipality ____________________________________________ 11 Figure 7 : Percentage of respondents according to whether or not they have access to verified and -sensitive information on conflict ________________________________________________________________________ 14 Figure 8 : Percentage of respondents who affirm receiving information from participatory conflict analyzes and those ______________________________________________________________________________________ 18 Figure 9 : Percentage of respondents affirming the realization of the participatory theatres and the participants 19 Table 1: Number of surveyed people and women by target municipality __________________________________ 4 Table 2 : Divider factors underlying a tense social environment _________________________________________ 8 Table 3 : Indicators considered at community level to identify risk factors for atrocity commission ____________ 14 Table 4 : Connectors between actors and communities living in the target municipalities ____________________ 19 V Search for Common Ground | Mali Executive summary Context of the baseline This baseline study was carried out as part of the “Anw Ko Hêrê” project which is implemented by Search Mali in partnership with the Association des Jeunes contre l’Enrôlement dans le Terrorisme (AJCET). This 24-month project funded by the Department of State aims to “strengthen the resilience of communities in central Mali” to prevent atrocities and is implemented in 12 municipalities of 3 prefectures (Bandiagara, Bankass and Koro) in the Mopti region. Search Mali carried out the baseline study between November 2019 and March 2020 in the target municipalities of Bandiagara, Doucombo, Pignari Bana and Sangha in the prefecture of Bandiagara, the ones of Bankass, Baye, Koulogo and Ouenkoro in the prefecture of Bankass and finally Dinangourou, Dioungani, Koro and Yoro in the prefecture of Koro. Objectives, methodology and limitations of the study A mixed methodology was adopted to implement the baseline in order to understand the security and social context of the target areas, to provide a state of violence committed in the target municipalities, to identify risk factors for atrocities and to measure the indicators of the project at the beginning. The study included, in addition to the documentary review on the context analysis and the prevention of atrocities, the realization of 93 interviews (Key Informant Interviews - KII) with the key actors of security and protection (community leaders, administrative authorities and local elected leaders, members of Security Defense and Forces - SDF, and media professionals), 35 Focus Group Discussions (FGD) with communities members (including 12 FGD with women and 12 FGD with youth), and a random survey of 424 people (including 186 women) distributed among target municipalities. The percentage of women required for the study (50%) was not reached due to their reluctance to be interviewed. The research teams (24 investigators under the supervision of the Design Monitoring & Evaluation - DM&E team of Search Mali) also had difficulty interviewing magistrates and justice officials because they were not available. Results of the baseline Security Context The results of the study show that the project will be implemented in a deteriorated security context characterized by the presence of SDF with bases in some municipalities (Bankass, Koulogon, Ouenkoro, Dinangourou, Dioungani and Koro) and conducting patrols in others, the presence of self-defense and armed groups affiliated to ethnic groups in all the municipalities except Dinangourou