Étienne Fakaba SISSOKO
Étienne Fakaba SISSOKO. Photo credit: @Etioo. Source WikiCommons
Author, academic and political activist Étienne Fakaba Sissoko was serving a one-year prison term in Kéniéroba Central Prison at the end of the year. Arrested on 25 March 2024 by the Judicial Investigation Brigade (BIJ), on 27 March 2024, Sissoko was charged with ‘harming the reputation of the state’, ‘defamation’ and ‘dissemination of false news disturbing the public peace’ in connection with his 2023 book, Propagande, Agitation, Harcèlement: La communication gouvernementale pendant la transition au Mali (Propaganda, Agitation, Harassment: Government Communication During Mali's Transition). The book denounces alleged propaganda in the Malian government’s public information campaign.
Sissoko was sentenced on 20 May 2024 to two years in prison, with one year suspended, and a fine of XOF three million (about USD 4,800) for ‘damages’ to the state. The Bamako Court of Appeal approved his provisional release on 14 October, pending his appeal, but Sissoko was rearrested the same day in the Court precincts, after the Public Prosecutor objected to his release. On 15 December 2024, the Court of Appeal upheld the sentence.
Sissoko’s conviction and sentence as a reprisal for his book is a typical example of the Malian military government’s instrumentalization of the justice system to persecute the few voices still criticising the abuses and excesses of the military government.
Sissoko has previously been subjected to judicial harassment since the 2020 military coup. In January 2022, he was arrested for alleged ‘subversive’ speech and detained for close to six months without trial after he publicly criticised the management of the military transition and alleged that government appointments were based on ethnicity and false academic certificates. He was also reportedly questioned about the validity of his own academic qualifications in what credible sources have told PEN International was an attempt by the Malian authorities to discredit Sissoko’s academic credentials. He was conditionally released in June that year and barred from traveling outside Mali.
On 18 December, in an open letter, 11 African PEN Centres urged the Malian authorities to quash Sissoko’s conviction and release him unconditionally.
Étienne Fakaba Sissoko, born on 2 February 1983, is a prominent author of non-fiction books, as well as an economist, academic, researcher, publisher and political activist. He has written on the economic and development crisis in Mali and the dynamics of the business sector in several books.