2020 Malian parliamentary election


Parliamentary elections were held in Mali on 29 March 2020, with a second round on 19 April. They were initially scheduled to be held on 25 November and 16 December 2018, but were moved to April 2019 and then to June 2019, before being postponed until 2020 by the Council of Ministers. The elections were marred by violence in the north and center of the country.
These are the first elections to fill Mali’s 147-seat parliament since 2013.
Thousands of Malians have died as the country suffered sporadic attacks by jihadists as well as cases of inter-ethnic violence since unrest began in 2012.

Electoral system

The 147 members of the National Assembly are elected from 125 constituencies using the two-round system to serve five-year terms. In constituencies where there is more than one seat, block voting is used.

Conduct

Leader of the opposition Soumaila Cissé was kidnapped on 26 March, three days prior to the elections. Village chiefs, election officials, and an election observer were kidnapped; there were death threats and a police station was ransacked according to the Coalition for the Observation of Elections in Mali, which had sent 1,600 observers. Nine people were killed when their vehicle hit a landmine on 29 March. Three soldiers were killed and three injured in another landmine on 30 March. An al-Qaeda-aligned group took responsibility for the bombings, as well as an attack on soldiers and the killing of a group of Dozo hunters on 27 March.

Results

Parties formed different alliances in different constituencies, making it impossible to determine a national set of vote figures. The election continued a decades-long trend of turnout being under 40% in the country, and the first-round elections were marred by violence in the north and center of the country.