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RACE, STEREOTYPES AND POLITICS 89from the Catholics. We want them to go, and from then on everyone will commandin their own right. There will only be exchanges between us. That is all we want. Itis not to command in your place. Each will command in his own place. And theFrench want to set you up against this to slow it all down?” The Tuareg chiefsreplied: “We and the French, we have agreed on nothing definite so far. If you donot want to command us, there is no problem”. “We are not going to command you,each one commands in his own right. There will only be exchanges between us asmuch as there are now.” So. They [Tamasheq chiefs] said: “We will go back to tellthem this”. [Amegha directly makes the others reply:] “Yes, yes, they have only onemonth left before they leave. No one will come to see you and they are forced toleave since they have signed to do so.” So they did this. Everyone returned homeafter having bought some bags of millet. They returned home. One month laterindependence arrived. Contrary to what was said to the chiefs, we saw the blacksoldiers coming to command the goum platoons and the ettebel. We were occupiedby civil servants while the goumiers were only loyal to France. And indeed, theblacks have changed things. 40Two main elements stand out in this story. First, the Kel Tamasheq chiefswere in contact with the Sudanese political elite on the subject of independence.The latter assured the former that autonomy was guaranteed and that independenceto them entailed a religious commitment. It was their intention to freethe country from the rule of infidels. Second, and most important, these politiciansdid not keep their word. The last two elements came up in other conversationsI had with Kel Adagh on independence and the nature of the KeitaGovernment. Mohamed Lamine Fall explained to me why the Kel Adagh haddecided to fight the Malian Government in 1963 as follows:Attaher had come to an agreement with the head iklan of the South to unite, to formthe Government. But the Malians are badly educated. They accept anyone into thearmy; Christians, the non-religious, et cetera. They did not send people here whoknew politics. The people Mali had sent were not of the sort agreed upon inAttaher’s agreement. (...) The people who were sent to the bush by the administrationwere not the nobles of the South, but bad people whom they had promotedto officer ranks so they would agree to come to the North. 41The language used is telling. Mohamed Lamine first calls the new MalianGovernment the ‘head iklan’, the ‘head slaves’. These had no ‘education’, wereuncivilised, and were not Muslims. He then recognises that the Southern4041Conversation with Amegha ag Sherif. Brussels, October 1994. It is not clear whichpetition Amegha is referring to. It could be the September 1958 referendum, thepetitions by Mohamed Mahmoud ould Cheick, or an entirely new one. Interestinglyenough, Amegha has developed a kind of standard narrative about these events.Amegha gave a very similar account to Pierre Boilley, see Boilley, P. 1999: 299-300. Boilley links this account to Mohamed Mahmoud ould Cheick’s petitions discussedin Chapter 1.Interview with Mohamed Lamine ag Mohamed Fall. Kidal, 23/5/1999.