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REVOLUTION: TESHUMARA AND TANEKRA 229considered the Tanekra as only their affair, but they were not the only onesinvolved. At the start of the second rebellion, they did not even form themajority of fighters. Second, a process of imagining and reification in politicaldiscourse had assured that egha over Alfellaga had been extended to all ofTamasheq society. The bloody crushing of Alfellaga by ‘Mali’ had not onlytouched those directly involved. It had been an attack on the honour and dignityof a large part of society, and by extension it had left a feeling of powerlessnesswith all the Kel Tamasheq. In discussing the memories on Alfellaga in Chapter4, I have introduced Charlotte Linde’s term ‘induced narrative’. This is exactlywhat happened with stories about Alfellaga among other Kel Tamasheq. Withinthe Tanekra, all were confronted with the pain of the Kel Adagh over Alfellagaand, together with its’ stories and poems, made it their own. It was the reifyingand essentialist language of nationalism, in which large social bodies and politicalentities can be represented as almost anthropomorphic beings that enabledthe collective feeling of egha to be expressed. In Tamasheq nationalist imagining,egha over Alfellaga was a contracted debt between Tamasheq society andMali and Niger. Third, Alfellaga was not the only cause of shame, pain andpowerlessness. The unfolding of events after the droughts of the 1970s – thelack of governmental cooperation in strategies to counter the effects of drought,and the corruption of civil servants responsible for the distribution of relief aid– was set against the national discourse of the Malian state as one of ‘brothersin unity’.I listen to Mali. He says: “one People, one Goal, one Religion”. I say nothing. I saynothing! 79On the contrary, the Kel Tamasheq had the sentiment that they were on theirown. In exile after the droughts, the ishumar could compare the wealth of theirhosts to that of their countries of origin and their own poverty. Many ishumarcame to see their society as backward, in need of education and more modernpolitical organisation. All the problems described above were seen as humiliationsand signs of Tamasheq impotence.The young Kel Tamasheq had seen that Algeria had its independence, the South ofour country [Mali] had its independence. The Kel Tamasheq had not had their independence.They had become the slaves of the blacks. The young Kel Tamasheqhad seen that the other countries in the 1960s and 1970s were constructing villages,were modernising, while they remained nomads. That too caused hatred. In the yearof the drought, they had seen that they had nothing but themselves to protect them.There was no country that came to their rescue. That too created hatred. 807980Interview with Taghlift. Ménaka, 19/04/1999.Interview with Mohamed Lamine ag Mohamed Fall. Kidal, 23/05/1999.