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266 CHAPTER 6other side of reality is that the other tribes exist and that they are more numerousthan the Ifoghas. 27This leadership became strongly contested after the outbreak of the rebellion.Particularly after the second drought of the 1980s, the participation oftribes from outside the Adagh had risen within the movement. The new recruitswere mostly from the Chemennamas, Ishidenharen, Dabakar and other fractionsfrom the Tamesna and Azawad, although a small number of them had joinedearlier. These men had different experiences in the Tanekra and to them theleadership of the Kel Adagh was not a foregone conclusion. Most attacks in thefirst six months of the rebellion took place within the Adagh, which reconfirmedKel Adagh leadership over the movement, and gave the rebellion thelook of ‘another Kel Adagh affair’, probably to the discontent of the fightersfrom the Ménaka battalion. The negotiations at Tamanrasset again proved KelAdagh leadership. The majority of the negotiators on behalf of the movementwere Kel Adagh, with Iyad ag Ghali signing the treaty. Leadership and hierarchyamong tewsiten and fractions form the core of Tamasheq social politicallife. The leadership position the Kel Adagh claimed within the movement couldthus not be without consequences for internal hierarchy and organisation. Thosemen resisting Kel Adagh leadership and control over the movement simplyopted out to create their own front. The outcome of the Tamanrasset Agreementcan be put forward as a second reason for the division between the Kel Adaghand the other Kel Tamasheq. The moderates leading the negotiations in Tamanrassethad opted for the acceptance of de facto Malian citizenship, on thecondition that Northern Mali would gain a large amount of autonomy. Thiscondition was met by the Malian state in the form of decentralisation of thehitherto highly centralised state. To phrase this mutual agreement, a ratherstrange formulation was used in the agreement.The two parties have agreed that the populations of the three Régions in NorthernMali will freely administer their regional and local affairs through the mediation oftheir representatives in the elected assemblies, in accordance with an exceptionalstatus consented to by law. 28At the time ‘Tamanrasset’ was signed, Northern Mali was administrativelydivided into only two Régions: Timbuktu, the VIth Région; and Gao, the VIIthRégion, which included the Adagh as the Cercle of Kidal. What had beenarranged for in Tamanrasset, was the promotion of the Cercle of Kidal to a fully2728Interview by Pierre Boilley with Iyad ag Ghali. Bamako, 10/02/1994. Boilley, P.1999: 514.Procès verbal de la rencontre entre la délégation du Gouvernement du Mali et laDélégation du Mouvement Populaire de l’Azaouad et du Front Islamique Arabe del’Azaouad à Tamanrasset du 10 au 12 octobre 1990. Personal Archive.