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| Official Name : |
RÉPUBLIQUE
DU MALI (Republic of Mali) |
| Land Area: |
1,240,000 square kilometres / 478,640 square miles. |
| Population: |
12,292,000 (est 2005). Density 9.9 persons per square kilometre.. |
| Languages: |
French (official), Bambara, Fulfuldé, Songhai, Tamashek. |
| Religions: |
Muslim 90%, Traditional 9%. |
| Capital: |
Bamako. Population 700,000 |
| Currency: |
CFA franc, divided into 100 centimes. |
| Political: |
The Sudanese Republic and Senegal became independent of France in 1960 as the Mali Federation. When Senegal withdrew after only a few months, the Sudanese Republic was renamed Mali. Rule by dictatorship was brought
to a close in 1991 with a transitional government and in 1992 when Mali's first democratic presidential election was held. After his re-election in 1997, President Alpha Konare continued to push through political and economic reforms and to fight corruption. In keeping with Mali's two-term constitutional
limit, he stepped down in 2002 and was succeeded by Amadou Toure. |
| Geography: |
The low-lying featureless terrain of Mali is dominated in the north by the virtually uninhabited Saharan plains of Tanezrouft and Taoudenni. The river Niger flows northeast to the Guinean border in the southwest, irrigating the
semiarid savannah and forming a fertile inland delta in the central and southern regions. |
