The Mali coup is one of those opaque events that are really hard to figure out.  Observers try, and they have to produce something (for their blogs, or their employers) … but in their hearts they know they really have no idea, and also that there is a circle of people who actually do know, but there is no real way to verify what they know because at this stage they presumably are in full lying mode as they jockey for power (or even their lives).  So…. tough position to be in, I sympathize (and see how I get to blog about the coup without knowing anything at all!).

Mann’s analysis raises a question I’ve pondered since we got our first glimpse of Mali’s coup plotters on Malian state television, early in the morning of March 22: What are these guys after? While I cannot take the putschists’ justifications of their actions at face value, I also cannot say what their motivations are. Did these junior army officers set out deliberately to derail Mali’s democratic process and seize power for themselves? I doubt it. More likely, they simply filled a void that opened up before them, without either adequately preparing for or fully considering the consequences of their actions. Here’s why I think this is the case.

via Bridges from Bamako | life in a budding West African metropolis.