Mohamed Ali Ansar

MOHAMED ALI ANSAR, the Co-Director of Timbuktu Renaissance Association, started his presentation by showing a short film of 6 minutes that gave more information about the situation of where he is from. Ansar indicated that it is hot but he told that they still have hope and all these goals are very fitting to what they need. However, he indicated that he is surprised to not see a goal about culture.

MOHAMED ALI ANSAR, the Co-Director of Timbuktu Renaissance Association, started his presentation by showing a short film of 6 minutes that gave more information about the situation of where he is from. Ansar indicated that it is hot but he told that they still have hope and all these goals are very fitting to what they need. However, he indicated that he is surprised to not see a goal about culture.

Ansar stressed that the culture generates income to people, and it is a way to maintain peace. He told about the one part of the Mali society who is called the Giyru, and said that they have a very important social role in peacekeeping. When there is a problem between two tribes in the desert or two villages or between two groups, Ansar indicated that they come and fix the relationship between the two and make peace. According to him, this is only the social way of the culture. He underlined that, with culture we can maintain peace, and without peace there is no development. It is for this reason said Ansar, that it is important for us to include culture.

Ansar also mentioned that it is a priority for Mali to develop their tourism sector. However, he also stressed that today this mission is very hard as it is not easy to attract tourists to Mali because of security reasons. But with the international support and help, Ansar indicated that they hope to overcome this, to have peace back in Mali. He underlined that these are the same kind of problems that most of the African countries are going through. Ansar said that the development is Mali`s dream, but before having development, he underlined that Mali should have security. He said “We should be able to stay where we are and to be able to do our farming, to do our music, to do our handcrafts. The first priority is peace. Because if you speak about these goals to someone in Timbuktu today, he will say “I want my wife to be able to go to the market and come back home safe.”