flag of Mali

Like other formerly French-controlled territories in West Africa, Mali chose for its national flag the popular colours green, yellow, and red, which later came to be known as the “pan-African colours.” The African Democratic Rally, a coalition of African delegates founded after World War II, had utilized those as its party colours. They were also characteristic of the national flags of Ethiopia, Ghana, and Guinea, which (together with Liberia) were the oldest of the independent non-Arab African states.

In 1959 Mali linked its fortunes with Senegal in the Mali Federation. Its constitution, adopted in January 1959, stated that the flag of the federation and its member states was to have equal vertical stripes of green-yellow-red with a black stylized human figure in the centre, his arms raised toward heaven. This symbol, known as the kanaga, originated with the Dogon people of Mali and was given modern meaning by the Negritude movement of West African and Caribbean intellectuals. In 1960, when Senegal and Mali split into separate countries, Muslim fundamentalists in Mali objected to the human figure as being contrary to the precepts of Islam. Therefore, as of March 1, 1961, the emblem was dropped from the flag, and the plain tricolour represented the nation.