The West African nation of Mali has recorded its first coronavirus death on Saturday, March 28th, 2020, a day before it votes in a long-delayed parliamentary election.

The election has been under threat by both coronavirus pandemic and security issues.

The abduction of the leader of the country’s main opposition party earlier this week has also cast a shadow over the election, with a security source saying he was “likely” under detention by a jihadist group.

various opposition parties on Saturday, March 28th, 2020, called for the election to be postponed, owing to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, of which eighteen (18) people have tested positive, since the country confirmed its first case on Wednesday, Manday, March 25th, 2020.

The Health Minister of Mali, Michel Sidibe, said in the late hours of Saturday, just a few hours before polls opened the following day, that the patient who had tested positive for the deadly disease had died earlier in the day.

he said,

We have a death today, because the virus was in his lungs.

Although Mali so far has relatively few cases of coronavirus in comparison to other countries, the impoverished nation of some 19 million people, where large swathes of territory are not under state control, is the kind of place medical experts fear is particularly vulnerable to widespread disease outbreak.

Justin Nwosu

Justin Nwosu is the founder and publisher of Flavision. His core interest is in writing unbiased news about Nigeria in particular and Africa in general. He’s a strong adherent of investigative journalism, with a bent on exposing corruption, abuse of power and societal ills.