Maba Diakhou Bâ

Maba Diakhou Bâ (also Ma Ba Diakhu, Ma Ba Diakho Ba, Ma Ba Jaaxu, Màbba Jaxu Ba) (born 1809 at Tavacaltou - July 1867) was a marabout from Rip, and a disciple of the Tijaniyya Sufi brotherhood. He became leader (Almamy) of Saloum.

A descendant of the Fulani dynasty of Dényankobé, from the branch of the Bâ family in the region of Badibou, Maba Diakhou Bâ combined political and religious goals in an attempt to reform or overthrow previous animist monarchies, and resist French encroachment. He is in a tradition of Fulani jihad leaders who revolutionized the states of West Africa at the time of colonialism.

Maba Diakhou Bâ founded the city of Nioro in Rip, and the village of Keur Maba Diakhou near Kaolack is named for him.

Maba Diakhou Bâ mounted a fierce resistance to the French colonial invasions of Senegal. Under governor Faidherbe French forces had carried out a scorched earth policy against resistance to their expansion in the Senegambia, with villages razed and populations removed after each victory. Throughout the founding of an Islamic state, Maba Diakhou Bâ tried to unify the area north of the Gambia, while leading a war of conversion against the traditional states.

After meeting Oumar Tall around 1850, Maba Diakhou Bâ launched his jihad into Serer territory from his small state of Rip in 1861. While he eventually succeeded in overtaking the dynasty of Saloum, his movement never succeeded in Sine, and much of Serer territory remained animist or Christian into the 20th century. That said, there is much to suggest that Sine resistance was as much nationalist as religious, with Muslims and animists fighting on both sides of these struggles.

On 30 November 1865, with the help of Lat Dior and his Cayor forces, Maba Diakhou Bâ began the conquest of the states of Sine, Baol and Djolof.

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