Will Mali hold once the French leave?

The ongoing strife in Mali should definitely act as a litmus test to the rest of Africa when it comes to defending a nation’s sovereignty: Are we capable of copping by ourselves?The stakes have been pushed high in Mali, not because it could not hold its own when attacked by a band of well-armed desert nomads, but because it threw out a democratically elected government and put the fate of the country in the hands of foreigners, including its former colonial master; France.