The 2019-2020 Academic Year of the IFIC (Bamako)

The Institute for Islamic-Christian Training (IFIC) continues to carve out a place for itself in West Africa. It has a double mission to achieve. Firstly, to awaken the consciences of the passive believers so that they realise the inescapable role they are called to play in the construction of social peace in Africa and in the world. Secondly, to help break down barriers in religious discourse in order to open the trained to religious pluralism and make them capable of looking at religious difference as a richness so as to be receptive and ready to learn from the other.

Because of the COVID-19 that hit Mali in March 2020, IFIC experienced a three-week delay in its initial programme. Classes resumed on 11 May with a change in the schedule. Courses ended on 20 June and the year-end was 1 July 2020. The students held on until the end. The administration congratulated them on their assiduity and the seriousness with which they approached the training. Several of them received the PISAI diploma at the end of their training. The work of the new Director of Studies, Father Basile Essofa Kondoh, a former PISAI student, who ensured that the courses were very well organised with rigour and method, was considerable.