As if the poverty of the population of Mayotte were not enough, cyclone
Chido has hit those who have nothing harder than hard. Chilling imagesof devastation have reached us. How can we remain indifferent? Let us
remind this government that Mayotte is French territory and that the
island is in the Indian Ocean and not the Pacific, as has been claimed.
---- Mayotte, a department in disrepair? ---- Mayotte, the poorest
department in France. This is a fact that raises questions. How is it
that in a republic, which displays the principle of equality in its
constitution, that one department is the poorest compared to the others.
There is therefore a principle of inequality in fact. The notion of the
poorest department covers much more than a notion of money. A failing
school system, an undersized and outdated health sector, with epidemic
risks, an obsolete water system dependent on droughts, and precarious
electrical energy. 53% of young people are unemployed.
I find no excuse for successive governments, who let this situation
continue. The governments since 1975, the date on which Mayotte was
integrated into the French Republic, there was more than enough time to
act and then nothing, really nothing. And above all the governments knew
what the situation was in this department.
A department is not just an administrative name, it is above all and
before all people.
More promises?
The presidency and a resigning minister travel and spout their share of
ya ka, faut kon, on va, nous vais, j'ai frais des bottles de eau, plus
little revolting phrases of contempt. Moreover, with the outrageous
media coverage, one would have thought it was a miracle-working monarch,
giving lessons. There may be an improvement in living conditions in the
coming weeks, but they will not be satisfactory. I expect a return to a
situation before the cyclone. Which in the eyes of "Paris" will be a
mission accomplished and that's all. We'll talk about it again. For
those at the top, that will be quite enough, you think.
Question of choice
In statist societies, everything is a question of political choice. The
means are there, the money that drives capitalist societies is also
there. Then the decision-makers judge what seems good or not to them to
commit as means. In Mayotte as elsewhere in the world where poverty
persists, if it persists it is only a question of cynical, calculated
choices. Without taking anything away from you or me, we could feed,
clothe, house, care for, educate the entire human population.
Solidarity, mutual aid, self-management
As we have seen, this situation in Mayotte is poorly managed, upstream
and downstream of the cyclone. No lessons will be learned from all this.
Count on the State? Above all, do not count on the rich and the wealthy,
who are very quick to make donations for the reconstruction of a
cathedral, but when it comes to helping the population, their Christian
charity or not, evaporates.
There remains solidarity, mutual aid, self-management. And freeing
ourselves from these incompetent managers of our lives and living
conditions. Once rid of this pseudo-management, of its representatives,
finally the populations will be able to take charge of the management of
their needs, counting on cooperation at the global level to obtain what
they lack, put in place the means that would allow them to live with
dignity and protect themselves from meteorological events.
I suspect that my writings may seem, as they say, "disconnected" and
that it is so easy to comment and make politics, a few thousand
kilometers from where the emergency is located. Nevertheless, the State
is failing. But it seems to me that, as in many cases of disasters,
instead of waiting for help from the State, situations of mutual aid and
self-management must be set up and operate informally at the local
level, in Mayotte and elsewhere in the world. And of course what each
and every one can do to help, even at distances of thousands of km, will
be able to relieve these human sisters and brothers, is welcome.
Frédéric CLERE
Commune de Paris Group
https://monde-libertaire.fr/?articlen=8160
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