| In previous issues of abcBurkina Maurice has commented on some of the topics discussed at the Social Forum in Bamako. I wish to contribute some additional aspects that touched me particularly. In order to get to the venue of the Forum I often boarded a SOTRAMA, a collective taxi cab, where 10 to 15 passengers are crammed together. As I have learnt jula, (a dialect of the Bambara language spoken in Burkina Faso) I was able to discuss with my fellow travellers. Whenever I told them I was French, the question of immigration came up. The Malian soul has suffered deep and lasting wounds by the contempt with which France (its leaders?) has tackled this matter. True, many Malians (and West Africans) want to go and work in France and send money back to their country. True, agriculture in Mali, and many other West African countries, does not provide enough food for its children. Nor do the suburbs around African cities. Production costs are only thinly covered by ”market” prices … Farmers are not correctly rewarded for their labour. Those who have been able to find a job in Europe really do help their country by sending home a good deal of money… When you have nothing left to lose (and possibly everything to win), why no try your luck and take yourself to one of those countries which have already accumulated so much wealth for their own benefit alone? Many discussion groups at the Forum brought forth these queries. Free circulation for capital, goods and services, yes … but definitely not for humans. Everywhere privatisation is forced through, for no other fundamental reason than the wish to privatise short term profits … and possibly dump the burden of longer term investments on the tax payer … Here there was an outcry from the Malians: Why should the railways be privatised, railways built with the blood and sweat of Malian forced labour in colonial times? Why? Several workshops raised these questions, angered by the intense neocolonialisation and the renewed depletion of African natural assets by multinationals. We must resist … We must resist. That was the prime call that arose from many of the workshops in which I took part more directly. Resist GMO seeds if there is no evidence that they are better than conventional seeds, if potential profits are not returned to the farmers and if GMOs are not a prelude to a takeover of seed control by the multinationals, subjecting the agriculture of the world to their own short term interests exclusively. Resist the EPAs (Economic Partnership Agreements proposed by the European Union). In liberalising trade the agreements will leave virtually no chance for exports of food stuffs (all too often held up at the borders for a variety of reasons) or for emerging productions that are yet too frail … Resist the systematic takeover of traditional knowhow, land and water by multinationals more powerful than the nation-states, acting in the sole interest of short term gains and capable of destabilising entire countries, ruining their populations and leading countless human beings into misery. But then, there are also all those who by their daily toil, close to the bare grass roots, work to restore human dignity to all the men, women and children horrendously abused by the violence of our world. There is ATD Quart Monde, Catholic Relief , associations fighting child trafficking, violence against women … Many at the Forum came to discover that they are not alone in their struggle and together they revived their hope for a different world, a better world ... David against Goliath? But do not forget the end of the story: It was David who won, wasn’t it?
Jacques Lacour
Koudougou
| 
View from the South