The inescapable demands of modernity ? The voice of the educated
To come out of the tunnel to see and be seen.
Sidalamin
Originally from the Adrar (Adagh), Sidalamin was educated in Mali. He is about 30 years old. This text was collected in French by Hawad in Burkina Faso, 1995.
No struggle is undertaken uselessly
We were a revolutionary people at first which then turned in upon itself. And now, extraordinarily, in a short space of time, it's like a shell opening, but violently ; the shell is exploding. That is why I don't condemn anybody. I observe & I see that all those who struggle, even if they make errors, advance the cause. I have family & friends on the battle fronts ; I see their rather mean way of running things, of seeing the future, of constructing, but I think that having several fronts in parallel is also a way of fighting for the cause. All that, it must move forward and one day, it will all fall into place & will form an extraordinary society that has been through all the stages of the struggle.
I think that all the present enemies of the cause are fighting for it without realising. Those from outside & even those they use inside are fighting for the cause. Because even very recently people didn't think about certain things. But when there are setbacks, traitors, then people ask themselves certain questions. So that they should know that it is not just survival that is at stake, but huge vested interests that the society must fight ... And this anarchy becomes useful because if there was just one current, a solution would already have been found to destroy us.
I don't think that any struggle is undertaken uselessly. There are consequences in the long, medium & short term. I know that unfortunately the horizon is dark, almost blocked, but I think that when a people, in all its generations, has a new thought, it is like it is coming out of a tunnel ... When one comes out into the daylight one is seen & one sees.
Adapt to the present times
To resist the Touareg turned in upon themselves ... I think that today, the strength that our people must seek inside itself is to refuse to continue its hibernation. There must be a waking up because times have changed and the world will soon be a big planetary village : this nation must evolve so that it not be the animal to kill in this big village.
It must find in itself the strength to adapt to the times we are living in & to the philosophy of these times.
This type of adaptation, is to make sure that the people can take care of itself, produce itself, feed itself, so that it become self-sufficient : for that the mentalities adopted at one time as strategies need to evolve greatly. That time is past. Now to adapt, one needs to have a more aggressive philosophy in every way, provoke & attract the spotlights of humanity upon one, so that it is known that there are people who have suffered, who are suffering & who will suffer still for twenty or thirty years and who have the right one day to have their scars cared for.
To see & be seen by new eyes
The outside world must look at us anew & ask questions. Why did this solution not work ? Why did, despite the means at it's disposal, that policy fail ? It didn't fail for nothing. It was either because the policy was not the right one or because it encountered a political body too resistant to take the graft.
We must accept to see the world with new eyes & the world also must look at us differently. Even the anthropologists, the sociologists, the geographers, the most famous historians, those who have a huge suitcase of diplomas, can't see further than the image of the Touareg as robbers & slave drivers, the Touareg is the bad man by definition. They must learn to see in us a civilised people who were slave drivers at a point in their history : the Touareg were because the Blacks who are complaining now participated in slave driving & the Arabs their neighbours were slave drivers : the Touareg were slave drivers on a scale infinitely inferior to the Blacks, the Arabs & the Europeans.
Difference is a richness
I believe that every society has a project. Touareg society, despite the problems that is confronted by, has not completely failed like other societies. If you look at your immediate neighbours, 90 per cent are just copying the West.
As for Touareg society, it's ancient project of society has not failed. But I believe it needs to have some corrections made to it.
It is a human model, which gives the right to every man to have dignity, to live freely ... the Touareg have always lived alongside other peoples, other societies, and despite the strength they had at the time, they never sought to say to people 'Hey you, your culture is inferior, you must adopt ours ..."
It is a society which thinks that everything that is on this earth has a use, from the infinitely big to the infinitely small, all have a role to play in this universe. That is its strength, it's a Touareg way of thinking. They think that difference is a richness & not a handicap.
When somebody pretends to ignore you or tries to look at you through a deforming lens, you must break the lens or give him a slap so that he looks at you & says 'But look, there's somebody there'. So for me the world should have a new vision of this society. What is strange is that even the 'intellectuals' of Africa have not understood this society. The doctors, the academics think worse than the villagers. The Bambara villagers are more capable of understanding this society than the intellectuals. Our intellectuals, instead of throwing light & helping people to think clearer, put them in darkness & hatred. They feed the animal & ignoble side of man.
A bridge between north & south
Something extraordinary struck me .... People who have all the useful intellectual baggage like the bureaucrats of Mali, Niger, Africa don't understand that a bridge is needed between black Africa & North Africa. And that bridge can only be Touareg ; it is he alone who feels as much at ease in the South as in the North. I don't believe that by wiping him out one will resolve the problem. Because the problem is one of frontiers & it's not only the Touareg that it harms : it harms even the Blacks : the Songhay of Gao have their cousins in Say : the Djoula of Sikasso have their cousins in Ferkedessougou in the Ivory Coast : the Baoulé have their cousins in Ghana. I think that sooner or later Africa will understand that the creation of frontiers was a diabolical thing and that they were made at a time when France was blinded by its ignorance & its desire for invasion & colonisation. There must now be an African integration, so frontiers must disappear and to the great unit of the south opposite the great unit to the north there must, in the centre, be the great Sahara. This great space which is only habitable for those who live there must not be an emptiness or a frontier but a bridge, a link.