@ -4815,14 +4815,14 @@ A French officer, participating in the capture of Sikasso (Mali) in 1898, descri
Then, on the way! Each European received a woman of his choice...
We did the 40-kilometer stages with these captives. Children and all those who are tired are killed with butts and bayonets...}
\enquote{The corpses were left by the side of the roads... In these same stages, the men requisitioned on their way to carry the millet remained five days without rations; receive 50 rope blows if they take a handful of the millet they carry.} (155).
\enquote{The corpses were left by the side of the roads... In these same stages, the men requisitioned on their way to carry the millet remained five days without rations; receive 50 rope blows if they take a handful of the millet they carry.}\footnote{Quoted by P. Vigné d’Octon, \emph{La gloire du sabre} (The glory of saber), Paris, Flammarion, 1900, p.131 and following (Notes from a witness to the capture of Sikasso).}.
\end{quote}
Another author explains: \enquote{The scenes that accompanied, last year, the capture of Sikasso, were only the reproduction of those that had followed the sack of Ségou, Nioro, and all the villages conquered by our weapons ...
It is by the hundreds, by the thousands, that our incessant columns thus increase the number of slaves...} (156).
It is by the hundreds, by the thousands, that our incessant columns thus increase the number of slaves...}\footnote{Jean Rodes, A look at Sudan, \emph{La revue Blanche} (The White review), November 1st 1899.}.
When, in the session of the Chamber of Deputies of 30 November 1900, Vigne d'Octon denounced the horrors of the conquest of Sudan, Le Myre de Vilers, a good-natured colonial, replied:
\enquote{Our honourable colleague is attacking enforcement agents; I blame governments; they cannot ignore that by sending troops several thousand kilometers from their base of operations, without means of transport, without food, without exchange goods, the troops are forced to live on the inhabitant, to requisition countless carriers, who sow the paths of their corpses...} (157).
\enquote{Our honourable colleague is attacking enforcement agents; I blame governments; they cannot ignore that by sending troops several thousand kilometers from their base of operations, without means of transport, without food, without exchange goods, the troops are forced to live on the inhabitant, to requisition countless carriers, who sow the paths of their corpses...}\footnote{Chamber of Deputies, sitting of 30 November 1900 (Annales de la Chambre des Députés, 1900, p. 580).}.
The African wars of the nineteenth century were limited in their effects by the mediocrity of armament; they devastated only certain regions.
On the contrary, the wars of colonial conquest raged everywhere, not sparing the \enquote{friendly} villages, removed from destruction but ruined almost as much by the requisitions of grain, cattle, carriers.
@ -4838,11 +4838,11 @@ We will cite here only one example: on the night of January 8 to 9, 1899, reconn
\enquote{Patrols must approach the villages, seize them with knives, kill everything that resists, take the inhabitants into captivity, seize the herds.
On the morning of the 9th the reconnaissance returned to the camp with 250 oxen, 500 sheep, 28 horses, 80 prisoners. A few riflemen were wounded.
In order to \enquote{make an example}, Captain Voulet had twenty women mothers, with young children and udders, taken and had them killed with spears, a few hundred meters from the camp.
The bodies were later found by the commander of say's post}(158).
The bodies were later found by the commander of say's post}\footnote{P. Vigné d’Octon, \emph{op. cit.}, pp. 40-41.}.
\end{quote}
In another village, carriers having been drafted, all the able-bodied men took refuge in the bush. \enquote{The old men, the women, the children alone remained.
They were taken out and, after having them placed on a row, salvo fires shot them down to the last.} (159) There were 111 bodies as a result of this \enquote{incident} alone.
They were taken out and, after having them placed on a row, salvo fires shot them down to the last.}\footnote{Testimony of Sergeant Toureau, dans P. Vigné d’Octon, \emph{op. cit.}, pp. 142-143.} There were 111 bodies as a result of this \enquote{incident} alone.
Concerned, less about the procedures used and revealed by the press, than about the delay in the mission's planned schedule, the Sudanese authorities sent Lieutenant-Colonel Klobb and Lieutenant Meynier in search of the mission to regain control.
Fifty years later, Meynier, now a general, describes the traces of the mission as follows:
@ -4856,20 +4856,13 @@ It was, around the large village of Tibery, the corpses of dozens of women hange
Or, at the crossroads of two tracks, we discovered the corpse of some guide, suspected of having wanted to mislead the mission.
The most painful impression was caused by the meeting of two corpses of girls (nine and ten years old) hanging from a large tree branch on the edge of the small village of Koran-Kalgo.}\rfootnote{Not terminated}
\enquote{... In the villages encountered, the wells are almost everywhere filled or polluted by piles of corpses that are difficult to distinguish whether they are animals or humans.}(160).
\enquote{... In the villages encountered, the wells are almost everywhere filled or polluted by piles of corpses that are difficult to distinguish whether they are animals or humans.}\footnote{General Meynier, \emph{La Mission Joalland-Meynier}, Paris, Éditions de l'Empire français, 1947, pp. 39-40.}.
\end{quote}
When the two officers join Voulet and Chanoine, the latter, furious at being dispossessed of \enquote{their} mission, shoot at them: Klobb is killed, Meynier wounded.
But when Voulet and Chanoine inform the riflemen that they will create with them an independent Empire on the scene of their conquests, and that they will not return home with their loot, they mutiny, Voulet and Chanoine are killed.
The \enquote{incident} will be attributed to a crisis of madness, and vigilant censorship will ensure for half a century that there is no more talk about this unfortunate case.
155 Quoted by P. Vigné d’Octon, \emph{La gloire du sabre}(The glory of saber), Paris, Flammarion, 1900, p.131 and following (Notes from a witness to the capture of Sikasso).
156 Jean Rodes, A look at Sudan, \emph{La revue Blanche} (The White review), 1er novembre 1899.
157 Chamber of Deputies, sitting of 30 November 1900 (Annales de la Chambre des Députés, 1900, p. 580).
158 P. Vigné d’Octon, op. cit., pp. 40-41.
159 Testimony of Sergeant Toureau, dans P. Vigné d’Octon, op. cit., pp. 142-143.
160 General Meynier, \emph{La Mission Joalland-Meynier}, Paris, Éditions de l'Empire français, 1947, pp. 39-40.
\section{The colonial system}
What does the African colonial system look like when it stabilizes at the beginning of the twentieth century, and as it will continue until the fifties of this century?
@ -4884,7 +4877,7 @@ The colonized are French \enquote{subjects} , but not citizens; they do not vote
Local decrees regulate the status of these \enquote{subjects} known as \enquote{indigenate}
The European local administration can, by these texts, impose on the subjects by simple administrative decision, without judgment, for reasons as varied as \enquote{negligence in the payment of tax}, \enquote{disobedience to village or canton chiefs}, \enquote{unfounded} complaints, or \enquote{infringement of the respect due to the French authority}, prison sentences and fines.
Governors and Governors General may impose deportation sentences.
The governor of Ivory Coast, Angoulvant, in 1916, regretted that the death penalty was not provided for, but observed that in view of the statistics, deportation led to the same results (161).
The governor of Ivory Coast, Angoulvant, in 1916, regretted that the death penalty was not provided for, but observed that in view of the statistics, deportation led to the same results\footnote{G. Angoulvant, \emph{La pacification de la Côte d'Ivoire} (The pacification of Ivory Coast), Paris, Larose, 1916.}.
Indeed, the sending of deportees from forest regions to Port Étienne, Mauritania, in the middle of the Sahara leaves them only a reduced life expectancy, and the \enquote{notables} affected by this measure are advised to make their will before departure.
The \enquote{attack on the respect due to French authority} is, for example, on the part of an indigenous, forgetting to uncover himself or to make the military salute at the passage of a white leader (and all whites are, more or less, leaders).
@ -4900,13 +4893,13 @@ Subjects are subjected to forced labour: in principle, a few days of \enquote{pr
But, in case of necessity, the planned number of days is unscrupulously exceeded, and in some cases, the \enquote{required} are sent, for months, hundreds of kilometers away.
Forced labour provides for the construction and maintenance of administrative buildings, tracks and roads, railways.
From 1921 to 1934, the construction of the Congo-Ocean railway, from Pointe Noire to Brazzaville, led to a real massacre, denounced in its time by the journalist Albert Londres (162).
From 1921 to 1934, the construction of the Congo-Ocean railway, from Pointe Noire to Brazzaville, led to a real massacre, denounced in its time by the journalist Albert Londres\footnote{Albert Londres, \emph{Terre d'ébène} (Ebony earth), Paris, Albin Michel, 1929.}.
The local requirements were not enough, so workers of 3,000 kilometers or more were brought in from Oubangui-Chari (now central African Republic) and Chad, part on foot, part by the waterway of the Oubangui and Congo.
The exhaustion of the journey, the epidemics following the crowding on the barges almost without food and in unimaginable hygienic conditions, the passage, for these populations from the savannahs to a humid climate and a different diet, make the required die like flies.
The survivors must work under the foremen's chicote to drill the rock with shovels and mine bars.
In 1929, Albert Londres estimated the number of dead (while there were still 300 kilometers to be built) at 17,000.
He notes, however, an \enquote{improvement}, since, according to official statistics, mortality, from 45.20\% in 1927, fell to 17.34\% in 1929! (163)
He notes, however, an \enquote{improvement}, since, according to official statistics, mortality, from 45.20\% in 1927, fell to 17.34\% in 1929!\footnote{R. Susset, \emph{La vérité sur le Cameroun et l'A.E.F.} (The truth about Cameroon and A.E.F, Paris, Éd. de la Nouvelle revue critique, 1934.}
Another major project responsible for massacres: the Office du Niger.
In its central part, in present-day Mali, Niger slows down its course and spreads out in multiple arms and lakes: it is the central Niger Delta.
@ -4930,12 +4923,12 @@ This is the case of Oubangui-Chari (now Central African Republic) and Chad for c
In cotton areas, each taxpayer is obliged to cultivate a parcel of cotton, of a specific size, and to deliver the products to \enquote{concession companies} that have been given a monopoly on the purchase and processing of cotton.
Under the supervision of the administration and the agents of the companies, and under penalty of sanctions, the peasant must, when the time comes, deliver to the \enquote{buyers} of the company the required cotton.
The price set is ridiculous. It allows, at most, to pay the tax (164).
The price set is ridiculous. It allows, at most, to pay the tax\footnote{See Jean Cabot, \emph{La culture du coton au Tchad} (Cotton cultivation in Chad), Annales de géographie, 1957, pp. 499-508.}.
But this regime is nothing compared to the one to which these same populations were subjected at the beginning of the century.
The \enquote{French Congo}, which in 1910 became French Equatorial Africa, was almost entirely shared between 40 \enquote{concession companies} in 1899.
The latter have a monopoly on the exploitation of local resources on their territory and, de facto, on trade.(165)
The latter have a monopoly on the exploitation of local resources on their territory and, de facto, on trade.\footnote{G. Coquery-Vidrovitch, \emph{Le Congo au temps des grandes compagnies concessionaires (1898-1930)} (The Congo at the time of the big concession companies (1898-1930)), Paris-La Haye, Mouton, 1972.}
They will make almost no investment and many will quickly go bankrupt, after having plucked a few suckers on the stock market.
Those in employment exploit picking rubber, with forced labour paid only as \enquote{harvesting work}, with the companies arguing that the harvested rubber, produced from the soil, belongs to them under their concession.
@ -4954,14 +4947,7 @@ The missionary explains that, in the first two years, the populations were able
But, little by little, resources are running out. The \enquote{harvesters} have to work further and further away from their villages, as rubber vines become scarce near the villages.
\enquote{Towards the end of the month, they were given two or three days to go to the village to refuel, but most of the time, they came back empty-handed, the plantations were no longer renewed...
The sick and small children (who remained in the village) died of starvation. I visited several times a region where the least sick finished the most affected to eat them; I saw open graves where the corpses had been removed for food.
Skeletal children searched piles of rubbish for ants and other insects they ate raw. Skulls, shins, dragged around the villages.} (166)
161 G. Angoulvant, \emph{La pacification de la Côte d'Ivoire}(The pacification of Ivory Coast), Paris, Larose, 1916.
162 Albert Londres, \emph{Terre d'ébène}(Ebony earth), Paris, Albin Michel, 1929.
163 R. Susset, \emph{La vérité sur le Cameroun et l'A. E.F.}(The truth about Cameroon and A.E.F, Paris, Éd. de la Nouvelle revue critique, 1934.
164 See Jean Cabot, \emph{La culture du coton au Tchad}(Cotton cultivation in Chad), Annales de géographie, 1957, pp. 499-508.
165 G. Coquery-Vidrovitch, \emph{Le Congo au temps des grandes compagnies concessionaires (1898-1930)}(The Congo at the time of the big concession companies (1898-1930)), Paris-La Haye, Mouton, 1972.
166 R. P. Daigre, \emph{Oubangui-Chari, témoignage sur son évolution (1900-1940)}(Oubangui-Chari, testimony on its evolution (1900-1940), Issoudun, Dillen et Cie, 1947, pp. 113-116.
Skeletal children searched piles of rubbish for ants and other insects they ate raw. Skulls, shins, dragged around the villages.}\footnote{R. P. Daigre, \emph{Oubangui-Chari, témoignage sur son évolution (1900-1940)} (Oubangui-Chari, testimony on its evolution (1900-1940), Issoudun, Dillen et Cie, 1947, pp. 113-116.}
\section{The exercise of \enquote{French authority}}
@ -4976,7 +4962,7 @@ To carry out these tasks, the administrator needs indigenous auxiliaries; it is
These leaders sometimes come from the old pre-colonial dynasties; sometimes it is a parvenu, a former gunman, sometimes even a former boy or cook of a governor whom he wanted to reward.
The head of the canton, let alone the village chiefs who are subordinate to him, enjoys no legitimacy, no stability:
\enquote{The head of the canton}, writes Governor-General Van Vollenhoven in a circular, \enquote{even if he is the descendant of the king with whom we have dealt, has no power of his own; appointed by us, after a choice in principle discretionary, it is only our instrument.} (167).
\enquote{The head of the canton}, writes Governor-General Van Vollenhoven in a circular, \enquote{even if he is the descendant of the king with whom we have dealt, has no power of his own; appointed by us, after a choice in principle discretionary, it is only our instrument.}\footnote{Quoted by R. Cornevin, \emph{L’évolution des chefferies dans l’Afrique noire d’expression française} (The Evolution of Chiefdoms in French-Speaking Black Africa), Recueil Penant, n° 687, juin-août 1961, p. 380.}.
At any time, if he does not fulfill his obligations in the desired way, the leader can be dismissed, imprisoned.
@ -4990,7 +4976,7 @@ To collect the tax — and to meet the other obligations that we will see — th
To the administrator and ethnologist Gilbert Vieillard, who reproached his \enquote{notables} for surrounding themselves with \enquote{frank scoundrels}, they replied:
\enquote{Do you want, yes or no, that we collect the tax, that we provide chores and conscripts? We will not achieve this through gentleness and persuasion:
if people are not afraid of being tied up and beaten, they are laughing at us.} (168).
if people are not afraid of being tied up and beaten, they are laughing at us.}\footnote{Gilbert Vieillard, \emph{Notes sur les Peuls du Fouta-Djalon}(Notes on the Peuls of Fouta-Djalon), Bulletin de l'Institut français d'Afrique noire, Dakar, n° 1, p. 171.}.
Here we see mention of the other two obligations that are those of the chief:
provide recruits for forced labour; and, since the war of 1914-1918, for conscription (quota fixed for each canton, military service of three years).
@ -5009,11 +4995,7 @@ This is evidenced by this mention in the file of a European official: \enquote{F
In the bush, when the wife of a white man is dissatisfied with his boy or his cook, whether he has broken the teapot or spoiled the sauce, she sends him to the \enquote{office} (of the circle commander) with a note indicating the number of chicote shots to be administered by the guards.
Still in 1944, the socialist Albert Gazier, a member of the Provisional Consultative Assembly of Algiers, having toured our Colonies in Africa, asked about forty Europeans the following question:
\enquote{Sir (or Madam), do you ever beat your boy?} And he notes, \enquote{I didn't get any negative answers.} (169)
167 Quoted by R. Cornevin, \emph{L’évolution des chefferies dans l’Afrique noire d’expression française}(The Evolution of Chiefdoms in French-Speaking Black Africa), Recueil Penant, n° 687, juin-août 1961, p. 380.
168 Gilbert Vieillard, \emph{Notes sur les Peuls du Fouta-Djalon}(Notes on the Peuls of Fouta-Djalon), Bulletin de l'Institut français d'Afrique noire, Dakar, n° 1, p. 171.
169 Testimony during the Colloquium of the Institute of History of the Present Time, published in 1986 by Éditions du CNRS, under the title \emph{Les chemins de la décolonisation de l’Empire français (1936-1956)}(The paths of the decolonization of the French Empire (1936-1956)).
\enquote{Sir (or Madam), do you ever beat your boy?} And he notes, \enquote{I didn't get any negative answers.}\footnote{Testimony during the Colloquium of the Institute of History of the Present Time, published in 1986 by Éditions du CNRS, under the title \emph{Les chemins de la décolonisation de l’Empire français (1936-1956)} (The paths of the decolonization of the French Empire (1936-1956)).}
\section{From colonial legend to reality}
@ -5056,7 +5038,7 @@ The director of the health services of Cameroon could write, in 1945:
\begin{quote}
\enquote{Diseases, although they play a very important role in the decay of indigenous populations, are not the only ones responsible, and other causes that facilitate their devastation and whose importance is great but which escape the action of the health service, must be rightly incriminated:
undernourishment and the almost general lack of nitrogenous foods, an inconsiderate economic policy that, in some regions, has pushed for the development of rich (export, Editor's note) crops to the detriment of food crops, the imbalance that exists between the earnings of the natives and the prices of the most essential items.} (170).
undernourishment and the almost general lack of nitrogenous foods, an inconsiderate economic policy that, in some regions, has pushed for the development of rich (export, Editor's note) crops to the detriment of food crops, the imbalance that exists between the earnings of the natives and the prices of the most essential items.}\footnote{Médecin-Colonel Farinaud: Medical report 1945. Cité in Afrique noire: l'ère coloniale, op. cit. Cit. p. 493.}.
\end{quote}
As a result, mortality rates, especially infant mortality, are very high.
@ -5082,12 +5064,9 @@ The liberation of slaves was commonly applied, toward rebellious or reluctant po
But where the support of the traditional ruling classes was deemed politically necessary, such as in Fouta-Djalon (Guinea) or in the Sahelian Saharo regions, slavery remained intact, and the administration endorsed (or covered up) the practice of the \enquote{resale right} (search, capture and return to their masters of fugitive slaves).
In Guinea, the first census by sampling carried out by the I.N.S.E.E. in 1954-1955, listed separately, in Fouta-Djalon, the \enquote{captives}.
In Mauritania, the persistence of slavery, with administrative support, was denounced in 1929 by the Dahomean teacher Louis Hunkanrin, who was sentenced to ten years of deportation to Mauritania.
He denounced the practice in a pamphlet, the text of which he managed to send in France, and which was published by a local section of the League of Human Rights (171).
He denounced the practice in a pamphlet, the text of which he managed to send in France, and which was published by a local section of the League of Human Rights\footnote{J. Suret-Canale, Un pionnier méconnu du mouvement démocratique en Afrique: Louis Hunkanrin, \emph{Études dahoméennes, nouvelle série, no 3} (Dahomean studies, new series n°3), Porto Novo, December 1964, pp. 5-30.}.
This situation was perpetuated after independence and it is known that, most recently, Mauritanian human rights activists, for denouncing this survival, were arrested, imprisoned and convicted.
170 Médecin-Colonel Farinaud: Medical report 1945. Cité in Afrique noire: l'ère coloniale, op. cit. Cit. p. 493.
171 J. Suret-Canale, Un pionnier méconnu du mouvement démocratique en Afrique: Louis Hunkanrin, \emph{Études dahoméennes, nouvelle série, no 3}(Dahomean studies, new series n°3), Porto Novo, December 1964, pp. 5-30.
\section{Demographic data}
The slave trade, from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century, had already demographically weakened Africa.
@ -5096,16 +5075,16 @@ The fighting, then the excesses of the carrying and requisitions of men, food, l
They leave populations weakened, more susceptible to epidemics and other accidents — droughts for example.
\begin{quote}
\enquote{The slightest accident — exceptional drought, invasion of locusts — was dramatized by the simultaneous colonial withdrawal of food and work, without the administration having provided the means for the necessary intervention.} (172)
\enquote{The slightest accident — exceptional drought, invasion of locusts — was dramatized by the simultaneous colonial withdrawal of food and work, without the administration having provided the means for the necessary intervention.}\footnote{C. Coquery-Vidrovitch, \emph{Afrique noire, permanences et ruptures} (Black Africa, permanences and ruptures), Paris, Payot, 1985, p. 52.}
\end{quote}
It was the period 1880-1920 that was the period of the largest demographic decline, moreover impossible to quantify given the mediocrity of statistical information.
In Dahomey (now Benin), one of the most densely populated and relatively peaceful colonies, there was a decline of 9\% between 1900 and 1920 (173).
The decline was certainly more noticeable in regions with more limited resources and hit by massive requisitions of men, livestock and food with regard to their resources such as Niger (174) or Mauritania.
In Dahomey (now Benin), one of the most densely populated and relatively peaceful colonies, there was a decline of 9\% between 1900 and 1920\footnote{\emph{Ibid.}, p. 57.}.
The decline was certainly more noticeable in regions with more limited resources and hit by massive requisitions of men, livestock and food with regard to their resources such as Niger\footnote{See Idrissa Kimba, \emph{La Formation de la colonie du Niger 1880-1920} (The Formation of the Colony of Niger 1880-1920). State thesis, University of Paris VII, 1983.} or Mauritania.
Already depopulated, the regions of the A.E.F. ravaged by the abuses of the concession system (Central African Republic) or by the exploitation of wood
(Gabon: adult men \enquote{drafted} by two-year contracts to work on the forest sites; villages — where only women, children, and the elderly remain, \enquote{taxed} in cassava to feed the construction sites)
the fall was even more massive (from 30 to 50\%) (175).
the fall was even more massive (from 30 to 50\%)\footnote{C. Coquery-Vidrovitch, \emph{op. cit.}, p. 56.}.
In the Sudano-Sahelian regions, the great droughts of 1913-1914, 1930-1933, the consequences of which were aggravated by the political-economic context (war of 1914-1918, crisis and depression of the 30s) and finally the drought of 1972 and following, led to famine and famine.
@ -5113,11 +5092,6 @@ It was not until the 30s that the first effects of mass medicine were felt.
The Africa of independence has gone from demographic regression to explosion, but the consequences of an economic regime inherited from colonization have maintained to this day misery and undernourishment, aggravated by internal conflicts.
But that's another story.
172 C. Coquery-Vidrovitch, \emph{Afrique noire, permanences et ruptures}(Black Africa, permanences and ruptures), Paris, Payot, 1985, p. 52.
173 Ibid., p. 57.
174 See Idrissa Kimba, \emph{La Formation de la colonie du Niger 1880-1920}(The Formation of the Colony of Niger 1880-1920). State thesis, University of Paris VII, 1983.
175 C. Coquery-Vidrovitch, op. cit., p. 56.
\rauthor{Jean Suret-Canale}
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