2024-01-05 20:07:58
The explosion which mowed down four Senegalese soldiers on patrol near the border with Gambia on December 14 has awakened bad memories in southern Senegal. Scattered across the region at the height of the conflict between the State of Senegal and the separatist movement of the Democratic Forces of Casamance (MFDC) since 1982, many mines are still found in the border areas, while the villages are deserted. in the early 1990s due to the fighting, gradually saw their inhabitants return.
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In the town of Boutoupa Camaracounda, about thirty kilometers south of Ziguinchor, near the Guinea-Bissau border, the mayor, Ousmane Sanding, has been calling for mine clearance for two years “preventatively” of part of its rural commune of 340 km2. But security is not the city councilor’s main priority. Only two villages, out of the twenty-four in his commune, have access to electricity. “We lack basic infrastructure, water points, schools, health centers, income-generating activities…”lists Ousmane Sanding.
Extremely fertile land
He himself is a former refugee. His family went into exile in Guinea-Bissau in October 1990. At the time, fighting between the Senegalese army and the rebels was raging. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), more than 23,000 Senegalese fled to Guinea-Bissau in 1994. There were only 2,000 left in 2021, thanks to security operations undertaken by the Senegalese army which weakened the rebellion. Several military cantonments are now established in former separatist strongholds.
With around 8,000 inhabitants in 2015, the repopulation of Boutoupa Camaracounda is well underway. Wearing large mud-stained boots, Mamadou Biaye returned from Guinea-Bissau “with nothing in my pocket”, to return to the fields of his native land. Nothing remains of his old house, burned down on February 11, 1991 by the rebels.
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Bilass, his village, has long served as a rear base for one of the MFDC factions. The local land, known to be extremely fertile, is suitable for growing cashew nuts, one of the region’s main export products, making the town a strategic position for the insurgents. “They had also transformed certain fields into Indian hemp crops”whispers a resident, corroborating the statements of the authorities, who accuse the rebels of engaging in timber and cannabis trafficking.
After yet another sweeping operation by the army, Bilass is the 23rd and last village of Boutoupa Camaracounda to be repopulated. Abdou Diamé, the dean, returned there in 2021 with the green light from the military after spending thirty years in Dakar, the Senegalese capital. His large family is still there. Because everything still needs to be rebuilt in the town, starting with the homes.
“One or two bowls of rice”
A few barely visible stakes among the shrubs suggest a makeshift housing development, but very few houses have yet seen the light of day. The fault is the lack of water necessary for construction, explains Cherif Diamé, the village chief. The mini-drilling is broken down and the few wells are emptying despite their great depth while the rainy season has barely ended.
It is therefore towards the well of the military cantonment a few hundred meters distant that the inhabitants turn. “When they ask us, we try to do what we can”confides a soldier. “One or two bowls of rice come to us from the camp when we have nothing left to eat”confesses Abdou Diamé.
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Some residents, installed in shelters built in the center of the village to accommodate them, are only passing through, coming to harvest rice and peanuts, before returning to Guinea-Bissau. “At least there, we can manage to have something to live on”laments Mamadou Biaye.
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