December 16, 2024 editorial of the New Anticapitalist Party-Revolutionaries (NPA-R) in France, translated from French
On December 14, Mayotte (an island in the Indian Ocean that is a colony of France) was hit by cyclone Chido, and the situation of the population is critical. It highlights the island’s difficulties and, in particular, the negligence of the French state. New Prime Minister François Bayrou dispatched the former Minister for Overseas Territories and, above all, [French Interior Minister] Bruno Retailleau, Darmanin’s successor, who is even worse than his predecessor, who has left a very bad impression on Mayotte with the hunt for the poor and migrants of Operation Wuambushu he led in April 2023.
Considerable damage…
The cyclone ravaged the whole of northern Mayotte, with wind gusts of over 130 mph (220 km/h). The port of Mamoudzou was destroyed, the airport severely damaged, and so was the hospital. Entire districts were wiped off the map. The human toll is still difficult to assess: 14 deaths have been officially recorded to date, but the prefect fears that thousands may in fact be buried under the rubble. The number of residents who have lost everything is much higher. An estimated 100,000 people are homeless, almost a third of the archipelago’s population.
Against a backdrop of widespread extreme poverty…
Damage to infrastructure has made access to electricity, telephone services and running water even more difficult than usual, complicating the work of the emergency services. What’s more, roads, already inadequately maintained, have been rendered impassable by the many trees uprooted by the wind.
The poorest neighborhoods are on the front line. Shanty towns account for a third of all housing in Mayotte; built of sheet metal, they have been swept away. Undocumented migrants were even harder hit. Many of them did not seek shelter in accommodation centers, for fear of being arrested. Hospitals, already in poor condition, have been damaged and flooded, and are now unable to receive and treat all the injured.
Natural disasters are becoming increasingly frequent due to the ravages of capitalism on the climate, as the recent floods in Valencia, Spain, reminded us. But Hurricane Chido has more in common with disasters in Pakistan in 2022 or Libya in 2023: poverty and underdevelopment make these populations even more vulnerable than those in rich countries.
… and the responsibility of the French government
The French government initially reacted by announcing the presence of 1,600 police officers on the island, clearly less concerned about the problems of the population than about the “looting,” before adjusting the tone of its public relations by highlighting the dispatch of civil security, firefighters and the establishment of an air bridge between France and Mayotte, via La Réunion Island. It must be said that this was particularly shocking at a time when the inhabitants, deprived of everything, are looking for water and food!
Although Bayrou announces that he is monitoring the situation “hour by hour,” and government representatives swear that they are doing their best to resolve the situation, this does nothing to calm the concerns of the inhabitants. Beyond the shock felt, there is revolt against the French state. A feeling of abandonment that doesn’t come from nowhere: underfunding of public services and repression are constants in Mayotte. This has worsened in recent years with the disastrous management of Covid and the hunt for the poor and migrants during Operation Wuambushu.
The crocodile tears of Macron and his acolytes are therefore particularly hypocritical. Mayotte is officially a French administrative department. But the situation on the island resembles that of the poorest among neighboring African countries far more than it does that of the metropolis of the world’s seventh-richest country. This cyclone is taking place on a territory that has already been ravaged for years by imperialism, a catastrophe that has nothing to do with nature.
