Azawad This article is intended to those who never heard, or mistakenly informed, about Azawad territory. Brief analyse will be given to Azawad in a hostorical context : cultural , economic , political marginalization. Knowing accurate information about Azawad will be helpful to answer many question regarding this territory. Azawad is a new created state in Africa 6 aprile ,2012 , but not internationally recognized, with an estimated area of 800000km. Azawad is bordered with Mali to south, Niger and Burkina fasso to south-east , Algeria to north and Mauritania to west. However, The struggle of Azawad people for independence goes back to many years , since departure of france colonization from Africa which annexed Azawad territory to Malian state on 1960 . Azawad witnessed four remarkable uprisings through time : uprising of 1963, 1990, 2006 and 2012. Anyway , people of Azawad have been complaining for cultural ,economic al and political persecution by successive Malian governments, appealing for their right for self –determination . Malian successive governments have been fighting hardly to eliminate culture of Azawad territory . This is can be exemplified by domination of france and Bambara language and culture at schools while Azawad language ( TUAREGS, Fullani , ) was marginalized and considered as backward culture . More , Azawad children were thought at schools to consider their language and culture as a nomadic worthless language , forgetting completely about Aazawad ( tuaregs) literature , history , and resistance. Finally, the children grow up with psychological problems such as inferiority complexes. For economic reasons, Azawad have been economically marginalized and left without any necessary life needs including absence of drinkable water , health and food . Azawad people have been fight for dialy water from remote wells in order to survive without any help from the governoments of Mali through history. During drought years , Malian authorities did not help Azawad people and left them dying of hungry , forcing many of them to flee to neighbouring countries . More worst , mali uses poverty in Azawad as a big deal to collect donation from international organizations and governments, while Azawad never get a benefit as it should be from that donations. Regarding political persecution , during uprising of 1963 Malian authorities committed summary executions against helpless nomadic people accusing them for being linked with revolutionists .On the 1963-1964, Malian army crossed Azawad territory , shooting nomadic defendless civilians , killing animals and poising wells , the only water source of Sahara people . This barbaric attack by Malian army forced thousands of women , children and men to escape the massacres to the neighbouring countries. In conclusion, the history of Azawad is full of instability and struggling for existence as a result of the above stated reasons. However, the solution will be as Azawad get full independence . Otherwise, there will be endless conflict and insecurity in the region.
Posted on: Sun, 03 Nov 2013 19:23:47 +0000