By Abayomi Azikiwe
During September a general strike and mass demonstrations in the French colonial outpost of Martinique erupted over the escalation in prices for food, fuel and other essential goods and services.
Martinique is located in what is known as the Lesser Antilles in the Eastern Caribbean where approximately 350,000 people live, the majority of whom are of African descent.
This is not the first time in recent years that territories under the imperialist domination of Paris have erupted in industrial actions and urban rebellions. Despite the French propaganda that it is a democratic state, there are areas in the world where Paris continues to impose national oppression and economic exploitation.
Several months before in the South Pacific territory of New Caledonia French President Emmanuel Macron used the security forces to violently suppress the demands for self-determination and democracy. Territories in the Caribbean, Indian Ocean and Asia-Pacific which are still administered by France are demanding the right to control their own affairs in the 21st century.
In Martinique two unions operating in the transport and healthcare sectors engaged in work stoppages and other forms of protest. The transportation workers used vehicles to block traffic preventing the normal operations of commerce.
The French government in response to the labor actions and social unrest deployed the previously banned riot police known as the Companies for Republican Security (CRS). According to recent reports, the CRS had not been sent to Martinique since a massacre it carried out in 1959 where numerous protesters were killed. Nonetheless, during the general strikes of 2009, there was the utilization of the CRS to put down the unrest in neighboring Guadeloupe.
The masses in Martinique have been angered by the disproportionate rise of consumer prices in comparison to those on the mainland in Europe. Consequently, island residents have charged the French colonial authorities with implementing a racist system of pricing.
On September 21, the French administration enacted curfews in the four municipalities of Fort-de-France, Le Lamentin, Ducos and Le Robert. In addition, demonstrations were banned for the following week in order to prevent the gathering of workers and community people in mass demonstrations.
Demonstrations since mid-September have been largely peaceful, bringing thousands into the streets. However, some commercial establishments were damaged while at least eleven police officers and three civilians were injured in the unrest.
French National Assembly representative Beatrice Bellay of the Martinique Socialist Federation condemned the use of the CRS saying that the island was not in a civil war. She described the situation in Martinique as a “social war.” Bellay was elected to the National Assembly earlier in 2024 as a representative of the Federation which is an affiliate of the Socialist Party of France.
The Reality of 21st Colonialism
The recent demonstrations against high prices were led by the Rally for the Protection of Afro-Caribbean Peoples and Resources. This organization along with the trade unions are demanding the alignment of prices with what is being charged in France itself.
One source on the current situation in Martinique indicates that:
“The social climate in Martinique is not new. Already in 2021, during the health crisis, the island was shaken by similar violence. The current situation is also reminiscent of the general strike of 2009, which paralyzed the island for more than 40 days. For Justin Daniel, professor of political science at the University of the Antilles, these recurring crises are symptomatic of a deep malaise. According to him, ‘idle young people’ are often at the origin of the violence, but they do not represent the entire social protest movement.”
Since the 2009 uprising much of the focus of the corporate media has been on the social problems triggered due to the economic inequalities which prevail in Martinique and other so-called “French overseas territories.” Most reports fail to emphasize that the underlying socio-economic crises stem from the outmoded colonial system.
If the people of Martinique, Guadeloupe, French Guiana, New Caledonia, La Réunion, Mayotte, Saint Barthélemy, Saint Martin, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, Wallis and Futuna, French Polynesia had the right to determine their own political and economic systems real advances could be made. Colonialism and neo-colonialism were designed by the imperialist states for the sole benefit of the ruling class. Therefore, the workers, farmers and youth will always bear the brunt of inherent aspects of racial domination and economic exploitation.
The same source cited above recognizes the failure to resolve the recurrent outbreaks of strikes and social unrest in Martinique, noting:
“The State has tried to provide solutions to mitigate the crisis, in particular through the ‘quality-price shield’ system, which aims to limit increases on consumer products. However, the actions undertaken, such as the signing of an agreement setting the price of a basket of 134 products at 387 euros, are considered insufficient. Local authorities, such as the President of the Executive Council of Martinique, Serge Letchimy, are calling for more radical measures, such as price freezes or the removal of VAT [value added tax] on basic necessities.”
Liberation from colonial rule could represent the first step in the creation of a form of governance which serves the interests of the majority of the people. After national independence, it would be up to the masses to determine whether they want to transition to socialism where the workers, farmers and youth own the means of production and distribution.
Legacy of Anti-Colonial Struggle
Since the 16th and 17th centuries, the people of Martinique and the entire Caribbean were subjected to the extermination of the indigenous people and the importation of Africans for the purpose of enslavement. In Martinique, sugar production became the major crop for export.
During the 19th century, the struggle against African enslavement resulted in the abolition of human bondage by 1848. Nonetheless, the people have remained under the colonial control of Paris.
One notable figure in the 20th century, Dr. Frantz Fanon, emerged as a major theoretician and practitioner in the movements for national liberation and socialism. Fanon was born in Martinique in 1925 and would later serve in the French military during World War II.
He would study psychiatry in France and was later assigned to work in the-then North African colony of Algeria. While practicing medicine in Algiers, Fanon would join the ranks of the National Liberation Front (FLN) which was fighting for the total liberation of the country from Paris.
Fanon served as a contributing editor to the FLN journal El Moudjahid and represented the organization at the All-African People’s Conference (AAPC) held in Accra, Ghana in December 1958 under the leadership of Prime Minister and later President Dr. Kwame Nkrumah. His perceptions of the colonial system were written about in his best-known books entitled “Black Skin, White Masks” (1952) and “The Wretched of the Earth” (1961).
In his conclusion to “The Wretched of the Earth” Fanon emphasizes:
“Come, then, comrades; it would be as well to decide at once to change our ways. We must shake off the heavy darkness in which we were plunged and leave it behind. The new day, which is already at hand, must find us firm, prudent and resolute. We must leave our dreams and abandon our old beliefs and friendships of the time before life began. Let us waste no time in sterile litanies and nauseating mimicry. Leave this Europe where they are never done talking of Man, yet murder men everywhere they find them, at the corner of every one of their own streets, in all the corners of the globe. For centuries they have stifled almost the whole of humanity in the name of a so-called spiritual experience. Look at them today, swaying between atomic and spiritual disintegration.”
These prophetic words written by Fanon over sixty years ago still ring true today in the third decade of the 21st century. Colonialism and its modern iteration of neo-colonialism must be rejected by the oppressed.
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