>
>The Village Voice
>Week of February 20 - 26, 2002
>
>Freed From Slavery and Terror,
>Mauritanians Fight for Those Left Behind Beyond Survival
>by Raffi Khatchadourian
>
>Early every day, Mohamedou Ould Isselmou, a 37-year-old Mauritanian
>living in
>New York, leaves his fourth-floor Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment at noon
>and
>heads for a nearby halal caf? where he works, often until past
>midnight. On
>some days, like today, the sky is gray, cold, and rainy, and Isselmou
>will
>tighten his hood as he rushes past a derelict lot opposite his
>building, past
>a large industrial pipe pouring clouds of steam onto the street, past
>a
>rundown corner liquor store. But no matter how dreary the trip, and no
>matter
>how long or tedious his working hours, he says he rarely loses grasp
>of the
>one reality that keeps him tethered to this city: He is living the
>life of a
>free man. Back in his West African homeland, he still would be a
>slave.
>
>When Isselmou recalls his days in Mauritania and the life of forced
>servitude, he remains soft-spoken and deliberate. "In Mauritania, if a
>master
>were to tie you up and beat you until you died, it would not be a
>problem for
>him," he said one morning in his small apartment, his voice swooping
>through
>his English vowels as if tracing the Arabic calligraphy many
>Mauritanians
>adopted centuries ago. "Many times, my master tied me up and beat me."
>
>Isselmou's personal history may sound striking, but like a number of
>other
>former Mauritanian asylum seekers in New York, he is resistant to
>dwelling on
>his experiences. What he'd rather discuss is El Hor, or the Free, an
>underground Mauritanian abolitionist movement founded in 1974, with
>branches
>that stretch from Africa to Europe to North America.
>
>Last month, El Hor went into high gear in New York when it teamed up
>with
>other Mauritanian groups to protest slavery and other civil rights
>abuses.
>That protest, in part, was galvanized by a short U.S. talking tour
>featuring
>a Mauritanian slave and a master that ended in Manhattan last month.
>Over the
>past several years, the Mauritanian exile community here has evolved
>from a
>group of disparately placed immigrants and refugees into a collective
>force
>for political change. No longer content with simply struggling to
>survive,
>they're taking on the highest powers in the land, from their former
>masters
>to the American president and the chieftains at the UN.
>
>For the roughly 3000 Mauritanians in the States-a thousand of them in
>New
>York alone-this political awakening has been decades in the making.
>Isselmou
>says he has been involved with El Hor since he was seven years old. "I
>had no
>choice," he explains, when asked why he joined. "I realized that there
>is no
>reason why a man should be a slave of another man."
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------------
>On the map of Africa, Mauritania appears as a large, angular republic
>situated in the continent's northwest, with a substantial coast on the
>Atlantic. Mauritania became independent from French rule only in 1960.
>Like
>its politics, its borders display the stamp of colonialism. Long
>straight
>lines, bearing little relation to topography or ethnic groupings, cut
>down
>from Algeria and Western Sahara. Mauritania's eastern frontier with
>Mali may
>well have been drawn with one massive tape measure.
>
>Within those borders, though, things are much less orderly. In 1984,
>Maaouya
>Ould Sidi Ahmad Taya seized Mauritania's leadership during a bloodless
>coup
>and installed a repressive regime. Beginning with Taya's rule, the
>Moorish-dominated government initiated a campaign of ethnic and racial
>cleansing that continues to this day, according to international human
>rights
>groups. Although this campaign targeted Black Africans living in
>Mauritania's
>south, it primarily focused on the Fulani, an ethnic group driven by
>the tens
>of thousands into neighboring Senegal.
>
>However, the most abused group in Mauritania may be one that has no
>real
>ethnicity: the slave caste of Africans known as the Harateen, who to
>this day
>must serve their Moorish masters, and who have done this for so many
>centuries that they no longer can trace their ancestry, according to
>Moctar
>Teyeb, a Harateen who now lives and works in the Bronx, where he runs
>the top
>U.S. branch of El Hor. Based on 1994 Mauritanian census figures, Teyeb
>says,
>49 percent of the country's 2.4 million people are either slaves or
>former
>slaves.
>
>The practice of slavery in West Africa dates back hundreds of years,
>and has
>become deeply woven into Mauritanian customs and religious beliefs. Ne
>arly
>all Mauritanians are Muslim, and activists such as Teyeb and Isselmou
>say
>twisted notions of Islamic scripture have been used to buttress
>slavery in
>their homeland for centuries. "Some of my family said I shouldn't go
>to
>America," said Isselmou. "They said I should obey my master, my
>religion, and
>accept the situation."
>
>Isselmou's small stretch of Brooklyn, between Bedford and Nostrand, is
>where
>he has enjoyed a good deal of his freedom since he came to this city
>two
>years ago. This neighborhood may be the closest New York has to a
>Little
>Mauritania. In addition to the small community of Harateen, the area
>is also
>home to a number of Fulani exiles, many of whom also say they are
>fleeing
>persecution.
>
>This sense of community may mark something of a change. Both the
>Fulani and
>Harateen say they have suffered extensively at the hands of the Moors,
>but
>have only recently begun to work together. According to some
>activists,
>Mauritania's masters kept the two groups separate in a cynical game of
>"divide and rule." They cite, for example, instances of slaves or
>former
>slaves in the north who were directed to participate in Fulani
>deportations.
>But the divisions this policy created are now beginning to drop away,
>said
>Habsa Sileymane, a Mauritanian human rights activist living in New
>York, as
>more and more black Mauritanian exiles focus on the Taya regime as the
>root
>of their country's problems. "We are all working for the respect of
>human
>rights in our country; this is what brings us together," Sileymane
>said over
>a sweet Senegalese ginger drink at the midtown caf? that serves as an
>occasional Mauritanian community center.
>
>In the United States, for instance, Mauritanian anti-slavery activists
>intensified their efforts after the former slave's speaking tour of
>the
>Northeast. The talks, which were co-sponsored by the Boston-based
>American
>Anti-Slavery Group and an underground Mauritanian abolitionist
>movement
>called SOS Slaves, were led by Nasser Yessa, who grew up in a
>slave-owning
>family. "Every day, for the first 16 years of my life, slaves prepared
>my
>meals, cleaned my clothes, washed my hands, and massaged my back," he
>has
>said. "Though we were both Muslims, my slaves and I understood that
>their
>black skin made them impure-and that they had to serve me faithfully."
>
>In Manhattan, Fulani and Harateen émigrés sent an open letter to UN
>Secretary-General Kofi Annan on January 28 pleading their cause; that
>same
>day, they gathered before the United Nations to protest the recent
>banning of
>a Mauritanian anti-slavery opposition party, Action for Change.
>"Silence from
>the African nations, from the UN, and the United States has not only
>encouraged Taya to continue his crooked policies, but has made him
>eager to
>increase his appetite for abuses and violations of human rights," said
>Moctar
>Teyeb, the former slave and national El Hor coordinator, in an address
>during
>the demonstration. "Why has Taya banned this anti-slavery party now?
>Taya
>thinks the world is busy with its war against terrorism."
>
>--------------------------------------------------------------------
> Later, in his Bronx apartment, Teyeb, who has testified before
>Congress on
>slavery in Mauritania, further explained how the U.S.-led war on
>terrorism
>was having a detrimental effect on his cause. "One week after
>September 11,
>unfortunately, President Bush sent a letter to Taya, referring to him
>as his
>friend, and so the following week, Taya went around the country on a
>propaganda tour, reading from the letter, saying that he is close to
>the
>United States, and that the United States was with him."
>
>In a typed statement to the Voice, the Mauritanian embassy in
>Washington
>defended the banning of Action for Change, accusing the party's
>leadership of
>"anti-constitutional behavior" and "making racist anti-democratic
>statements
>aiming at dividing Mauritanians and jeopardizing our national unity."
>The
>statement continues: "In order to build a democratic republic, a
>country
>needs respect for the State and for its institutions. . . . This party
>has
>crossed the line, by transforming the [parliament] into a platform to
>circulate untruths on slavery and re-open old wounds."
>
>On the matter of modern-day slavery, the statement goes on to explain
>that
>"our government recognizes that there are still some unfortunate
>vestiges and
>consequences of slavery in Mauritania; we are even more determined and
>committed to eradicate them by concerted and determined action to
>fight
>poverty among the poorest social groups." It also states:
>"Unfortunately
>certain persons in Mauritania and a small number of Mauritanian
>immigrants
>abroad who, in order to advance their political agenda or extend their
>stay
>in the host country, decided to use these baseless accusations of
>slavery and
>hurt their country."
>
>However, many observers say Mauritania so far has a poor record
>combating
>slavery. "If there are only 'unfortunate vestiges and consequences of
>slavery' left in Mauritania, if the Action for Change party is truly
>circulating 'untruths' on slavery, then a comprehensive and
>independent
>multinational investigation into slavery in Mauritania will prove the
>government correct," says David Moore, an activist with the American
>Anti-Slavery Group. "But if there is nothing to hide, then why does
>the
>government continue to stifle dissent, ban political parties, and
>refuse to
>let foreign journalists freely roam the country?"
>
>According to a 1996 U.S. congressional resolution, "Chattel slavery,
>with an
>estimated tens of thousands of black Mauritanians considered property
>of
>their masters and performing unpaid labor, persists despite its legal
>abolition in 1980." Moreover, anti-slavery activists, both here and in
>Africa, point out that there are no real legal mechanisms to enforce
>the
>Mauritanian anti-slavery law, and that the only people who are granted
>any
>right to compensation are the masters, not the slaves.
>
>Still, Isselmou, the former slave living in Brooklyn, is optimistic.
>"I did
>not come to the United States just to sit here," he says. "I want to
>go back
>to my country to live with my family when I can live a safe life, my
>own
>life. The most important thing for any man is the life of freedom."
>
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>
>Forward Ever (by any means necessary); Backward Never!
>Karen-Yaa (YGA)
>