In this episode, La Loupe looked at the case of Mayotte, where the State is struggling to respond to distress signals. To help us see things more clearly, Alexandra Saviana, journalist from the Société de L’Express service, and Hugues Tertrais, historian and former president of the French Overseas History Society, explain the situation to us on the spot, and we tell how this archipelago serves as a laboratory for government policies…
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The team: Charlotte Baris (presentation), Agathe Hernier (writing), Jules Krot (editing and production)
Credits: Mayotte la 1ère, INA, France Info, France 24, TV5 Monde
Music and dressing: Emmanuel Herschon/Studio Torrent
Logo: Jérémy Cambour
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Charlotte Baris: 70 kilometers. This is the distance that separates Mayotte from the Comoros. A migratory route which, each year, turns into a cemetery for hundreds of lives. In September, a shipwreck claimed 12 lives. In August, eight more bodies were found. Tragedies due to poor navigation conditions or certain criminal practices.
In addition to this dangerous sea, public policies do not always manage to respond to the emergency. For more than 15 years, the question of immigration has saturated public debate in Mayotte. The Visa Balladur, the revision of land law, mass expulsions… So many measures intended to regulate the migratory flow, making the island a testing ground for increasingly security policies. In addition to immigration, there are other crises. This department of France drowned in the Indian Ocean is experiencing an alarming rate of poverty, delinquency problems, difficulties in accessing housing, and more recently, a serious health crisis. A cholera epidemic lasting more than six months has left at least five dead. Exceptional situation, exceptional measures… This is the argument used by several politicians to justify certain measures applied in Mayotte that one would not imagine in mainland France.
To go further
Mayotte: after New Caledonia, this other time bomb for the executive
Professor Antoine Flahault: “The cholera epidemic in Mayotte would already be contained if the government wanted it”
Cholera in Mayotte: our revelations on the origin of the epidemic