History, memory, and politics

Debates about memory have been extensively explored by philosophers and historians (Bédarida Reference Bédarida2001; Nora Reference Nora1984; Ricœur Reference Ricœur2000); these scholarly exercises provide us with a set of tools that allows us to address the Mauritanian resistance debate, as well as this country’s (late) discussion of its colonial past and of its present as an independent state.

Memory debates involve memorial places and chosen historical episodes. They generally embrace political motivations and tend to be instrumentalized. These memorialized topics then are publicly discussed through different media outlets as well as in academic publications. The creation of memories often pertains to issues of identity—concerning policies of national definition, or the interests of a specific group—through the selection of a particular episode that is either glorified or denigrated. The construction of memories is often based on the idealized conception a group or a community has about its past, which can be either negative (victimization) or positive (glorification). When making its claims, a community opens itself to be challenged by other groups with contradictory views regarding the episode at hand. These opinions tend to generate a conflicting version of the same event, causing what Pascal Blanchard and Isabelle Veyrat-Masson (Reference Blanchard and Veyrat-Masson2008) have called “the war of memories.”

Generally speaking, the relationship between history and memory, though closely related, differs in nature, objectives, and means. Pierre Nora accurately defines memory as a domain that “filters, accumulates, capitalizes, and transmits,… erases and recomposes at will, according to the needs of the moment” (Blanchard & Veyrat-Masson Reference Blanchard and Veyrat-Masson2008:337). The work of memory is thus resolutely subjective and partial, sometimes simply representing a manipulation of history (Klein Reference Klein2000); it can also be oriented toward oblivion and the rejection of certain episodes. Through this selective work, a community can either rewrite or conceal part of its history. The work of memory thus participates both in a “strategy of forgetfulness as well as remembrance” (Gensberger & Lavabre Reference Gensburger, Lavabre and Müller2005:8). Enveloping the known parameters of “forgetfulness” or “reminiscence” (Étienne Reference Étienne2006), the state is many times a protagonist in the making of memories (or, in fact, history; see Trouillot [Reference Trouillot1995]). This stance, sometimes embodied in memorial laws, can aggravate an already strained landscape of conflicting opinions (see Figure 2).^{Footnote 6}

Figure 2.

Avenue de la Résistance, Rachid, Mauritania (Photo by Elemine Ould Mohamed Baba)

Figure 3.

Map representing the Bidhan geographic aire d’influence

The fate of the Um Tounsi’s monument described above epitomizes the ambivalent approach of certain segments of society toward the remembering of a particular event. Those who destroyed this memorial plaque wanted to forget an episode that was disadvantageous for them, while others, observing the same event, reiterated the implausibility of any resistance movement against French colonial rule in Mauritania.^{Footnote 7}

Attempting a reading of the region’s colonial past, one cannot overlook recent events in neighboring Senegal. In contrast to events in Mauritania—where the Um Tounsi’s memorial plaque has not been rehabilitated and the whole monument is today practically in ruins—in Senegal the statue of the former French governor of the colony, Louis Faidherbe, initially erected in 1886, was restored to public space in 2017, with the inscription: “To its governor, L. Faidherbe, Senegal is grateful.” In fact, the Senegalese government ordered the mayor of the city of Saint-Louis to repair Faidherbe’s statue after strong gusts of wind toppled it from its pedestal in September 2017. This episode has raised intense debate, with opinions in some cases declaring that this “was the perfect opportunity to get rid of it once and for all” and others arguing that Faidherbe was “the creator of modern Senegal and the liberator of black Senegalese facing the exactions of the Moors.”^{Footnote 8}

Achille Mbembe’s “conspiratorial reading of history” (Reference Mbembe2001:11), identifying Africa’s need to annihilate its enemy (the colonizer) as a common model for producing cultural identity, is also useful here, particularly if we focus on the recent actions promoted by the Mauritanian government. While reflecting on Mbembe’s views, what is probably more surprising are the difficulties observed in the process of structuring national identity, almost sixty years after the closure of the colonial moment in Mauritania. If the memory/resistance debate in Mauritania in fact portrays the colonizer as an enemy—despite the depth of the social, political, and economic bonds still noticeable between Nouakchott and Paris—it equally resonates with more profound social questionings specific to Mauritanian hassanophone spheres.

The most prominent aspect of the resistance debate relates to the reawakening of the well-known rivalry between groups of different status (Hassān and Zwāya). The present reassessment of the country’s history affirms the resuscitation of a unresolved centuries-old quarrel, which was muted during the colonial and immediate postcolonial period. The difficulties faced by Mauritania in its transition from colony to independent state—difficulties also evident in the theorizing efforts of researchers on postcolonial spheres (Seth Reference Seth2014)—are proof of the ubiquitous character of these internal tensions. One wonders if Mauritania is not finally concluding its decolonial transition, through what Mudimbe (Reference Mudimbe1994:xiv) called a return to the “original locality.” Our analysis has broader significance for current debates about the decolonization of knowledge, insofar as the data presented here declare a valuable reassessment of Mauritania’s colonial period (and, in fact, of the overall western region of the Sahara). The succession of long political administrations (Daddah, 1960–1978; Ould Taya, 1984–2005), as well as the instability generated between these regime-change periods, seem to have somewhat frozen the public debate associated with the country’s colonial past. It might have taken Mauritania more than half a century to fully consider its internal tensions and, while coming to terms with its colonial past, reassess the social designs associated with its Bidhan populations.

Society and history in the muqawama debate

In order to fully understand the surge of publications denying the existence of a resistance movement to colonization in Mauritania, it is necessary to briefly recall the region’s underlying sociohistorical context. The population of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania comprises an Arab-Berber community known as Bidhan (Moors in English) and three Black African communities: Pulaar, Soninké, and Wolof. Traditionally, each of these communities hierarchically discriminates between “noble” groups—of “religious” and “warrior” status—served by different tributary populations (Barry Reference Barry1985; Bathily Reference Bathily1989; Kane Reference Kane1986). As the resistance debate dealt with in this article is limited to the Bidhan, we will restrict ourselves to presenting the historical background of this community, which took its current form in the seventeenth century, with the consolidation of the duality between the two components of its nobility: a “religious” group of Sanhadja origin (the Zwāya) and a group of warriors of Arab origin (the Hassān). The Arabs who began their descent into present-day Mauritania in the fifteenth century triumphed over the region’s original inhabitants and later founded supra-tribal political organizations called emirates, four of which reigned over the Moorish country: Trarza, Brakna, Tagant, Adrar.^{Footnote 9}

At the end of the nineteenth century, conflicts between different emirates, and succession crises within one emirate, created an “anarchic” (sayba) milieu, marked by the increase of depredatory raids carried out by the tribes of the north (the Ahil Sahil, essentially comprising the Rgueybat, the Awlād Busba, and the Awlād Dlaym), which frequently targeted the southern (Al-Gibla) Zwāya tribes, who pejoratively called their rival groups lamhaliyyin (“the wicked”).^{Footnote 10}

It is during this period (the late nineteenth century) that the existing rivalries between nomadic groups (from the north) and southern Mauritanian populations (much more attached to commerce and with very limited nomadic routes) started to experience the interference of European colonial powers throughout the extended western Saharan region. French authority, centralized in Saint-Louis (a town bordering Mauritania, on the southern margins of the Senegal River basin), hoped to consolidate its rule over the northern (eminently Saharan) territories. This ambition (Taylor Reference Taylor1995) should be seen in the context of the southern Moroccan frontier, where the Spanish accelerated a colonial project of their own for the western Sahara. By the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, in addition to intra-Saharan social rivalries (often comprising north-south depredatory raids), interventions by colonial actors throughout the entire Bidhan region of influence were increasingly significant.

The Zwāya, suffering from predatory raids from the north and often oppressed by warrior groups from their own emirate (Ould Mohamed Baba Reference Ould Mohamed Baba1984:7), supported the machinations of Xavier Coppolani, a colonial officer who, with the aid of distinguished Zwāya figures such as Cheikh Sidiya Baba, ratified the French protectorate over the Trarza (El Gibla) region (southwestern Mauritania) on December 12, 1902 (Harrison Reference Harrison1988:33–40).^{Footnote 11}

From the Hassān standpoint, opposition to this agreement was immediate. Ahmed Ould Deid, the Trarza emir, now a hero for the resistance party, decided to attack the French forces. The Brakna emir, Ahmedu Ould Sid’Eli, also participated in the 1906 battles against the French. Bakar Ould Swayd Ahmed, the emir of the Tagant, and Sid’Ahmed Ould Ahmed Ould ‘Ayda, the Adrar emir, were both killed in combat (in 1905 and 1932 respectively).

Coppolani was murdered in Tidjikja on May 12, 1905, by a commando unit led by Sharif Sidi Ould Moulay Zein.^{Footnote 12} In the aftermath, armed groups from different regions, galvanized by the psychological effect of Coppolani’s death and with the support of the Moroccan sultan, created a federation under the banner of Cheikh Ma al-‘Ainin.^{Footnote 13} The French forces subsequently suffered a number of crushing defeats, forcing them to deploy many more troops to maintain control of the Adrar region (northern Mauritania) in 1909 (Bonte Reference Bonte1984, Reference Bonte2006). By then, the northern tribes, often called tlāmīd (“disciples”) of Cheikh Ma al-‘Ainin, and commanded by Ma al-‘Ainin’s own sons, were raiding colonial military posts while also attacking the populations of the Al-Gibla region, whom they accused of providing logistical support to colonial forces. The followers and sons of Cheikh Ma al-‘Ainin justified these actions by a fatwa, which declared that the goods owned by these populations constituted lawful booty.^{Footnote 14} These guerrilla raids continued until 1934, when aviation and radio TSF started to operate in Mauritania.^{Footnote 15} In the same year, a joint colonial operation, uniting troops from Sudan (colonial Mali), Algeria, and Morocco, regrouped around Mauritania’s northeastern borders. This blocked off the corridors from which the groups of fighters staged their attacks on French military posts. This is the historical context that led to the “war of memories” currently taking place in Mauritania.

“You are nothing but looters”

Since at least November 28, 2008, the commemorations of Mauritania’s independence have been permanently marked by controversy. While declaring their right to freedom of expression, some speakers have started openly to attack Zwāya status groups (those from the Trarza/Al-Gibla region, in particular), who are regarded as the main endogenous vectors of colonial occupation and openly treated as “traitors to the national cause.” They have been accused of responsibility for facilitating colonization, “by offering them [the colonizers] legitimacy through treaties and fatwas and by providing them with supplies.”^{Footnote 16} In contrast, according to this view, the Hassān established a coherent front blocking French occupation.

Faced with these attacks, the voices of those opposed to the existence of any resistance movement in Mauritania also gained an audience in the general public, and over time the media began to give them a lot of publicity. An online article with the corrosive title “National Resistance: Myth or Reality?” was published in 2014. The author of this article described the muqawama as “a war of interests, of raids and counter-raids of looter gangs” (Ould Inalla Reference Ould Inalla2014).

One of the authors spurring the greatest controversy was undoubtedly Omar Ould Beibacar.^{Footnote 17} Ould Beibacar published a series of articles about the “resistance,” the first of which was in response to the decision to name Nouakchott’s new airport “Um Tounsi.”^{Footnote 18} He called for this decision to be reversed, claiming it was intended only to “immortalize a battle in which several dozen Mauritanian soldiers from the Trarza Nomadic Group were massacred in an ambush by a ghazi of 120 foreign looters.”^{Footnote 19} In his rendition, this battle was motivated “essentially by a vendetta against Trarza warriors.” He concluded by asking, “how can we honor foreigners who have distinguished themselves by the looting and the systematic slaughter of our fellow citizens?” (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015a).

After this first article, Ould Beibacar became more and more virulent, and in his second article titled “Facing Colonial Occupation: Can We Speak of Resistance?” (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015b), he explicitly attacked the iconic figure of the resistance narrative, Sharif Sidi Ould Moulay Zein (see footnote 12), who, on May 12, 1905, in Tidjikja in central Mauritania, killed Xavier Coppolani, the Governor-General’s delegate and architect of the so-called penetration pacifique (or peaceful expansion) in Mauritania.

Coppolani’s death constitutes a major turning point in Mauritanian colonial history. After his passing, colonial authorities experienced a period of uncertainty, and consideration was even given to withdrawing from Mauritania entirely. The disappearance of the head of the colonial expedition completely disorganized the “Tagant Mission,” which was besieged for a time after being apparently lost in enemy territory far from its bases. (Désiré-Vuillemin Reference Désiré-Vuillemin1999:145–84). On the other hand, news of Coppolani’s death, while giving hope of a definitive end to the colonial expansion, presented additional arguments to the Saint-Louis trading lobby, which had initially opposed Coppolani’s presence in Mauritania and pleaded for France to withdraw after this incident. For the Saint-Louis merchants, it would have been more profitable to continue trading peacefully with the Saharan populations rather than penetrating into their territory. Coppolani’s assassination also boosted the morale of the muqawama partisans, who, by then, were benefiting from the military and organizational support of Cheikh Ma al-‘Aynin. This period, in fact, marked one of the greatest offensives of the resistance, notably with the battles of Tidjikja and N’yimlān in 1906 (Bonte Reference Bonte2002).

Let us now return to Ould Beibacar’s argument as outlined in his second article (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015b). He started by minimizing the effective role of the Sharif, suggesting that credit for the operation that made him famous should be shared with Sidi Ould Boubeit, a man the Sharif had met by chance and who nonetheless provided him with information on the precise location and routines of Coppolani and his entourage. According to Ould Beibacar, it was because of this man that the Sharif acquired the information necessary for the success of the operation:

In addition to noting the amateurish planning of this operation, dependent on the hazardous meeting of an anonymous informant, Ould Beibacar questions the authorship of the founding act of the so-called “Mauritanian resistance,” by asking “Who killed Coppolani?” He quotes Frèrejean, another decisive colonial actor, as saying that “it was a second shot fired by another member of the Sharif group that finished Coppolani off,” and concludes that “the Sharif was not the real killer” (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015b).^{Footnote 20} This statement openly confronts a pivotal moment in the building of the resistance narrative. Sharif Sidi Ould Moulay Zein, the martyr par excellence, as well as his defining act of “bravery” are irreverently labeled “le coup de main de Tidjigja” by Ould Beibacar (Reference Ould Beibacar2015b).

Ould Beibacar represents the core argument of those who refuse to qualify the armed actions undertaken against the French during the colonial era as effective acts of resistance. For those who share this opinion, it is the culture of violence and the spirit of plunder that determined these actions, rather than any religious or patriotic motives, as supporters of the resistance narrative claim. According to his interpretation, the muqawama was nothing more than an armed “feudal” fight against French expansion, orchestrated by secular and bloodthirsty emirate leaderships that had profited from such methods since the eighteenth century. Some of the members of this coalition were allied with ambitious militant Sufi brotherhoods whose aim was essentially to preserve a long-established order (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015b).

According to Ould Beibacar, the regional status quo was characterized by violence, arbitrariness, and the decline of Islamic values. He argued that the political structures behind these operations (the emirates) lived essentially off the profits earned from the trade in gum arabic, salt, and especially slaves (captured among the black populations of the Senegal River basin), through a systematic plunder of the weakest. For him, the colonial occupation of Mauritania could not have favored the well-established “predation economy” on which certain segments of society based their supremacy. Therefore, in addition to denying the existence of real patriotic and religious motives, the deniers of the muqawama also act as the voice of the groups subjected to the oppression of the “old system,” and who were, naturally, appreciative of the “benefits of colonization” (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015b).

Ould Beibacar rejoices at the defeat of what he calls “feudal entities,” which were “fortunately beaten, pacified, and subjected to French colonization, which was much more merciful.” In a highly provocative tone, he titles one of his texts “Merci Coppolani” (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015c).^{Footnote 21} He again heaps criticism on the hero of the resistance, Sharif Sidi Ould Moulay Zein, considering him “an enlightened fanatic” who committed a “heinous crime.” On the other hand, he laments the fate reserved for Coppolani: “an illustrious administrator, a great humanist of superior intelligence, who wanted to make our country the largest and richest of the states of French West Africa” (Ould Beibacar Reference Ould Beibacar2015c).

It is this opposition between the model established by the colonizer and a state of disruption (al-sayba, “the reign of anarchy”) that constitutes the backbone of the arguments of those refuting the muqawama, which is presented as an apologia for arbitrariness.

“You are nothing but ignorant”

The arguments advanced by Ould Beibacar have also been addressed by Ould Haroun, who, in a series of online articles, has distanced himself from the provocative style of Ould Beibacar.^{Footnote 22} However, Ould Haroun’s arguments can easily be qualified as a pro domo plea. Its author, a lawyer and counselor at the Ministry of Justice, is in fact the grandson of Cheikh Sidiya Baba, and his public intervention was based on what he considered “his family’s moral duty” to defend his ancestor (a renowned Islamic scholar and Brotherhood leader; see footnote 11).

In an introduction to the debate, Ould Haroun states that he hopes to respond, in particular, to the flow of denigrating arguments that became almost intolerable when “November zealots” and provokers, taking advantage of competition among television channels, began to label those who had cooperated with the colonizer as mercenaries, accomplices, lackeys, and traitors (Ould Haroun Reference Ould Haroun2014).^{Footnote 23} In his response to these “provocations,” he extensively reviews local historiographic accounts and Islamic jurisprudence, to conclude that, due to the local and international geopolitical context, cooperation with the colonizer was the more justifiable option (Ould Haroun Reference Ould Haroun2014).

He repeats Ould Beibacar’s argument, signaling the state of endemic anarchy that reigned in precolonial Mauritania, drawing on the existing sociocultural environment at the time of Cheikh Baba Ould Cheikh Sidiya. He defends his ancestor’s doctrinal position and reformist project, based on that of his grandfather, Cheikh Sidiya Ould Mokhtar al-Hayba (1777–1868) (Robinson Reference Robinson2001:178–93).^{Footnote 24}

The elements of Islamic jurisprudence evoked by Ould Haroun remove all legitimacy from jihad/“resistance.” The basic conditions for jihad—the appointment of an imam and the establishment of communal funds—were simply not met in colonial Mauritania. For Ould Haroun, jihad is prescribed only when the hostility of the Christian party prevents Muslims from practicing their rite—something that, in his opinion, did not occur in colonial Mauritania (Ould Haroun Reference Ould Haroun2014).

Ould Haroun also observed the geopolitical arguments explored in a fatwa by Cheikh Sidiya, where he argued for a peace pact with the French. His argumentation was based both on legal/theological justifications as well as on a pragmatic/political basis, as he viewed colonial progression as an unavoidable reality acknowledged all over the world. He thus concluded that it was better to negotiate peace with the French before being confronted with their—inevitable—occupation of Mauritania (Ould Haroun Reference Ould Haroun2014).

The theological controversy, according to Ould Haroun, revolved around the writings of Islamic scholars who had allowed their followers to plunder the goods of the populations subjected to, or who were accomplices with, the French.^{Footnote 25} On the basis of the evidence available to him, he demonstrates that these scholars finally distanced themselves from their initial position and prohibited any harm to the lives and property of the populations of southwestern Mauritania (Ould Haroun Reference Ould Haroun2014).^{Footnote 26} The absence of legal (Islamic) foundations for a resistance movement, the inevitability of colonization, and the anarchic antecedent acknowledged in the region supports the position of the muqawama deniers. These arguments should suffice to justify their cooperation with the colonial authority. The logical conclusion to this argument emphasizes the unfounded nature of the “resistance” and the pure and simple denial of the existence of such a movement.

Political uses of the muqawama

The Mauritanian government was itself directly involved in debates around the muqawama, and one might even speculate that it had a role in the creation of the controversy. Indeed, it was after a presidential speech, delivered in November 2009, during the official celebrations to mark the country’s independence, that laudatory interventions regarding the resistance started to permeate the media landscape. In his speech, President Aziz declared:

One might regard this moment as the start of the official rehabilitation of the resistance narrative in Mauritania, through a political effort expressed by the country’s highest figure. In celebrating the heroism of “the resistance” and meditating on its martyrs, President Aziz committed the state to a policy that defends the need to rewrite the country’s recent history, thus questioning a historiographic tradition in which resistance to colonialism had, to a very large extent, been officially silenced.^{Footnote 28}

In stark contrast to the first generation of Mauritanian political leaders, President Aziz declared the emergence of a “New Mauritania,” which should distance itself from the “old regimes.” In his view, resistance should play a pivotal role in this agenda. Aziz’s role as champion of the resistance was made clear in yet another statement, made in November 2016, when he declared that “Mauritania has a rich history of fighting against colonialism… . The nonwriting of the history of the national resistance is explained by external and internal causes, but it is necessary to write this history and to value it.”^{Footnote 29} It is evident that the internal reasons he refers to are associated with the political class that governed the country until 1978, which blatantly rejected the resistance topos. These political actors have been portrayed as direct heirs of the Gibla (southwestern Mauritania) politico-religious elite that established peace with the French colonial forces and continued to play a decisive role in the country’s transition to independence. For those in the resistance camp, the Gibla political actors have always aimed to silence anything likely to shame French colonization of Mauritania.

More recently, the resistance controversy has moved into Mauritania’s parliament, confirming its appropriation by eminently political groups. Following days of consultations, which were boycotted by some members of the opposition, revisions to the 1991 constitution were put to a referendum. The proposed amendments included changes to two key symbols associated with the first civil regime: the flag and the national anthem.^{Footnote 30} Concerning the flag, it was proposed that two red stripes be added to the original design, symbolizing the blood of the martyrs of the resistance (see Figure 4).

Figure 4.

The current Mauritanian flag now incorporates 2 red stripes, symbolizing the blood of the martyrs of the resistance

As for the national anthem, the suggestion was made to introduce a completely new theme. For those proposing this amendment, the national anthem did not display any elements likely to stimulate patriotic fervor, and, probably more importantly, it made no reference to the resistance. Those opposed to this proposal reiterated that the religious character of the hymn was the best conceivable formula for uniting the entire country around the song.^{Footnote 31}

The debate leading to the parliamentary approval of a new flag and a new national anthem perfectly illustrates the socio-political poles characterizing the current resistance debate in Mauritania. For those unwilling to accept changes to these national symbols, Mauritania’s first civil regime represented a blessed time of affirmation of national identity, of civic values, and of economic development. For those defending the amendments, Aziz’s efforts were valued as patriotic acts, in line with the president’s courageous reformist policies.

At times, this debate also assumed a regionalist angle, and was dragged into vulgarity and quibble in the antagonism between “the people of the north” and “the people of the south” (Ould Eida Reference Ould Eida2015). It was ultimately a controversy between the opposition, which sometimes used the arguments of the resistance deniers, and the supporters of President Aziz, who always supported the resistance and therefore supported the proposed reforms. The constitutional amendments finally adopted express the alignment between the government and those glorifying the resistance.^{Footnote 32}

These changes to the flag and the anthem, in addition to the renaming of Nouakchott Airport (now “Oumtounsy International Airport,” see Figure 5), can be likened to “memorial laws,” in that the state legislates on the basis of a non-consensual representation of the country’s past.^{Footnote 33}

Figure 5.

The new Nouakchott international airport, named after the battle of Um Tounsi (Photo by Elemine Ould Mohamed Baba)