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HIDDEN DEBATES OVER THE STATUS OF THE CASAMANCE DURING THE DECOLONIZATION PROCESS IN SENEGAL: REGIONALISM, TERRITORIALISM, AND FEDERALISM AT A CROSSROADS, 1946–62

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 March 2020

SÉVERINE AWENENGO DALBERTO*
Affiliation:
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Institut des Mondes Africains, Paris

Abstract

The article studies the contexts in which the idea of a separation of the Casamance from the rest of Senegal arose during the process of decolonization. The idea was an outgrowth of colonial representations forged since the end of the nineteenth century. It was first formulated by the French authorities in secret discussions with the representatives of the Casamance in the context of the 1958 referendum. It was taken over by local political leaders who saw it as a possible answer to the debates over representation that arose in the post-war process of democratization, and later by proponents of political mobilization at the sub-regional level after independence. By examining this little-known moment of possibility, the article shows that the claims of the current armed independence movement are in fact part of a longer, more ambivalent history in which a separatist imaginary of the Casamance took shape.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © The Author, 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press

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Footnotes

I wish to thank Frederick Cooper, Vincent Foucher, Camille Lefebvre, and Ibrahima Thioub for their comments on an earlier version of this article. My gratitude also goes to the people who grant me time for interviews. I also thank the archivists of the Archives Nationales du Senegal (ANS), the Archives Nationales section Outre-Mer (ANOM), and the Centre des Archives Diplomatiques de Nantes (CADN). Author's email: sawenengo@gmail.com.

Translated from the original French by Susan Taponier

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24 ANOM 1affpol/2248, Office of the High Commissioner of the Republic in AOF. Collection of the main intelligence reports received by the AOF research department for the period from 15 to 21 Sept. 1958, 19.

25 ANOM 1affpol/2281/5.

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44 With one exception: the conseiller territorial Pierre Édouard Diatta, son of Benjamin Diatta, the Chef de Province of Oussouye.

45 ANS 21G/219/178, ‘The Casamance Security Sector’, meeting of the SFIO Party of Ziguinchor, 22 Oct. 1947.

47 ANS 11D1/309, statutes of the MFDC.

48 APPIC, minutes of the MFDC-BDS meeting, Dianki, Mar. 1955.

49 APPIC, L. S. Senghor to E. Badiane, Paris, 10 Mar. 1951.

50 APPIC, letter from E. Badiane to P.-I. Coly, Sédhiou, 20 Mar. 1951.

51 APPIC, MFDC, ‘Structuring of MFDC-BDS sections’, 1951.

52 ANOM, 1affpol/1004, minutes of the Voting Census Commission of 17 June 1951.

53 Interview with Yoro Kandé.

54 Interview with Sancoung Sané, Sédhiou, 6 Aug. 2002.

55 APPIC, MFDC, minutes of the extraordinary convention in Marsassoum on 14–15 Nov. 1953.

56 ANS 2G/53–213, ‘Senegal, Quarterly Summary of Events, 4th Quarter 1953’; ANS 11D1/309, note on the MFDC, 20 May 1954.

57 APPIC, MFDC, minutes of the extraordinary convention in Marsassoum on 14–15 Nov. 1953.

59 Interview with Mamadou Dia, Dakar, 4 Jan. 2004.

60 ANS 21G/220/178, tract put out by the MAC, 9 Dec. 1955.

61 ANOM 1affpol/2263, M. Dia, annual report to sixth BDS convention, Ziguinchor, 19–21 Apr. 1954.

62 Cooper, ‘Conflict’, 1538.

63 ANS 21G/220/178, ‘Intelligence: Public BDS meeting in Rufisque on 25 Dec. 1955’. Senghor was referring to the Lebu patronym of Seck, which originates in northern Senegal. Seck's family had settled in the Casamance at the end of the nineteenth century.

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90 This was symptomatic of the ability of the PRA-S in the Casamance to unite different bases of opposition to the central government: the former chefs de canton felt threatened by the policy adopted by Senghor and Dia.

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93 P. Bourdieu, Homo academicus (Paris, 1984), 207–50.

94 Interview with Yoro Kandé. Diallo and Badiane died in 1971 and 1972.

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