Saturday, October 15, 2005
Migrants' plight forces new look at Africa - AP
When he was a construction worker in Senegal, Lamine Sambou never knew from one day to the next whether there would be food for his wife and two children. So he, like many desperate Africans, set out for Europe.
A year later, a penniless Sambou sweated under a scorching sun after a night at a Dakar stadium. He had made it only as far as Morocco, when he and hundreds of Africans were deported this week.
"I walked through the desert for days with hardly any water or food. ... I slept in a prison cell, though I was not a murderer or a thief" ...
Still, he swore he would try again - "just to give my family a decent living."
Dramatic, mass bids in recent weeks by would-be immigrants storming the fences around Spanish enclaves in Morocco, and Morocco's crackdown in response, have drawn the world's attention to Africans' determination to get to Europe. Many hope it will also draw attention to the problems that force them from their homelands on the world's poorest continent ...
More than half of Senegal's 10 million people live below the $1-a-day poverty line. Unemployment is about 48 percent and is particularly high among the nation's youth.
The country has few resources and an agriculture economy based primarily on peanuts. Nearly two-thirds of its population is illiterate. Hospitals and roads need repair. Vast numbers of people do not have access to adequate shelter, water or sanitation. The misery has been exacerbated by consecutive years of drought and a devastating locust invasion last year.
Senegal has an advantage over other African nations in similar straits - a history of stability on a continent mired by coups and civil wars. Civil strife across Africa undermines attempts to pull it out of poverty and sends millions fleeing.
...
While in Morocco, he had peered into the Spanish enclave, glimpsing street lamps and smooth, clean roads that contrasted sharply with the misery of Senegal.
"I have not seen it on television, but with my own eyes," Sambou said. "I will be part of it one day."
When he was a construction worker in Senegal, Lamine Sambou never knew from one day to the next whether there would be food for his wife and two children. So he, like many desperate Africans, set out for Europe.
A year later, a penniless Sambou sweated under a scorching sun after a night at a Dakar stadium. He had made it only as far as Morocco, when he and hundreds of Africans were deported this week.
"I walked through the desert for days with hardly any water or food. ... I slept in a prison cell, though I was not a murderer or a thief" ...
Still, he swore he would try again - "just to give my family a decent living."
Dramatic, mass bids in recent weeks by would-be immigrants storming the fences around Spanish enclaves in Morocco, and Morocco's crackdown in response, have drawn the world's attention to Africans' determination to get to Europe. Many hope it will also draw attention to the problems that force them from their homelands on the world's poorest continent ...
More than half of Senegal's 10 million people live below the $1-a-day poverty line. Unemployment is about 48 percent and is particularly high among the nation's youth.
The country has few resources and an agriculture economy based primarily on peanuts. Nearly two-thirds of its population is illiterate. Hospitals and roads need repair. Vast numbers of people do not have access to adequate shelter, water or sanitation. The misery has been exacerbated by consecutive years of drought and a devastating locust invasion last year.
Senegal has an advantage over other African nations in similar straits - a history of stability on a continent mired by coups and civil wars. Civil strife across Africa undermines attempts to pull it out of poverty and sends millions fleeing.
...
While in Morocco, he had peered into the Spanish enclave, glimpsing street lamps and smooth, clean roads that contrasted sharply with the misery of Senegal.
"I have not seen it on television, but with my own eyes," Sambou said. "I will be part of it one day."
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