Discussion of All Things Political

Benoît Assou-Ekotto and Sébastien Bassong attack France race quotas

Benoît Assou-Ekotto still finds the concept faintly amazing, despite having lived in England for the past five years, and so does Sébastien Bassong, his Tottenham Hotspur team-mate, who has been in the country now for three. When the French-born Cameroon internationals ask colleagues such as Jermain Defoe or Aaron Lennon where they come from, the answers touch a nerve that is red raw in France at present.

"They say, of course, that they are English or British," Assou-Ekotto says. "At first, I thought that they must be ashamed of their origins because coming from where I did in France, even if you had only one little drop of Moroccan blood, for example, you would represent it to the death. You would be fiercely proud of being African.

"But here, it is different. People might say that their parents are from Ivory Coast, Nigeria or wherever but they are fiercely proud of being here and the society accepts that, which is a big difference to France. When you ask the same question in France, people will say, 'I'm from Congo or Mali or Cameroon' because there isn't the sense of belonging."

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But the general unpleasantness of the affair has raised more fundamental questions, with the most prominent concerning why young men such as Assou-Ekotto and Bassong, who were born and raised in France, can feel such a disconnection from the society and, by extension, the France national team.

"I'm surprised by this affair but I'm not necessarily shocked because it's a reflection of French society as I see it," Assou-Ekotto says. "I would put a question to you. Can you name another country where, when the national anthem is sung at the stadium, people boo and whistle? This happens in France all the time. It is not foreigners who make up the crowd; it is people who are supposed to be French and yet there is this disconnect between the state and the people, and they do that. And yet, when something is wrong, they highlight the foreigners.

"France has, at its heart, a problem where it has been unable or unwilling to accommodate the sons and daughters of its former colonies, even though France benefited and enriched itself greatly from the relationship. That's hard to accept and it's what sits at the base of what is dysfunctional in France."MORE

I and other have been saying this shit for a long fucking while: if the dominant culture is nasty to its immigrants then what the fuck do they expect said immigrants to do? Continue to hold out their hands to get slapped? Of course they are going to be alienated and draw away from the dominant society. This is logic and common fraking sense! Now the fun thing of course is that Britian has it own issues with immigration. But damn France, damn.

CAMEROON

Cameroon Protest 23 Feb 2011: Police Easily Cracks Down Cameroon Protests VIDEO AT THE LINK IS DISTURBING

23 February – Cameroon’s nation-wide anti-government protests started modestly today, with calls for President Paul Biya to step down. But protesters in Douala and Yaoundé were outnumbered by police.

Since the food price riots in 2008, 23 February has been the day in the year discontent Cameroonians take to the streets; mostly being quickly dispersed by the police.

This year was to be different, according to the hopes and aspirations of the organisers of the protests. This year, they had announced during the last few weeks, 23 February would be the start of Cameroon’s Egypt-like revolt.
A gathering of protesters in Douala’s Akwa neighbourhood was dispersed.
Reports from Cameroon today – both by the protesters and the media – however indicate that the anticipated anti-government riot rather has been a bleak repetition of the minor 23 February protests during the last years.

The reason may have been that Cameroonian authorities were on a high alert over possible riots, with Communication Minister Issa Tchiroma Bakary yesterday telling the local press that organisers of the protests wanted “to destroy this nation.”

Consequently, Cameroon’s two major cities this morning were filled up with riot police. In Douala, the country’s largest city located at the coast, large groups of uniformed police and soldiers lined up at central squares, roads and in the central Akwa neighbourhood. Vehicles entering the city were stopped and checked by police.MORE

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