Africa’s Last True Colony

The Scramble for Africa was a period of roughly 30 years which can be characterized by the brutal violence of colonial regimes operating under the guise of attempting to bring civilisation to the backwater savages of tribal pre-industrial nations. This colonial project was undertaken by supposed enlightened Western nations to tame the savage wilds of Africa and reap the benefits of her underdeveloped resources. However, it only ended with the devastation of life and land across some 90% of African territory. In spite of efforts of decolonial activists and the international community, one can still observe the broader negative trends and impacts of colonisation. Moreover, efforts to prolong the colonial endeavours into the latter half of the 20th century only served to project its maladies for posterity. One would assume that few know of the Western Sahara, wherein colonialism operates to this day and as such the international community must bring to light its history and seek to end its oppression. Thus, the case for the Western Sahara, Africa’s last true colony, is one muddled in colonial relations, guerilla warfare, and abusive obstructionist politics, and to understand it, one must understand how the conflict began.

The Spanish Crown first seized ports on the coast of the Western Sahara in the 1500s to service the lucrative fishing and slave trade of the Canary Islands. Prior to this, the nomadic pastoral tribes of the Sahrawi peoples roamed the deserts claimed by the Sultanates of Morocco, though true sovereignty was rarely exercised with any consistency (Besenyo. The Spanish would go on to develop and profiteer from the Sahara’s vast supply of fish and minerals like sulfur. Following the Berlin Conference of 1884, Spain exerted full sovereignty over the territory as a Spanish colony with the division of spheres of influence (which had little regard for the territorial integrity of the colonies). The Western Sahara would remain this way until the wave of decolonisation brought on by the independence of neighbouring territories as well as the weakening moral, ethical, and political basis for colonial projects. During this period, the native population sporadically engaged in acts of resistance. These uprisings were quickly quelled by the Spanish military presence in the region, totalling some 15,000 soldiers strong. During this time, the Spanish established legions of soldiers and nomadic cavalry troops, recruiting locals including the native Sahrawi populations (these Spanish units were modernised in the early 1970s).

Growing tensions stemming from World War II and the growing Moroccan Liberation Army’s independence movement led to the outbreak of the Ifni War in 1957. Sahrawian and Moroccan rebels (backed by the then illegitimate Moroccan Government) mounted a series of attacks and incursions in Spanish West Africa culminating in the Siege of Ifni, a contested town once controlled by Morocco. Following the moderate successes of the rebel incursion, a military operation between the Spanish and the French, fresh from the bitter struggles in Morocco and Algeria, launched a series of attacks using their technological (napalm & air support) advantages to overwhelm the enemy. In spite of the valiant guerilla efforts of both the Moroccan Liberation Army and the Spanish-Sahrawian forces, Operation Ecouvillion managed to dislodge the rebel forces. Fears of further retaliation following the success of Ecouvillion, Morocco refused to deliver aid and quickly forged a neutrality agreement, forgetting its allies in favour of securing its territorial prospects. The following years were of relative peace and stability as resistance fomented and other African nations liberated themselves one after the other: Mauretania in 1960, and Algeria in 1962, and by 1965, some 38 countries were independent in Africa.

By 1974, tensions boiled below the surface as the growing independence movement of the native Sahrawi population’s demands for independence grew. Growth in civil society helped foster unity amongst the tribes of the Sahrawi peoples: political organisations like the Saharan Liberation Organisation or the militant POLISARIO Front had been emerging since the late 1960s. Spain, heeding calls to decolonize and recognizing the waning strength of Franco’s tenure, sought to divest itself through a controlled referendum of the Sahrawi people on the matters of independence. To further complicate matters, fervent Moroccan nationalism and the sophist political projection of irredentism and a “Greater Morocco” drove outrage over the potential newfound independence of the Western Sahara, free of Moroccan influence. Moreover, the Sand War of 1963, between Morocco and Algeria over valued resources and border delineation embittered the relations of the two countries for years to come (placing Algeria in the position to: “support any initiative that would weaken Moroccan influence in the Maghreb)”.

In 1975, contrary to the declaration of the United Nations Decolonisation Committee (which reached its decision a decade prior), King Hasan the II began the semi-militant “Green March” into the Western Sahara in an effort to reclaim the territory. In the two years which preceded thus, conflicts between the growing POLISARIO Front and those who would oppose liberation, led to the seizure of territory as well as the beginnings of the fledgling movement of the Saharan Arab Democratic Republic. This followed years of Moroccan efforts with the UN, the International Court of Justice, and the Organisation of African Unity (precursor to the AU) to prevent the referendum, culminating in the postponement of in favour of a ruling delivered by the ICJ on the subject of Moroccan and Mauritanian territorial claims in the region. In spite of the ruling of the ICJ, dictating the Sahrawian right to independence, the breakdown of relations was inevitable. However, it is worth considering how the historical material conditions of the Maghreb contributed to the rapid escalation of this conflict. By the end of 1975, the POLISARIO Front had escalated their tactics from insurgent guerilla attacks on colonial forces, to war against Morocco.

There is no doubt that at the heart of this conflict lies colonialism. The Spanish’s desire to profiteer from the vast sums of unexploited wealth deposited within the sands of the Sahara, coupled with the greed and zealotry of their other colonial compatriots which drove the need for liberation. The continuous repression and maltreatment of the native populations in tandem with the elevation brought by these endeavours allowed for drastic income inequality, the devastation of the nomadic pastoralist way of life, and more than the desire but the need for social equity and political autonomy. Moreover, it was not simply these material conditions which fomented a form of class consciousness, but a continuous legacy of ethnic struggle built on years of oppression from several colonial masters.

The observation of African liberation born not through kindness and questioning, but through direct action and demand would also have held great influence in the Sahrawi leadership. As noted by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., “freedom is never given voluntarily by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.” While one could argue that the international community could have done more, or that the Sahrawis have been given pan-African unity with Morocco, or how the Sahrawi’s should be patient as other colonial projects were, skirt the abject truth: they do not want us there. Any desire for individual or collective benefit is overshadowed and thus made insignificant by the continued demand for emancipation, and ignorance to that fact is shown to be not only be complicit, but an active participant in their continued oppression. Moreover, any consideration for the success of those endeavours must contest with the legacy of resistance and recognize that this will not stop. The insurrection and rebellion will continue so long as oppression remains and liberation is not the topic of conversation, and the end result. This was true of the Vietnamese in French Indochina, and later in North and South Vietnam, of the Kurdish in Iraq and Syria, of ISIL, and of most if not all other African Liberation Groups. As said by John F. Kennedy:

The great revolution in the history of man, past, present and future, is the revolution of those determined to be free.”

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Nicholas Donaldson is a 3rd Year undergraduate at Queen's University majoring in Political Studies (specializing in Political Economy) and minoring in history. His research interests include global political economy, migration politics, the Western Sahara conflict and crises of capitalism.