Better Be A Refugee Than A Citizen?

 

Mauritania’s decision-maker(s) ought to look at this item published today on Saharamedia’s website: “Mauritanian citizens living in the Bassiknou district hosting Malian refugees in the Hodh Elchargui region have been apparently registering as refugees to get food assistance.”

Here, were are not dealing with a simple case of fraud. But rather with an eloquent indictment of the state of affairs in the country: an impoverished population that is living on the margins of the state, and lacking most basic services. As the world gears up to deal with the Jihadi infection next door in Azawad, it should consider learning the lessons of Azawad: if you leave a population living in abject poverty, you will undermine its immunity to radical jihadists. If said population reaches the conclusion that the State is no longer credible, then Islamism becomes a real alternative. 

Finally, we are told in the same piece that there are 200000 Malian refugees in Mauritania. The question is rather: How many Mauritanian refugees are there in Mauritania?