Ouled Ayad, a
community in the suburbs of Beni Mellal, central region of Morocco, in the
plain of Tadla, at the foot of Mount Tassemit (word Amazigh means cold)
altitude 2240 m, between the High and Middle Atlas, populated since millennia,
the spreading of the caves confirms it. It is one of the great regions of
Morocco that has conquered by the agro-food industry and irrigated agriculture
in the plains.
Last
December, a company of its owner, businessman, real estate speculator who lives
in Rabat had ravaged their land, she became owner of 107 hectares of land of
small farmers Ouled Ayad, at a price of 3 dirhams meter 0,27 euro, on the basis
of an official act. The 366 families that made up the entire community had
appropriated these lands more than 150 years ago, each family owns one hectare.
Today, they struggle against a new colonization that turns them into poor
peasants. The police and the repressive forces had driven them from their land
and society had ravaged their wheat culture to implement the project of a great
gentleman from the capital Rabat.
Rahma
Bouhajra, a peasant woman from Ouled Ayad, leader of the peasants' struggle for
their right to land, was tortured, relaxed after breaking her teeth by the
police, prosecuted and sentenced to 4 months in prison.
She fought
against the violation of the lands of Ouled Ayad, the authorities of Beni
Mellal have tried several times to liquidate this case, but Rahma Bouhajra is a
peasant woman who prefers to starve rather than betray the peasant women of her
tribe.
The only bag
of indictment, always the same, is to insult the state agents when they
complete their task. His comrades had organized sit-ins in front of the Bani
Mellal court, claiming his freedom and their due to the land. A curious way of
application of the resolution announced by the Moroccan State of "the
restitution of a million hectares of collective land irrigated to small
farmers".
Real estate
speculators in Rabat know how to chase prey, new predators in financial crisis,
who find in the lands of small farmers the only solution to get out. A class
policy that must be projected and combated on the path of peasant struggle at
the national and international levels by strengthening the organization of poor
peasants in Morocco.
Testimony of
a farmer:
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