Tensions over the fate of Western Sahara had reached the L’Île-Saint-Denis fan zone during a concert organized after Morocco Day, on the evening of August 1. To the point that the mayor of the town, Mohamed Gnabaly, had to resolve to close the Morocco stand of the Olympic fan zone set up on site. This Tuesday, the mayor announced that he had filed a complaint for racist insults and threats of which he had allegedly been the victim since this decision.
On Thursday, ahead of the evening dedicated to Morocco at the Africa Station, the African continent’s Olympic celebration site during the Olympic Games, Mohamed Gnabaly had called for a certain measure. “We don’t want to get involved in politics, we’re all together,” he warned. But the singer Saida Charaf, during her performance, ended up saying twice in front of the audience: “Western Sahara is Moroccan, thank you President Macron.”
A complaint against Morocco’s inaction
For Mohamed Gnabaly, the “commitments of neutrality” around the question of Western Sahara have been “seriously called into question”. “Faced with the inaction” and “without excuse” of the representatives of the Kingdom of Morocco, the city has terminated the occupation agreement binding it to the Moroccan embassy and closed its stand.
On X, the Moroccan consulate in Villemomble (Seine-Saint-Denis) considered that “the spontaneous expression of an opinion by Ms Charaf does not constitute a politicization of the Games, nor an obstacle to commitments of neutrality.”
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Morocco’s reaction to the closure of its Fan Zone at Station AfriqueThe Consulate General of Morocco in @MaVillemomble denounces the decision of the mayor of L’Île-Saint-Denis
The Consulate General of the Kingdom of Morocco in Villemomble published a press release on Sunday denouncing the… pic.twitter.com/uhQGg7BT2x
— INCIDENCES (@INCIDENCES12) August 4, 2024
Since the closure, Mohamed Gnabaly says he has been targeted on social media by hateful and racist messages, targeting him and his wife. “A complaint was filed by the mayor of the town in the face of all these acts of hatred (…) The mayor also asked the French State and the Minister of the Interior to react to this unacceptable situation towards an elected official of the French Republic,” the mayor wrote.
A “non-autonomous” territory according to the UN
In a letter addressed to King Mohammed VI on the occasion of the anniversary of his enthronement 25 years ago and made public on Tuesday, Emmanuel Macron considered that “the present and future of Western Sahara are part of Moroccan sovereignty”. Without expressly recognizing the “Moroccanness” of Western Sahara, this position provoked a strong reaction from Algeria, which decided in the process to withdraw its ambassador stationed in Paris.
Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony, is largely controlled by Morocco but claimed by the Sahrawi separatists of the Polisario Front, who are demanding a referendum on self-determination. The latter was planned during a ceasefire in 1991 but has never been organized. The UN considers this territory a “non-self-governing territory”.
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