THE OPINION OF THE “WORLD” – WHY NOT
We will consider this documentary on the phenomenon of illegal migration in Europe if not for its cinematographic achievement, at least for the singularity of its point of view. Its director, Mary-Noël Niba, of Cameroonian nationality, is indeed interested in aspects of this migration which, no doubt because they seem contingent, are rarely taken into account by commentators. This film sets out to shed light on these gray areas by highlighting, on the one hand, the part of fantasy and blindness that sometimes goes into the decision to leave, and by collecting, on the other hand, the words of those, more numerous than one thinks, who return to the country, laminated by their experience.
Coming from Cameroon or Senegal, Stéphane, Léo and Cheikh thus testify not only to their annoyance at the experience itself, but also to regret at not having stayed in the country to have a more certain chance to spare misery and indignity. We will listen, for example, with astonishment to the extraordinary testimony of Senegalese Bobe Gayeou, sent as a worker to the Spanish fields by her own government as part of a bipartite agreement, mercilessly exploited within the framework of the said agreement, and broken return. in the country.
Ashamed of failure
The film also takes stock of a pervasive but little-known reality: the poor reception given to those who return, suspected of having been unworthy and often ostracized from society. The shame of failure thus forms a sort of mental prison for migrants, to whom it takes great courage to return and face the stigma. Many do not succeed, preferring to live a life of misery in an “El Dorado” which closes in on them like a trap. Guy Romeo, a young Cameroonian who took three years of his life to come to France, approach his idol, rapper Mac Tyer, from Aubervilliers (Seine-Saint-Denis), and try a career similar to his own, is in this case.
The real interest of this documentary, which advocates individual voluntarism, is however weakened by the almost total erasure of local socio-political contexts, which are nevertheless not for nothing in the need for so many people to go. try, by all means and at the cost of their lives, their luck in the West. The blindness which is imputed here to the candidates for clandestine emigration would thus be a more acceptable hypothesis if the film also paid more attention to the objective reasons which made them leave.
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