The President of the European Coordination for Support and Solidarity with the Saharawi People (Eucoco), Pierre Galand, indicated that the Moroccan people should ask themselves about the real beneficiaries of EU/Morocco trade agreements including occupied Western Sahara.
Speaking in the “Investig’Action” program on social networks, Pierre Galand declared that “today, the Moroccan people gain nothing in this war against the Polisario Front”, assuring that the beneficiaries of the illegal exploitation by Morocco of the natural resources of Western Sahara in the fishing and phosphate sector are the King and some big Moroccan fortunes.
“Moroccans should ask themselves about this King and what are his interests, he said. Who are the real beneficiaries of these fishing agreements? The King and some big Moroccan fortunes who share this exploitation with Spain for fishing and with France for phosphate”, replied the activist.
Referring to the Moroccan proposal to the UN to grant “broad autonomy” to Western Sahara, Mr. Galand indicated that this proves that Morocco behaves like a colonial power, recalling that all colonial powers at the time when they were in difficulty have made the proposal of “broad autonomy” for their former colonies.
“Morocco is making the same mistake that the colonial powers made before when the peoples demanded self-determination and the Sahrawis and the Polisario Front today claim their right to self-determination”, he continued.
After having made a retrospective on the way in which Morocco invaded the territory of Western Sahara in 1975 through what is called on the side of the Kingdom “the Green March”, the fervent defender of the Saharawi cause lamented that more than 30 years after the first ceasefire agreement signed between Morocco and the Polisario Front for the organization of a self-determination referendum in 1991, nothing was done.
“Morocco had done everything to ensure that this referendum never took place and to block any possibility of organizing it”, he maintained, in particular after the lists of Sahrawi voters had been drawn up and given to all the partners and observer countries “Morocco saw itself as the loser”.
In addition, Mr. Galand revealed that if France always put itself alongside Morocco, “it is because it still considers Morocco as its protectorate, which explains its political game of influence not only on Morocco but also on Africa and within the international community”.
“There is a permanent bargaining that weighs on the peoples, whether it is the Sahrawi people who are crushed by Moroccan power with the support of Western power, or for the Palestinian people who are oppressed by the Israelis”, regretted Mr. Galand.
