The President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron, defended, in an interview with Humanity published Sunday February 18 eveningthe government’s controversial bill to abolish land rights in Mayotte, the French overseas department, to stem illegal immigration, mainly from the neighboring archipelago of the Comoros.
“It is legitimate to ask this question because the Mahorais are suffering. They also welcomed this proposal very positively, whatever their political sensitivities. We must stop the migratory phenomenon in Mayotte, at the risk of a collapse of public services on the island”he pleads
Mayotte is a French department in the heart of the very poor Comoros archipelago. “Families travel there and arrive in France, via Mayotte, where they have access to services completely uncorrelated with the socio-economic reality of the archipelago”he judges. “Mayotte is the first maternity ward in France, with women who come to give birth there to have little French children. Objectively, we must be able to respond to this situation”he says.
“Added to this is a new phenomenon in recent months, given the security difficulties in the Great Lakes region: a massive arrival of people from Tanzania and other countries”he explains.
Maintain land rights “for the rest of the country”
For “break this migratory phenomenon”Mr. Macron also wants “restrict access to social rights for people in an irregular situation”. But the president assures that “restricting land rights for Mayotte does not mean doing so for the rest of the country”as the right and the extreme right are demanding. “I remain very deeply attached to this right for France”he assures.
According to him, this proposal to revise the Constitution “is not an attack on the indivisible Republic because the Constitution also recognizes it as plural and decentralized”. “We can adapt the Basic Law to overseas territories: we did it for French Polynesia, for New Caledonia”he emphasizes.