The Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) will host an International Conference on the liberation of Western Sahara (Saharawi Democratic Republic) the last Colony on the African continent at the Yar Adua Conference Centre, Abuja, next week.
The three-day conference opening next Tuesday, is to draw the world’s attention to the continued colonial domination of the people of Western Sahara by Morocco as well as its Western Allies.
At a briefing on Monday at the ASUU secretariat, University of Lagos (UNILAG), former ASUU National President and convener of the conference, Dr Dipo Fashina, said the platform would be used to galvanise support for collective action at both regional and global levels to facilitate speedy liberation of Western Sahara.
He said various speakers from Africa, America and Europe, some of who are sympathetic to the cause of the western Saharawi, would speak at the conference.
Fashina said ASUU’s involvement in the agitation is informed by its role in helping individuals and institutions, other than its members, whose rights have been abused as well.
He said: “Our unionism holds it to be true that colonial subjugation is a historical anachronism that must be expunged from the world. We believe in the legacies of the struggles of Pan-Africanists and African liberation fighters, that colonialism must be thoroughly defeated.”
Western Saharawi is the only colony in Africa on the United Nations’ list of 16 dependent countries of the world. It is situated between Morocco to the North, and Mauritania to the South and Algeria to the East. At present, Morocco occupies about 80 per cent of Western Sahara and considers the region its three southern provinces till date.
Morocco’s dominance of Western Saharawi pitched it against the Organisation of African Unity and later African Union, and on its adoption by the AU, forced Morocco to withdraw its membership.
Fashina said Western Saharawi remains the world richest in phosphate and fish, noting that these two resources may account for Moroccan insistence to hold on to the territory, in addition to the larger global interest by the West.
He lamented that Europe has failed to find a middle ground on the development despite its much claim to self determination.
“Europe is not playing its frontline role despite its claim that every nation has a right to self determination. In Morocco this is compromise, particularly in the interest of phosphate and fish,” he said.
He said Nigeria, just like every other nation, has only given diplomatic support to the cause of Western Saharawi.
“The area that morocco has seized is the richest in the world in phosphate and fish.The Sahrawi people are living in refugee camps in Tindouf, about 30 kilometres away towards Algeria, but the rest of the country is occupied by Morocco,”
he added.
