The situation has crashed on the island of Guadalupe, the island of the Caribbean which is still under French domination. The reason why the COVID-19 passport is forced in itself and the vaccine imposed on health workers and firefighters is that the problem is deeper and the environment that had been corrupted for some time has been despised in recent days. Thus is the atmosphere in the Caribbean island: violent kale borroka, the corners are burned, the police is brutal, the curfew is imposed, robberies, demonstrations, barricades, blocked roads, arrival of special police units RAID and GIGN from Metropolitan France and dozens of arrests.

From the street, the citizens of Guadalupe denounce the poor socio-economic situation and the "colonial attitude" of the French State. Unemployment is 17% – in Metropolitan France it is 8.9% – and 34% of the population is in poverty – in Metropolitan France 14%. In general, there is a great difference between Metropolitan France and the socio-economic conditions of these islands under its control, but there is no determination from Paris to bridge these differences.

The inter-trade union PTP called for a strike on 15 November against the latest measures taken on the occasion of COVID-19. The movement of health workers and firefighters has begun through the merger of several gas station unions. In order to calm the environment, it has been known on 23 November that the government has approved one of the demands of those who protest: the vaccine will be distributed to them without the ARN-messenger technique among those engaged in health care.

Government spokesman Gabriel Attali said that what is happening is "unacceptable and unsustainable" and that this is happening "by a minority". However, natives do not say the same. The UGTG trade union says: "These days of mobilization show that the demands of health and social professionals and firefighters are correct and supported by the public. But, in addition, they also make us see that the suffering, inequality, poverty and exclusion that our citizens suffer are terrible."

The Minister of the Interior, Jean Castex, was in Guadalupe yesterday, on 22 December. He strongly denounced the citizens' violence by saying that "public order" is a condition that must be met for dialogue. The government member was found to be infected with COVID-19 on the island.

In general, 43% of the indigenous population is vaccinated, so there is much less population than in Metropolitan France. They generally distrust the measures imposed from Paris, and they cannot deny that their history is understandable. Guadeloupe, colonized by the French in 1635, remains an administrative region within France.

In memory of chlordecone, in a territory contaminated by France

The authoritarian and colonial attitude adopted by Paris in the past and even today is also at the root of the riots this last week. Among them, the issue of chlordecone, in French. From 1972 to 1993, the insecticide Klordekona spread through banana plantations in Martinique and Guadeloupe. Despite the knowledge that the product was carcinogenic and endocrine disruptive, the French State opted to authorise the use of the product. Today, the two islands that depend on France are totally contaminated: land, water and inhabitants, all contaminated. The scandal, the scandal that is not mentioned but the pain of the guadalupearras in memory and body.

At the ARGIA on 9 February last year we published a report on chlordecone and the neo-colonialist attitude of France.

Cholera can spread to other islands

The fire, declared in Guadeloupe, could also spread to other towns in Martinique and Kanakya. Precisely, there is great tension in these two territories which continue to depend on France. Despite the request for the postponement of the independence memoirs, the French Government has rejected the petition and plans to convene a referendum on the independence of Kanaky to be held on 12 December. In Martinique too, several trade unions have called for mobilisation and have done so in cooperation with Guadeloupe.

Below are two videos to reflect Guadeloupe's atmosphere: