However, reading the book Pape Niang by Mikel Garcia Idiakez A new beginning, I was left with this confession by Mr Pape Niang from those cultivated in the head: “Some of us had to step up Europe to realize that it was better what we left behind than what we found outside. I’m sure many migrants repent that they waited for another reception and another life at the destination, but on many occasions you have no choice but to flee.”

Conviction is confirmed. They do not know what they are going to find in Europe, in some cases because the migrants who live in Europe do not inform them of their harsh living conditions, because they sweeten what they have lived through, in other cases they live in such miserable living conditions that they have no alternative in Africa doing long, tiring walks - like other humiliations, giving tips to the corrupt customs police to prevent the death of the borders of the State. They are also dazzled by the material riches observed in the media in the peoples of Europe.

Pape Niang Wolof, the protagonist and narrator of the book, is a community Muslim – in Senegal Christians and Muslims live seamlessly mixed, sometimes in the same family. The business of the goods store in the capital Dakar had set its way to Europe with a lot of euros in its pocket. He spent his happy childhood in Ndar (Saint-Louis in French; the sixth most populous city in Senegal), from where he made bread in Dakar, and in 2008 he went to Europe and in 2009 he went to Europe (Cadiz), with completely empty pockets. He has lived in Bilbao since 2010 and in the town of Artea he needs an agricultural cooperative, along with other migrants – hence the name of “a new beginning”. After seeing the Reds and the Blacks, it's hopeful, but it's clear that happy childhood will return to the homeland where it lived.

Have you suffered racism or contempt in Bilbao? He does not want to talk about it, but he has had to hear that it was better to continue through the jungle and the man who had said it answered: that the people of the jungle have a thousand times better respect and consideration than he does. And he's also been helped with us, what do you want? The people who ask him and the people who help him.

Why should I leave the homeland? Beyond personal anecdote – we already commented before the shop collapsed – it gives a clear political answer: France continues to govern in Senegal and decides what its authorities are and exploits resources: gas, gold, oil, minerals and natural resources. He cites some examples of neocolonialism, such as the recent airport 50 km from Dakar, or the streetlights such as the airport, which have been manufactured by French multinationals, although in Senegal there would also have been electricity companies and nice lanterns that if the works were awarded to them. More than that: he says that French is spoken in Africa in fourteen countries and that the money used in all of them is made by the Central Bank of France. They cannot take any monetary policy decision without the approval of the French Government.

From economy to culture, in order to reach the university they do not have to go to Paris, but the university in Dakar, about 90,000 students, works entirely in French, and the only official language in Senegal is French, although in a very different way the Wolof language, which also speaks other languages. Under these conditions is the sovereign country Senegal? The government, that is, the authorities sold to the French, and the agreements between the French are good for the Senegalese, so many young people, trained and unprepared, have to leave their homeland.

He does not know Euskera and has warned that the lack of knowledge of Euskera limits, not so much in Bilbao, but in other localities. The teacher who taught her Spanish told her that Euskera was a complex and difficult language, and that it was not worth it. He regrets that he has done so. He knows French well, but he's a wolof speaker from the wolof community, and he knows how important language is. "If you go to Senegal you will have the same thing: if you go there and make French to your people, most of you will understand, but if you talk about wolof, people are won, for sure. If you talk about wolof, the Senegalese will keep the conversation, if not out of curiosity, to know how far you can talk about wolof. The Basques give us what to think.

In 1960, Senegal became independent of France, but only in theory. Do you depend economically and politically on France and on language? There is a language that some 15 million people understand and speak, the wolof, and the only official language is French. Most Senegalese people have a sense of community, and to do so, if the wolof is decisive, and if it generates solidarity, that language will last a long time; it may be safer than ours - our language will have more officialdom in an area of the CAV and Navarre - but they take us a little advantage in social use.

Since 2010, Pape Niang has cried a lot in Bilbao, and has touched him to live and see both the Reds and the Blacks. Thanks to technology he comes into contact with the extended family of Senegal and it is clear that he will return and die there. Meanwhile, the people of Artea are excited about the migrant agricultural cooperative.

I think most of us don't think here that blacks should not leave the jungle, we have more respect than that, but when we see the black, especially if he's a street vendor, we see the poor, the poor, the poor, almost the beggar, and we don't want problems or we feel too little up to give them the help, to see if we care about social services, because we also have the needs. The selfishness of human beings always.

Books like this remind us that the new European colonialism is still in force, and that this will continue to create migrants, and that we are all partly responsible, more authorities but also inauthorities, and that as human beings on this single planet we cannot always look the other way.

We wish Pape Niang well here and to be proud of the wolof community.

Pako Sudupe

Writer