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Viewing cable 07NIAMEY23, NIGER: THREE PILLARS OF TRADITIONAL SLAVERY - AND
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| Reference ID | Created | Released | Classification | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 07NIAMEY23 | 2007-01-10 15:19 | 2011-08-25 00:00 | UNCLASSIFIED | Embassy Niamey |
VZCZCXYZ0000
RR RUEHWEB
DE RUEHNM #0023/01 0101519
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 101519Z JAN 07
FM AMEMBASSY NIAMEY
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 3168
INFO RUEHBP/AMEMBASSY BAMAKO 0349
RUEHNJ/AMEMBASSY NDJAMENA 1495
RUEHNK/AMEMBASSY NOUAKCHOTT 4776
RUEHC/DEPT OF LABOR WASHINGTON DC
UNCLAS NIAMEY 000023
SIPDIS
SIPDIS
DEPT: FOR AF/W, BACHMAN; G/TIP FOR ZEITLIN; AF/RSA FOR
HARPOLE; DRL FOR DANG AND MITTLEHAUSER; DEPT OF LABOR FOR
ZOLLNER
E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PHUM SOCI ELAB NG
SUBJECT: NIGER: THREE PILLARS OF TRADITIONAL SLAVERY - AND
WHY THEY ARE ERODING
REF: 06 NIAMEY 922
-------
SUMMARY
-------
¶1. Traditional caste-based servitude in Niger has always
rested on three pillars: a lack of economic options for
slaves, who tend to live in the least developed regions of
the world's least developed country; a lack of social
mobility in slaves' typically small, isolated, nomadic
communities; and, a racial hierarchy between "black" and
"white" Tuaregs, which contributes to the definition and
heritability of "slave" and "master" caste identities. By
their nature, each of these pillars is difficult to address
via legislation. Thus, traditional slavery has always been
impossible to legislate or prosecute away. However, during
recent travel to the northern region of Niger, Poloff
discovered that some fundamental political, social, and
economic changes have begun to erode these three pillars -
suggesting that traditional slavery does not have much of a
future in Niger. END SUMMARY
--------------------------------------------- ---
NEW ECONOMIC OPTIONS AND THE SUBSISTENCE ECONOMY
--------------------------------------------- ---
¶2. Depending on which study one chooses to credit, there are
anywhere between 8,000 and 43,000 slave caste persons in
Niger. Definitions and numbers are invariably loose, but they
are also of secondary concern - the fact remains that many
Nigeriens are locked into an outmoded system of forced labor,
and are abused to varying degrees by it. Since 1905, when the
French colonial government first banned slavery and related
practices, several attempts to address this problem via
legislation have been made. The most ambitious thus far was a
2004 revision of Niger's Penal Code that painstakingly
defined all elements of forced labor and traditional
servitude and applied penalties to them. Several cases have
been tried under this new law, and some convictions obtained.
However, slavery has always proved resistant to such
solutions because all too often slaves themselves have no
better economic choice than to remain within the system.
"Freedom" at times seems an abstraction that many Nigeriens
cannot afford.
¶3. Much of this is due to the fact that today's slaves tend
to be found among the most marginal communities in the
country, and inhabit the most marginal, isolated parts of the
semi-arid pastoral zone. Caste-based slavery is most common
among the traditionally nomadic communities of Northern
Niger. The situation among the nomadic Tuaregs, who comprise
between 8 and 9% of the country's population, is examined
here. NOTE: Slavery in sedentary regions along the Niger
river and Niger / Nigeria border appears to be more a matter
of residual social discrimination than forced labor. One
exception is the area described by anti-slavery activist
Ilguilas Weila as the "triangle of shame." The triangle,
which runs from Birni N'Konni in the west to Madaoua in the
east to Illela in the north, is the site of two of the five
investigations and prosecutions of slave-holders carried out
in 2006. The other three cases centered on the Tuareg town of
Abalak. END NOTE The Tuaregs traditionally lived a nomadic
existence premised on herding. Slave caste persons were
charged with some of the most repetitive forms of labor -
putting up and taking down tents, providing personal services
to the master etc. - but also some of the most creative.
Metal and leather working, shoe-making, singing and
entertainment, jewelry making, etc. were generally slave
caste occupations.
¶4. Major droughts in 1983-5, and 1994 initially worsened the
dependence of slaves on their masters. Over several decades,
many slave-caste persons had built up the means of economic
independence - small flocks of animals, and small plots of
land - and had moved out of the traditional master-slave
economic relationship. Many had moved physically as well, and
were no longer as subject to the social and psychological
constraints associated with the practice. The droughts
changed everything. Pasturage was wiped out and herds with
it. Many nomads of all social castes were forced to
sedentarize. Villages in the agro-pastoral zone became larger
towns overnight as nomads moved in to access government and
NGO services and support themselves through trade and paid
labor. Lacking resources, property, and marketable skills and
often speaking only Tamachek, slave-caste nomads gathered
around master caste Tuaregs who spoke their language for
money and support. Initially, Tuareg nobles provided for them
as a way of fulfilling Zakat - the tradition of obligatory
Islamic charity; eventually, the relationship solidified,
with the slave-caste Tuaregs doing chores and working in
return for material support from the masters. In a non-cash
economy, this was viewed as a reasonable and natural exchange
- not to mention a return to traditional ways - rather than
an imposition of forced labor.
¶5. While the forced sedentarization of the 1980s and early
1990s initially strengthened the master-slave economy, it
also laid the foundations for the emergence of economically
independent slaves. The re-emergence and growth of the
tourist industry in northern Niger after the 1991--1995
Tuareg rebellion created great opportunities for slave caste
nomads. Their traditional specialties - leather and metal
working, jewelry making, and music - have found a whole new
audience in the form of forex bearing tourists. Between five
and six thousand tourists (75% French) visit Niger's northern
Agadez region each year. Tourism is $2.6 million annual
industry. Sixty tourist agencies (up from fifty last year)
bring vacationers through many of the region's small towns,
where, as Poloff can attest, opportunities to buy traditional
nomadic crafts abound. While it is difficult to quantify the
level of wealth creation, it is important to realize that
virtually all of it accrues to savvy ex-slave entrepreneurs.
Master caste Tuaregs do not engage in any of these highly
lucrative "slave caste" professions, as they regard it as
beneath them. In time, market logic may change that; which
further underscores our argument that social conventions are
mutable in the face of profit.
--------------------------------------------- ------
SOCIAL AND POLITICAL REVOLUTION IN THE NOMADIC ZONE
--------------------------------------------- ------
¶6. Just how mutable they are was illustrated in Poloff's
December 12 meeting with Serge Hilpron, a Franco-Tuareg
opposition journalist and pro-democracy activist. Trained in
France, Hilpron returned to his native Niger in the early
1990s as democracy emerged. Intending to help it along, he
founded "Radio Nomade," in Agadez as a source for independent
news and commentary on the region. One of the best educated
and most well informed observers of the northern Nigerien
scene, Hilpron described the political and social changes he
had witnessed since his return to Agadez fifteen years ago.
¶7. Hilpron first emphasized the role of the 1991 - 1995
Tuareg rebellion as an agent for social change. Going beyond
the conventional view that the rebellion was solely concerned
with resource allocation and cultural identity issues between
the nomadic, minority north and the sedentary, black-African
south, he described the friction within the northern camp.
Echoing a view held by many other contacts, Hilpron argued
that the rebellion was a time for young Tuaregs to challenge
the traditional leadership, and for lower caste Tuaregs to
challenge the caste hierarchy. In Hilpron's view, many of the
most enduring changes wrought by the rebellion were in the
field of social relations among nomads, rather than in
political relations with the center. COMMENT: This theory
seems credible, given the tendency of rebellions to shake up
many aspects of a society. However, at least one of the
political outcomes of the rebellion - political
decentralization - has also affected the lives of slave-caste
persons. Under this system, authority over local issues
passed from appointed central government administrators to
265 new elected commune governments. Many of the councilors
and mayors elected in 2004 are slave-caste persons. END
COMMENT
¶8. Contrast this with the situation that existed prior to
the drought years of the 1980s and the rebellion of the
1990s. Traditionally, the subsistence economy of the nomadic
zone yielded conservative social mores. Part of a nomadic
"groupement," that rarely interacted with townsfolk or
observed alternative social structures, the slave-caste
Tuareg knew no other way of life. Sedentarization led to new
economic opportunities and offered a new social vision. The
towns in which most Tuaregs settled were heavily Hausa /
Zarma. In addition to learning new languages, slave caste
Tuaregs were exposed to the famously entrepreneurial culture
of the Hausas. Hausa cities like Maradi and Zinder are famous
for their self-made men, who have made enough money through
commerce to build large houses, marry additional wives, and
travel to Saudi Arabia on hadj, or to Europe to buy used
cars. Exposed to this alternative socio-economic model,
slave-caste nomads have started to break down barriers.
¶9. Serge Hilpron stressed the linkages between economic and
social change, arguing that the integration of slave-caste
craftsmen into the modern tourist economy has enabled them to
make money and transcend old social limits. Transition from a
barter economy where masters controlled the means of exchange
to a cash-economy where slaves are well equipped to earn
Francs has altered the latter's social position. Many have
married higher-caste members of the same ethnic group, a
practice that Hilpron described as "inconceivable, even as
recently as ten years ago." Intermarriage has also helped to
break down one of the most obvious traditional distinctions
between slave and master caste nomads - color.
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RACIAL HIERARCHY, RACIAL MIXING & IDENTITY
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¶10. Many exceptions must be granted to the rule that
slave-caste Tuaregs tended, traditionally, to be black
Africans while master caste Tuaregs tended to be
lighter-skinned Berber people. Certainly, that racial
distinction has never been as hard and fast in Niger as in
Mauritania. Perhaps the greatest exception is the Sultan of
the Air - principal traditional leader of the Tuaregs. For
centuries, ever since feuding Tuareg clans failed to agree on
a candidate to rule them and invited a noble Hausa family
from Birni N'Konni to re-establish its dynasty in Agadez, the
Sultan of the Air has been a black African. Yet, however
imperfect a measure in theory, racial difference has always
been a key determinant of caste-status in practice. Most
Nigeriens would consider a black African Tuareg to be a slave
caste person and would consider a Berber-Tuareg to be a
member of the master caste. Popular perception derives from a
historical truth concerning the development of the race-based
caste system among the Tuaregs.
¶11. Niger's Tuaregs moved into the country from the north.
Descendants of the Berber people of the Mahgreb, these
nomadic herders colonized the pastoral zone and drove out
other ethnic groups. Through their practice of raiding -
"razia" - which survives in muted form to this day under the
rubric "vol traditionel," the Tuaregs stole animals and
people from the sedentary black African ethnic groups of the
south. Initially integrated into the Tuareg communities as
slaves, the black Africans formed a racially and socially
distinct caste that enjoyed very little mobility. While the
kidnapping of persons via razias died out a century ago, the
racially based caste hierarchy that it established remained
durable until the advent of sedentarization.
¶12. While no census data are available to quantify the
argument, most Nigeriens, Tuaregs included, argue that
intermarriage between "white" and "black" Tuaregs has led to
a new demographic mix within the community. This has, in
turn, broken down the old color barrier between the two
castes, facilitating social mobility. Sedentarization again
played a role. As Tuareg communities settled in cities with
largely Hausa populations, intermarriage occurred. "Black"
Tuaregs especially had more marriage options outside of the
community. Coupled with the economic and political factors
noted above, intermarriage contributed to greater social
mobility. From Poloff's observations during extensive travel
to the north, the vast majority of today's Tuaregs are
indistinguishable in physical appearance from their Hausa
neighbors. "White" Tuaregs are a rare site in the population
centers of the north. Those who remain persist largely in the
small nomadic communities north and west of Agadez.
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COMMENT: CAN HISTORY KILL AN HISTORICAL EVIL?
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¶13. In a meeting last year with key anti-slavery advocates
(reftel), Ambassador and Poloff heard the consensus view of
the people who know the subject best: the long term solution
to slavery and associated social discrimination in Niger is
economic and social change. To the extent that donors and
NGOs can help that natural process along - by equipping
ex-slaves with economic tools like literacy, job training,
and microcredit, or educating them on their legal rights -
well and good. Less attention was paid to coercive legal
remedies, even though one participant - Timidria's Ilguilas
Weila - has made great use of them. Poloff's discussions and
observations during his trip to the nomadic zone suggest why.
Slavery - the product of economic, social, and demographic
circumstances - cannot survive changes in those
circumstances. Long term economic and social change is
eroding the pillars that support this system. Contacts agree
that those pillars are much weaker now than they were even
ten years ago. Through programs designed to enhance
ex-slaves' economic skills (and thereby their social
mobility) the USG can give slavery's tottering pillars a
push.
ALLEN