Mayotte diary: life in France's largest slum in the aftermath of the cyclone
**Fahad Idaroussi Tsimanda, a geographer specializing in the "informal" neighborhoods of Mayotte, returned to Kawéni (a suburb of Mamoudzou), France's largest slum, a few days after Cyclone Chido struck. He tells us about the destroyed "huts" and how people are coping to survive.
His logbook provides us with an hour-by-hour account of the disaster. Part Two.
Fahad Idaroussi Tsimanda, University of Montpellier
Monday, December 16
Two days after the cyclone passed, I decided to return to Kawéni. My first attempt had been impossible due to limited time and the many demands on my attention: interviews, helping with the clean-up in my village, and other emergencies. Kawéni, located in the commune of Mamoudzou, the island's capital, is home to the largest slum in France. This town was one of the study sites for my thesis on the vulnerabilities of migrants in Mayotte.
All the risk factors are presentthere: high population density, lack of access to resources (roads, water, electricity, etc.), land exposed to natural hazards, precarious housing, often built using recycled materials. These slums have been tolerated in Mayotte due to massive migratory pressure, which has undermined the island's ability to provide adequate housing, as well as economic constraints and difficulties in managing this long-standing phenomenon, which has become an integral part of the urban landscape.
On the road to Kawéni, passing through Majicavo Koropa, I see an emergency shelter built from Algeco containers, completely torn apart by the force of the wind. At the entrance to the slum, not far from the Lycée des Lumières high school, I bump into an acquaintance, Ravi, a resident of Kawéni Bandrajou who had helped me gain access to his neighborhood during my research. On the day the cyclone hit, he stayed in his tin shack and slept. A few minutes after he woke up, his house was completely destroyed by the wind. It is a miracle that he escaped unharmed.
Total chaos
Upon entering the Kawéni slum, I am struck by the utter chaos. The residents, mostly Comorians, are overwhelmed and constantly shuttling back and forth between the slum and the formal neighborhoods. Before the cyclone, the slum functioned in some ways like a formal neighborhood, despite the extremely precarious living conditions. The dwellings, 95% of which are made of sheet metal, cover an area of about one hectare. Inside, space is limited and multifunctional. A single room serves as a kitchen, bedroom, and living room. The furniture is basic: a few mattresses, plastic chairs, and a makeshift table. The paths between the houses are winding, steep alleys, sometimes stabilized by tires, rocks, or concrete.
Public infrastructure is almost non-existent. Here, everything is improvised: illegal connections for water and electricity, neighbors helping each other to make up for shortages. Community life is organized around informal activities: small grocery stores, livestock farming, craft workshops. Koranic schools and small squares, where residents chat and play, are central places for socializing.
Cyclone Chido destroyed everything: houses, shops, Koranic schools, the mosque. Even animals were swept away. This has profoundly affected the fragile system of solidarity that enabled the neighborhood to function. For the time being, the human toll remains uncertain. Authorities report 35 deaths across the island, 67 seriously injured, and 2,432 slightly injured.
However, some people working at the Mayotte hospital center are spreading other information: according to them, there are around 100 deaths in Petite-Terre and 1,000 deaths in Grande-Terre. The figures remain a subject of debate: many people question the government's transparency and accuse it of hiding the exact number of deaths in order to limit its responsibility for the tragedy.
A man explains to me that he, too, stayed at home while his wife and children were evacuated to the Lycée des Lumières high school.
"If I must die, it is God's will," he said.
Others put forward different reasons:
"I just didn't want to leave."; "I want to keep my house."; "There have been warnings before and nothing happened."
I ask whether the authorities came to warn people about the severity of the emergency, as they did in 2019 when Kenneth (April) and Belna (December) passed through. Someone tells me that they did not:
"No one from the town hall, the prefecture, or the intermunicipal authority came to see us."
Rebuilding the slum
Some residents, who have the physical or financial means, have begun rebuilding. The strongest are organizing themselves to fetch water, while others are content to try to protect what remains of their possessions. Everyone seems to be in a hurry, as if life had been put on hold by the hurricane and must be restarted at all costs.
Further away, I see residents collecting metal sheets, which appear to come from houses located in "formal" neighborhoods. Here, "formal" refers to neighborhoods recognized by the people of Mayotte, local authorities, and the state as official, legal residential areas with addresses, paved roads, etc. Conversely, "informal" refers to slums, where buildings are illegal and there are no utilities.
Some residents work in groups: one person transports the metal sheets from the boundary between the formal and informal neighborhoods, while another carries them to the location where they will be used.
Fear of theft
The tension is palpable. People are exhausted and mistrust prevails, especially when it comes to essential resources. Everyone accuses everyone else of being a potential thief. The hurricane has rendered several security measures (fences, alarms, video surveillance, etc.) ineffective. The Lycée des Lumières has paid the price: groups of thieves mingled with the families affected by the disaster and waited until nightfall to steal computers, video projectors, and chairs.
At around 6 p.m., a resident of the slum asks me to watch his metal sheets. I wait a long time for him to return. After he comes back, I decide to leave. Walking towards the paved road, I see several people gathered around a generator. I join them to find out more about this community initiative: here, for two euros, you can recharge your cell phone battery, which is essential for moving safely through the maze of metal sheets and staying in touch with loved ones during this crisis.
Around the connected phones, some Comorians talk about returning to their country of origin, because they have lost everything in the cyclone. They fear hunger or lack of work, those small jobs known here as "bricoles" or "kibaroa" –farming a Mayotte resident's field, building a house, etc. But for now, returning is impossible: there are no boats connecting the two neighboring islands of Mayotte and the Comoros.
Fahad Idaroussi Tsimanda, Geographer, Associate Researcher at LAGAM, University of Montpellier, University of Montpellier
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Readthe original article.