Archive of Maghrebi Resistance in 1970s Belgium

This contribution operates a bit differently from others in this issue. This is true for its format structured around archival images, but more importantly, because it breaks with a linear conception of the colonial continuum. By centering various histories of the political struggles of the Maghrebi diaspora in Brussels, it illustrates how the coloniality of power also knows a continuity across different nation-states nested in the European space and its overlapping colonial projects. While mostly colonized by France, Moroccans (in particular Rifans), Algerians, and Tunisians form a large part of the racialized working class in Belgium since the 1960s, and have organized politically to resist the various forms of racial capitalist exploitation and police violence. Mustapha Bentaleb, who has first-hand experience of these struggles, and Joachim Ben Yakoub use six archival documents from the 1970s to recount the various forms this political organizing has taken.

Truth and Justice for Ghanam ///
On June 23, 1973, a demonstration set off from Place Gaucheret in Schaerbeek, Brussels. The procession quickly grew in numbers, responding to the slogans shouted in unison: “We want the truth about Ghanam’s death!” Earlier that year, on May 7, at around 4:30 a.m., Mohamed Ghanam, a young Moroccan man, aged 22, lost his life. He was with a friend on Boulevard Léopold III, the same street where car doors had been forced that night, when he was struck by a bullet shot from a distance by the local police. He died on his way to the hospital. Ghanam’s death provoked anger and indignation among the Maghrebi community in Brussels who felt increasingly threatened in public spaces. Can a policeman kill someone because he suspects him of trying to steal a car? Is it possible for a policeman to feel threatened from 25 meters distance, claiming self-defense? Why does the press want to cover this up? People wondered. On May 15, the Ghanam Truth Committee was formed to respond to the need for justice. It issued an open letter to the mayor of Schaerbeek, Roger Nols, denouncing the increasing brutality of the Schaerbeek police’s arbitrary hunt on immigrant workers and demanding a form of accountability from the mayor. The need to express their anger and rage grew and culminated in what would become the first mobilization denouncing prevailing racism, carried out by the Maghrebi community in Brussels. Speeches recalled the dire living conditions, daily regressions, and the need to unite to put an end to growing intimidations. It was an unprecedented mobilization from which the trade unions and traditional anti-racist structures were largely absent, showing for the first time the combativeness of the Maghrebi community in Brussels.