in Calais, Ahmed, a Chadian exile, prefers “to die at sea than to live this life”

The shipwreck and the death of 27 migrants in the English Channel on November 24 will not deter Ahmed from attempting the crossing again. “I will try. Over and over and over again. Until I can.”, promises this 38-year-old Chadian met in early December in Calais (Pas-de-Calais) during a food distribution. Near the Auchan hypermarket, they are more than fifty that morning, chilled with cold, queuing for the breakfast offered by the Salam association.

Ahmed walks forward with a warm smile. “You are a journalist at franceinfo ? “ he asks, holding out one of his headphones: “It’s my favorite radio station! “ He wants to explain why he came to France and the reasons which push him today to want to leave there. In an icy wind, he tells, in perfect English, “the lack of future prospects” in his country, Chad, ruled for thirty-one years by Idriss Déby, France’s great ally in the fight against the jihadists, killed in April by rebel fire.

He describes “the powerlessness of the government” to protect the populations of the Nigerian jihadist group Boko Haram and the Islamic State in West Africa (Iswap). He also emphasizes “the absence of freedom of expression”.

“In Chad, there is no work, no drinking water. The roads are in a terrible state.”

“The borders with Sudan, the Central African Republic, Nigeria, Niger and Libya are very unstable. All these countries have a lot of problems. They are at war or there are conflicts between tribes”, he details between anger and resignation.

So in 2007, at the age of 24, he crossed Libya and took all the risks to reach the Mediterranean island of Malta, which has become one of the main gateways for African migrants to the European Union. Ahmed will spend twelve years there.

“When I arrived, I did not know the alphabet. But I was given the opportunity to study: I ​​went to university and for four years I learned English, mathematics and information and communication technologies. ” He worked in particular as a secretary for four years in a web software development company. “I was allowed to fit in, to live happily. I had the feeling of being part of society”breaths Ahmed.

But his situation deteriorated in 2013, when Prime Minister Joseph Muscat came to power “after campaigning against migrants, which allowed racists to publicly use hate speech against us”. He says he started to feel “pressure” in his work environment, at university, in transport and in the streets. “I didn’t feel safe anymore”, he sums up. He decides to leave Malta to join France. A dream: until his arrival he worshiped “the land of human rights”.

“French colonization created special links with Chad: France is seen as our leader, our guide. I have always greatly admired this country.”

But the disillusion is brutal. Arrived in Nantes on the 2nd February 2020, he gets no housing, no state aid, and sleeps with a friend for several months. He filed an asylum application on February 4 with Ofpra. Unable to stay with his friend indefinitely, he finds himself on the street, without resources, and begins to depend on associations to survive. On October 29, the ax fell: his request was rejected.

He filed an appeal in the wake, refused by the National Court of Asylum (CNDA) on March 17, 2021, showering all his hopes. “I don’t want any help from the French government. I don’t want money or food. I just want to have papers so I can work and fend for myself. “ “I just want to help myself”, he repeats several times (“I just want to help myself”).

Ahmed finds himself stranded in France, without any possibility of leaving the territory since he has no papers. If he goes to another European country, he will automatically be sent back to France, where his fingerprints have been recorded and where he is “dublined”. He therefore resigned himself to coming to Calais in April to try to reach England, where he hopes to be able to work more easily.

Ahmed knows that he will have to favor access by sea, like the vast majority of migrants waiting on the Calais coast. Between January 1 and November 20, 2021, they were 31,500 to have undertaken this dangerous crossing and 7,800 were rescued. The 2020 record was thus clearly broken. “I tried to take to the sea with a small canoe that we bought with friends on the internet a week ago. There were fourteen of us. But the police confiscated it from us as we started to board. “, he explains.

But he will try again because here his life has become unbearable. He navigates from camp to camp, from which he is chased by the police “almost every day”, he assures. “If they don’t come today, they will definitely come tomorrow or the day after, we know how it works now.”

His days have all been alike, for six months now: “I get up, I wash in cold water with cans of water donated by the associations. Then, I get a meal offered by these organizations and I look for a place to charge my phone. Then I go in search a place to sleep if I’ve been kicked out. Otherwise, I walk a lot, to warm up. “

“I don’t have a lot of places to go to protect myself from the cold. I dare not go into stores without money.”

He shows us around his camp, therefore temporary, located in a field, about fifteen minutes on foot from Auchan. About fifty tents are piled up on pallets, “so as not to take water”, without any tree for shelter. The wind blows constantly and interferes inside. Men are gathered around a wood fire on which tin cans are heated.

Outside, clothes are drying on wire fences. Ahmed does not want us to photograph the rubbish littering the ground, to avoid having “a bad image of the people who live here”. In a few days, he hopes to be able to try the crossing again. “Even if I die at sea, it will be better than living this life, here in France”, he slices. A tear runs down her cheek, no doubt from the cold.