France has “swept colonial past under the carpet”, Algerian student says

French politicians have always swept the issue of colonisation under the carpet, Mellina Tenfiche, an Algerian political science student at the University of Paris Nanterre, has stated.

Speaking at the youth forum “Strengthening the Role of Youth in the Post-Colonial Period” in Baku, she said France has still not issued an official apology to Algeria for its 132-year colonial period,” Caliber.Az reports.

“Regarding French colonisation in Algeria, it was accompanied by extremely brutal practices. Mass killings, destruction of villages, torture — the price in blood for the people was very high. These barbaric actions led to the deep disorganisation of Algerian society, accompanied by famine, forced displacement and extrajudicial executions,” she added.

According to her, this inevitably affects today’s relations between the two countries, especially since the largest Algerian diaspora lives in France.

She added that colonisation is not simply the occupation of territory or a conventional conquest transferring people from one state system to another, but something far deeper and more tragic for those who experienced it.

“Colonisation is not only the theft of land, wealth and resources, whether human or material, but also the stripping of a people’s culture, history and dignity. This is something much harder to restore than territory. It is physical violence through torture, rape, famine and death, but also psychological violence through the establishment of relations of domination between the coloniser and the colonised,” she remarked, noting that “it is the imposition of the idea of their ‘inferior nature,’ that they need ‘civilisation’ or ‘improvement’ from the dominant power.”

Tenfiche stressed that this cultural and psychological domination affects not only colonised peoples but also their descendants, as, in her words, “the ideological poison has already been embedded.”

“How many of our ancestors lived with the belief that Western man was more educated, more capable and even more attractive? Colonisation has even influenced our perceptions of attractiveness and the body. It produces control over bodies and reinforces gender stereotypes linked to racist undertones. [...] These images and stereotypes do not disappear with independence and continue to be transmitted today,” she emphasised.

She said that the colonial process in Algeria had a long-term impact on relations between ethnic groups, altering relations between Jews and Muslims and destroying centuries of coexistence.

“As a young woman representing the Algerian diaspora in France, I cannot fail to point out the negative impact of this policy of ‘colonial relativism’ on the social climate in France. The sociological consequences of colonialism persist. We see it in discrimination against ethnic minorities, especially those perceived as coming from the Maghreb or as Black. We see it in overt Islamophobia, directed primarily at women wearing headscarves — a legacy of French colonial campaigns to remove the veil. Surveys and studies confirm the difficulties minorities face in finding employment, housing, or even being taken seriously by medical staff in hospitals,” she explained.

Tenfiche concluded that moving toward a healthier post-colonial future and stable international relations requires official recognition of historical injustices and crimes, acknowledgement of racist and discriminatory prejudices that persist in societies, and stronger efforts to combat them.

By Bakhtiyar Abbasov