CHAHID EL HAFED (Dignity Camps) SPS – This March 8, the Saharawi people, and in particular its women, will celebrate a double anniversary: the fall of the first martyr of the Revolution and the International Women’s Day.
On 08 March, the Saharawi people celebrate the fall of their first martyr and hero of the Saharawi Revolution, Bachir Lahlaoui, in the battle for the liberation of the homeland.
For their part, the Saharawi women are celebrating another 8th of March in the Saharawi refugee camps, waiting for the international community to recognise their rights to a dignified life, and for their homeland, usurped by the Moroccan military occupation, to be returned to them.
Many March Eights have passed and Saharawi women continue to resist the extreme conditions of exile and Moroccan occupation.
While women in other latitudes celebrate their day in free homelands, Saharawi women continue to fight a battle for survival and for the rights of their people to a better life.
Saharawi women, unlike women in other countries, do not enjoy a free homeland, they do not enjoy the riches of their territory, they cannot move freely in their cities.
In the Occupied Zones she is repressed, tortured, outraged, insulted and her house is raided. In the O.Zones they have to endure harassment by the settlers, police insults and confiscation of their sources of livelihood.
The balance sheet of the sacrifices made by women in the struggle is extensive, their contribution to the revolutionary process is valuable, their participation in the social and political life is praiseworthy.
With firm hands, with love and gentleness they have made the extreme life in the Saharawi camps go on.
They are the fundamental pillar in the struggle for independence, the support of the values of our society, builders of hope in exile and spokespersons on the international stage for the just cause of their people.
Not a single day of those 48 years has gone by without women abandoning their dedication to national duty and faltering in the face of adversity.
Proud, proud to serve her people as a teacher, doctor, executive, parliamentarian, minister and above all, pleased with her achievements and the road she has travelled.
We salute the brave and courageous women in the Occupied Areas who daily defy the enemy and who with firm and solid resistance have carried the peaceful struggle far in the occupied Saharawi cities.
We salute the mothers, daughters, sisters, wives and grandmothers of the Saharawi political prisoners who are languishing in Moroccan prisons for the sole reason of having taken to the streets to demand the right to self-determination and an end to the occupation of their beloved homeland.
To those in the Dignity Camps, our recognition and gratitude for the duty done.
To the women in the Diaspora, our respects for the sacrifices they made for society.
Today we celebrate this 8th March with an eye to the near future and with the confidence that our women will continue to contribute to the struggle of their people and the building of their state.
Undoubtedly, the existence of the Saharawi people lies in the strength and spirit of its women.
