THE FEDERAL ISLAMIC REPUBLIC of the Comoros is an archipelago
situated in the western Indian Ocean, about midway between the island of
Madagascar and the coast of East Africa at the northern end of the
Mozambique Channel. The archipelago has served in past centuries as a
stepping stone between the African continent and Madagascar, as a
southern outpost for Arab traders operating along the East African
coast, and as a center of Islamic culture. The name "Comoros"
is derived from the Arabic kamar or kumr, meaning
"moon," although this name was first applied by Arab
geographers to Madagascar. In the nineteenth century, Comoros was
absorbed into the French overseas empire, but it unilaterally proclaimed
independence from France on July 6, 1975.
Comoros has had a troubled and uncertain course as an independent
state. Mahoré, or Mayotte, the easternmost of the archipelago's four
main islands, including Njazidja (formerly Grande Comore), Mwali
(formerly Mohéli), and Nzwani (formerly Anjouan), remains under French
administration, a majority of its voters having chosen to remain tied to
France in referendums held in 1974 and 1976. By the mid-1990s, the integration of Mahoré
into Comoros remained an official objective of the Comoran government,
but it had taken a back seat to more pressing concerns, such as
developing a viable national economy. Meanwhile, the Mahorais were
making the most of their close relationship with France. They accepted
large amounts of developmental aid and took an intense interest in
French political events. Although South Africa played a major role in
the Comoran economy in the 1980s, by the early 1990s France was the
island republic's foremost patron, providing economic aid, political
guidance, and national security.
Comoros is densely populated and dedicates only limited amounts of
land to food production. Thus, it depends heavily on imports of rice,
vegetables, and meat. Its economy is based on the production of cash
crops, principally ylang-ylang (perfume essence), vanilla, and cloves,
all of which have experienced wild price swings in recent years, thus
complicating economic planning and contributing to a burgeoning trade
deficit. A growing dependence on foreign aid, often provided to meet
day-to-day needs for food, funds, and government operations, further
clouds economic prospects. Comoros suffers the ills of a developing
nation in particularly severe form: food shortages and inadequate diets,
poor health standards, a high rate of population growth, widespread
illiteracy, and international indebtedness.
The country has endured political and natural catastrophes. Less than
a month after independence, the government of the first Comoran
president, Ahmed Abdallah, was overthrown; in 1978 foreign mercenaries
carried out a second coup, overthrowing the radical regime of Ali Soilih
and returning Abdallah to power. Indigenous riots in Madagascar in 1976
led to the repatriation of an estimated 17,000 Comorans. The eruption of
the volcano, Kartala, on Njazidja in 1977 displaced some 2,000 people
and possibly hastened the downfall of the Soilih regime. Cyclones in the
1980s, along with a violent coup that included the assassination of
President Abdallah in 1989 and two weeks of rule by European
mercenaries, rounded out the first fifteen years of Comoran
independence.
In the early 1990s, the omnipresent mercenaries of the late 1970s and
1980s were gone, and the winding down of civil conflict in southern
Africa, in combination with the end of the Cold War, had reduced the
republic's value as a strategic chess piece. However, as in the 1970s
and 1980s, the challenge to Comorans was to find a way off the
treadmills of economic dependency and domestic political dysfunction.
Comoros - Early Visitors and Settlers
Little is known of the first inhabitants of the archipelago, although
a sixth-century settlement has been uncovered on Nzwani by
archaeologists. Historians speculated that Indonesian immigrants used
the islands as stepping stones on the way to Madagascar prior to A.D.
1000. Because Comoros lay at the juncture of African, Malayo-Indonesian,
and Arab spheres of influence, the present population reflects a blend
of these elements in its physical characteristics, language, culture,
social structure, and religion. Local legend cites the first settlement
of the archipelago by two families from Arabia after the death of
Solomon. Legend also tells of a Persian king, Husain ibn Ali, who
established a settlement on Comoros around the beginning of the eleventh
century. Bantu peoples apparently moved to Comoros before the fourteenth
century, principally from the coast of what is now southern Mozambique;
on the island of Nzwani they apparently encountered an earlier group of
inhabitants, a Malayo-Indonesian people. A number of chieftains bearing
African titles established settlements on Njazidja and Nzwani, and by
the fifteenth century they probably had contact with Arab merchants and
traders who brought the Islamic faith to the islands.
A watershed in the history of the islands was the arrival of the
Shirazi Arabs in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Shirazi, who
originated from the city of Shiraz in what is now Iran, were Sunni Muslims adhering to the legal school of Muhammad ibn
Idris ash Shafii, an eighth-century Meccan scholar who followed a middle
path in combining tradition and independent judgment in legal matters.
The Shirazi Arabs traveled and traded up and down the East African coast
and as far east as India and Maldives. A legend is recounted on Comoros
and on the East African coast of seven Shirazi brothers who set sail in
seven ships, landed on the coast of northwest Madagascar and on Njazidja
and Nzwani, and established colonies in the fifteenth century. The
Shirazi, who divided Njazidja into eleven sultanates and Nzwani into
two, extended their rule to Mahoré and Mwali, although the latter in
the nineteenth century came under the control of Malagasy rulers. The
Shirazi built mosques and established Islam as the religion of the
islands. They also introduced stone architecture, carpentry, cotton
weaving, the cultivation of a number of fruits, and the Persian solar
calendar. By the sixteenth century, the Comoros had become a center of
regional trade, exporting rice, ambergris, spices, and slaves to ports
in East Africa and the Middle East in exchange for opium, cotton cloth,
and other items.
The first Europeans to visit the islands were the Portuguese, who
landed on Njazidja around 1505. The islands first appear on a European
map in 1527, that of Portuguese cartographer Diogo Roberos. Dutch
sixteenth-century accounts describe the Comoros sultanates as prosperous
trade centers with the African coast and Madagascar. Intense competition
for this trade, and, increasingly, for European commerce, resulted in
constant warfare among the sultanates, a situation that persisted until
the French occupation. The sultans of Njazidja only occasionally
recognized the supremacy of one of their number as tibe, or
supreme ruler.
By the early seventeenth century, slaves had become Comoros' most
important export commodity, although the market for the islands' other
products also continued to expand, mainly in response to the growing
European presence in the region. To meet this increased demand, the
sultans began using slave labor themselves, following common practice
along the East African coast.
Beginning in 1785, the Sakalava of the west coast of Madagascar began
slaving raids on Comoros. They captured thousands of inhabitants and
carried them off in outrigger canoes to be sold in French-occupied
Madagascar, Mauritius, or Reunion to work on the sugar plantations, many
of which French investors owned. The island of Mahoré, closest of the
group to Madagascar, was virtually depopulated. Comoran pleas for aid
from the French and the other European powers went unanswered, and the
raids ceased only after the Sakalava kingdoms were conquered by the
Merina of Madagascar's central highlands. After the Merina conquest,
groups of Sakalava and Betsimisaraka peoples left Madagascar and settled
on Mahoré and Mwali.
Prosperity was restored as Comoran traders again became involved in
transporting slaves from the East African coast to Reunion and
Madagascar. Dhows carrying slaves brought in huge profits for their
investors. On Comoros, it was estimated in 1865 that as much as 40
percent of the population consisted of slaves. For the elite, owning a
large number of slaves to perform fieldwork and household service was a
mark of status. On the eve of the French occupation, Comoran society
consisted of three classes: the elite of the Shirazi sultans and their
families, a middle class of free persons or commoners, and a slave class
consisting of those who had been brought from the African coast or their
descendants.
Comoros - French Colonization
Politics in the 1960s were dominated by a social and economic
elite--largely descendants of the precolonial sultanate ruling
families--which was conservative and pro-French. During Comoros' period
of self-government as an overseas department, there were two main
conservative political groupings: the Parti Vert (Green Party), which
later became known as the Comoros Democratic Union (Union Démocratique
des Comores--UDC), and the Parti Blanc (White Party), later
reconstituted as the Democratic Assembly of the Comoran People
(Rassemblement Démocratique du Peuple Comorien-- RDPC). Dr. Said
Mohamed Cheikh, president of the Parti Vert and of the Governing
Council, was, until his death in 1970, the most important political
leader in the islands. The Parti Blanc, under Prince Said Ibrahim,
provided the opposition, endorsing a progressive program that included
land reform and a loosening of the monopoly on Comoran cash crops
enjoyed by the foreign-owned plantation sociétés. The second
most powerful member of the Parti Vert, Ahmed Abdallah, a wealthy
plantation owner and representative to the French National Assembly,
succeeded Cheikh as president of the Governing Council soon after Cheikh
died.
Well into the 1960s, the two established parties were concerned
primarily with maintaining a harmonious relationship with France while
obtaining assistance in economic planning and infrastructure
development. Given this consensus, politically active Comorans often
based their allegiance on personal feelings toward the doctor and the
prince who led the two main parties and on whatever patronage either
party could provide.
The independence movement started not in the Comoro Islands but among
Comoran expatriates in Tanzania, who founded the National Liberation
Movement of Comoros (Mouvement de la Libération Nationale des
Comores--Molinaco) in 1962. Molinaco actively promoted the cause of
Comoran independence abroad, particularly in the forum of the
Organization of African Unity (OAU), but not until 1967 did it begin to
extend its influence to the islands themselves, engaging in largely
clandestine activities. The Socialist Party of Comoros (Parti Socialiste
des Comores--Pasoco), established in 1968, was largely supported by
students and other young people.
A growing number of politically conscious Comorans, resenting what
they perceived as French neglect of the Comoro Islands, supported
independence. Independence-minded Comorans, especially younger ones,
were energized by dramatic events across the Mozambique Channel on the
African mainland. Tanganyika had gained its independence from Britain in
1961 and soon adopted a government based on "African
socialism." Zanzibar, another longtime British colony, became
independent in 1963 and overthrew the ruling Arab elite in a violent
revolution the following year; the island state then merged with
Tanganyika to form the new nation of Tanzania. Meanwhile, nationalists
were beginning uprisings in the Portuguese colony of Mozambique.
Abdallah, although a conservative politician, saw independence as a
"regrettable necessity," given the unsatisfactory level of
French support and the growing alienation of an increasingly radicalized
younger generation. The violent suppression of a student demonstration
in 1968 and the death of Said Mohammed Cheikh in 1970 provided further
evidence of the erosion of the existing order. In 1972 leaders of the
Parti Vert (now the UDC) and the Parti Blanc (now the RDPC) agreed to
press for independence, hoping at the same time to maintain cordial
relations with France. A coalition of conservative and moderate parties,
the Party for the Evolution of Comoros (Parti pour l'Évolution des
Comores), was in the forefront of the independence effort. The coalition
excluded Pasoco, which it perceived as violently revolutionary, but it
cooperated for a time with Molinaco. During 1973 and 1974, the local
government negotiated with France, and issued a "Common
Declaration" on June 15, 1973, defining the means by which the
islands would gain independence. Part of the backdrop of the
negotiations was a proindependence riot in November 1973 in Moroni in
which the buildings of the Chamber of Deputies were burned. A referendum
was held on December 22, 1974. Voters supported independence by a 95
percent majority, but 65 percent of those casting ballots on Mahoré
chose to remain as a French department.
Twenty-eight days after the declaration of independence, on August 3,
1975, a coalition of six political parties known as the United National
Front overthrew the Abdallah government, with the aid of foreign
mercenaries. Some observers claimed that French commercial interests,
and possibly even the French government, had helped provide the funds
and the matériel to bring off the coup. The reasons for the coup remain
obscure, although the belief that France might return Mahoré if
Abdallah were out of power appears to have been a contributing factor.
Abdallah fled to Nzwani, his political power base, where he remained in
control with an armed contingent of forty-five men until forces from
Moroni recaptured the island and arrested him in late September 1975.
After the coup, a three-man directorate took control. One of the three,
Ali Soilih, was appointed minister of defense and justice and
subsequently was made head of state by the Chamber of Deputies on
January 3, 1976. Four days earlier, on December 31, 1975, France had
formally recognized the independence of Comoros (minus Mahoré), but
active relations, including all aid programs, which amounted to more
than 40 percent of the national budget, remained suspended.
Comoros - The Soilih Regime
Following a few days of provisional government, the two men who had
financed the coup, former president Ahmed Abdallah (himself the victim
of the 1975 coup) and former vice president Mohamed Ahmed, returned to
Moroni from exile in Paris and installed themselves as joint presidents.
Soon after, Abdallah was named sole executive.
The continued presence of the mercenaries impeded Abdallah's early
efforts to stabilize Comoros. Denard seemed interested in remaining in
Comoros, and he and his friends were given financially rewarding
appointments with the new government. In reaction to Denard's
involvement with Abdallah, the OAU revoked Comoros' OAU membership,
Madagascar severed diplomatic relations, and the United Nations (UN)
threatened economic sanctions against the regime. France also exerted
pressure for Denard to leave, and in late September--temporarily, as it
developed--he departed the islands.
Abdallah consolidated power, beginning with the writing of a new
constitution. The document combined federalism and centralism. It
granted each island its own legislature and control over taxes levied on
individuals and businesses resident on the island (perhaps with an eye
to rapprochement with Mahoré), while reserving strong executive powers
for the president. It also restored Islam as the state religion, while
acknowledging the rights of those who did not observe the Muslim faith.
The new constitution was approved by 99 percent of Comoran voters on
October 1, 1978. The Comorans also elected Abdallah to a six-year term
as president of what was now known as the Federal Islamic Republic of
the Comoros.
Although Abdallah had been president when Comoros broke away from
France in 1975, he now moved to establish a relationship much more to
France's liking. Upon Denard's departure, he gave a French military
mission responsibility for training Comoros' defense force. He also
signed an agreement with France to allow its navy full use of Comoran
port facilities.
Making the most of Comoros' new presidential system, Abdallah induced
the nation's National Assembly to enact a twelve-year ban on political
parties, a move that guaranteed his reelection in 1984. In 1979 his
government arrested Soilih regime members who had not already left or
been killed during the 1978 coup. Four former ministers of the Soilih
government disappeared and allegedly were murdered, and about 300 other
Soilih supporters were imprisoned without trial. For the next three
years, occasional trials were held, in many cases only after France had
insisted on due process for the prisoners.
Although the restoration of good relations with France represented a
sharp break with the policies of the previous regime, Abdallah built on
Soilih's efforts to find new sources of diplomatic and economic support.
Thanks in large part to aid from the European Community (EC) and the Arab states, the regime began to upgrade roads,
telecommunications, and port facilities. The government also accepted
international aid for programs to increase the cultivation of cash crops
and food for domestic consumption. Abdallah endeavored to maintain the
relations established by Soilih with China, Nigeria, and Tanzania, and
to expand Comoros' contacts in the Islamic world with visits to Libya
and the Persian Gulf states.
Despite international assistance, economic development was slow.
Although some Comorans blamed the French, who had yet to restore
technical assistance to pre-1975 levels, others suspected that Abdallah,
who owned a large import-export firm, was enriching himself from
development efforts with the assistance of Denard, who continued to
visit Comoros.
Opposition to the Abdallah regime began to appear as early as 1979,
with the formation of an exile-dominated group that became known as the
United National Front of Comorans--Union of Comorans (Front National Uni
des Komoriens--Union des Komoriens--FNUK-- Unikom). In 1980 the Comoran
ambassador to France, Said Ali Kemal, resigned his position to form
another opposition group, the National Committee for Public Safety
(Comité National de Salut Public). A failed coup in February 1981, led
by a former official of the Soilih regime, resulted in arrests of about
forty people.
In regard to Mahoré, Abdallah offered little more than verbal
resistance to a 1979 decision of the French government to postpone
action on the status of the island until 1984. At the same time, he kept
the door open to Mahoré by writing a large measure of autonomy for the
component islands of the republic into the 1978 constitution and by
appointing a Mahorais as his government's minister of finance. Having
established an administration that, in comparison with the Soilih years,
seemed tolerable to his domestic and international constituencies,
Abdallah proceeded to entrench himself. He did this through domestic and
international policies that would profoundly compromise Comoros'
independence and create the chronic crisis that continued to
characterize Comoran politics and government in 1994.
The Undermining of the Political Process
In February 1982, Comoros became a one-party state. The government
designated Abdallah's newly formed Comoran Union for Progress (Union
Comorienne pour le Progrès--UCP) as the republic's sole political
party. Although unaffiliated individuals could run for local and
national office, the only party that could organize on behalf of
candidates henceforth would be the UCP. In March 1982 elections, all but
one of Abdallah's handpicked UCP candidates won. UCP candidates likewise
dominated the May 1983 National Assembly elections, and opposition
candidates attempting to stand for election in balloting for the three
islands' legislative councils in July were removed from the lists by the
Ministry of Interior. Abdallah himself was elected to a second six-year
term as head of state in September 1984, winning more than 99 percent of
the vote as the sole candidate. During the National Assembly elections
of March 22, 1987, the Abdallah regime arrested 400 poll watchers from
opposition groups. A state radio announcement that one non-UCP delegate
had been elected was retracted the next day.
Abdallah also kept opponents from competing with him in the arena of
legitimate politics by reshuffling his government and amending the 1978
constitution. As part of what one observer wryly called the process of
"remov[ing] his most avid successors from temptation,"
Abdallah pushed through a constitutional amendment in 1985 that
abolished the post of prime minister, a move that made the president
both head of state and head of the elected government. The amendment
also diminished the status of Ali Mroudjae, the erstwhile prime minister
and a likely future candidate for president. Another 1985 amendment took
away many of the powers of the president of the National Assembly,
including his right to become interim head of state in the event of the
incumbent's death. The amendment transferred the right of succession to
the president of the Supreme Court, an appointee of the head of state.
Feeling the effect of this second amendment was assembly president
Mohamed Taki, another man generally regarded as presidential timber.
Mroudjae's subsequent career in the Abdallah government illustrated
the way in which Abdallah used frequent reshufflings of his cabinet to
eliminate potential challengers. Mroudjae's next job was to share duties
as minister of state with four other people; he was removed from the
government altogether in another reshuffle four months later.
Looking to the end of his second (and, according to the constitution,
final) term as head of state, Abdallah created a commission in 1988 to
recommend changes to the constitution. These changes, among other
things, would permit him to run yet again in 1990. A referendum on
revisions to the constitution was scheduled for November 4, 1989.
A weak, divided, and opportunistic opposition facilitated Abdallah's
efforts to undermine the political process. The character of Comoran
politics ensured that opposition would be sustained by an unwieldy group
of strong personalities. As the personal stock of these would-be leaders
rose and fell, coalitions coalesced and just as quickly fell apart in a
process that engendered distrust and cynicism. The ban on opposition
political organizations at home--brutally upheld, when necessary, by the
Presidential Guard (Garde Presidentelle--GP) and the Comoran
military--further undercut efforts to organize against the head of
state. The French government's displeasure at intrigues of Comoran
exiles in Paris also complicated opposition efforts.
Given the absence of an ideological basis for resisting the regime,
it was also not surprising that some opposition leaders were willing to
ally themselves with the head of state if such a move appeared likely to
advance them personally. For example, Mouzaoir Abdallah, leader of the
opposition Union for a Democratic Republic in Comoros (Union pour une République
Démocratique aux Comores--URDC), appeared with the president at
independence day celebrations in July 1988 amid rumors that the URDC
chief was being considered for a reconstituted prime minister's office.
In September 1988 another opposition leader, Said Hachim, agreed to join
the commission considering revisions to the constitution.
The credibility of Abdallah's opponents was also damaged by the
efforts of one opposition leader, former ambassador to France Said Ali
Kemal, to recruit mercenaries to help overthrow the Abdallah government.
Arrested in Australia in late 1983, six of the mercenaries gave
testimony discrediting Kemal.
Mercenary Rule
Abdallah complemented his political maneuvers by employing a GP
officered by many of the same mercenaries who had helped him take power
in 1978. Denard led this force, and also became heavily involved in
Comoran business activities, sometimes acting in partnership with
President Abdallah or as a front for South African business interests,
which played a growing role in the Comoran economy during the Abdallah
regime.
Although Denard had made a ceremonial departure from Comoros
following the 1978 coup, by the early 1980s he was again openly active
in the islands. The GP, whose numbers were reported to range from 300 to
700 members, primarily indigenous Comorans, were led by about thirty
French and Belgian mercenaries, mostly comrades of Denard's in the
post-World War II conflicts that accompanied the decolonization of
Africa and Asia. Answerable only to the president, the GP operated
outside the chain of command of the French-trained 1,000-member Comoran
Armed Forces, a situation that caused resentment among the regular
military, Comoran citizens, and other African states.
The GP's primary missions were to protect the president and to deter
attempts to overthrow his government. During the July 1983 elections to
the three islands' legislative councils, the GP beat and arrested
demonstrators protesting the republic's singleparty system. During
elections to the National Assembly in March 1987, the GP--which had
become known as les affreux, "the
frighteners"--replaced several hundred dissident poll watchers who
had been arrested by the army. On March 8, 1985, one of the most serious
attempts to overthrow the Abdallah government began as a mutiny by about
thirty Comoran troops of the GP against their European officers. The
disaffected guards had formed ties to the Democratic Front (Front Démocratique--FD),
one of the more nationalistic of the republic's many banned political
parties. The mutiny was quickly squelched; three of the rebellious
guards were killed, and the rest were taken prisoners.
President Abdallah used the uprising as an opportunity to round up
dissidents, primarily FD members, whose leadership denied involvement in
the coup attempt. Later in 1985, seventyseven received convictions;
seventeen, including the FD's secretary general, Mustapha Said Cheikh,
were sentenced to life imprisonment at hard labor. Most of the prisoners
were released in 1986 following Amnesty International charges of illegal
arrests, torture, and other abuses. France had also exerted pressure by
temporarily withholding new aid projects and purchases of Comoran
vanilla.
Perhaps the most notorious action of the GP on behalf of the Abdallah
government occurred in November 1987. After an apparent attempt by
dissidents to free some political prisoners, an event quickly labeled a
coup attempt by the Abdallah regime, the GP arrested fourteen alleged
plotters and tortured seven of them to death. Officials of the Comoran
government apparently were not allowed to participate in the prisoners'
interrogation. President Abdallah was on a state visit to Egypt at the
time.
With Abdallah's acquiescence and occasional participation, Denard and
the other GP officers used their connections to the head of state to
make themselves important players in the Comoran economy. Denard was a
part owner of Établissements Abdallah et Fils, Comoros' largest
import-export firm, whose primary owner was President Abdallah. Denard
also owned and operated a highly profitable commercial shuttle between
South Africa and Comoros, and owned Sogecom, a private security firm
with contracts to protect South African hotels being built in the
islands.
The GP officers, sympathetic to South Africa's apartheid government,
established themselves as a conduit of South African investment and
influence in Comoros. An official South African trade representative
conceded that a number of his country's investment projects, including a
525-hectare experimental farm, housing, road construction, and a medical
evacuation program, were brokered and managed by guard officers at the
mercenaries' insistence.
The GP also arranged for South African commercial aircraft to fly in
the Middle East and parts of Africa under the aegis of the Comoran
national airline, in contravention of international sanctions against
South Africa. Furthermore, the GP provided for South African use of
Comoran territory as a base for intelligence gathering in the Mozambique
Channel and as a staging area for the shipment of arms to rightist
rebels in Mozambique. The GP was widely understood to be funded by South
Africa, at the rate of about US$3 million per year.
Comoros as Client State: The Economics of Abdallah
President Abdallah generally put his personal interests ahead of
national interests in making economic policy. The result was the
creation of a client state whose meager and unpredictable cash crop
earnings were supplemented with increasing infusions of foreign aid.
Throughout the 1980s, export earnings from Comoros' four main cash
crops--vanilla, ylang-ylang, cloves, and copra--experienced a wrenching
sequence of booms and collapses because of weather and market factors,
or else steadily dwindled. The regime's principal form of response was
to apply the president's considerable diplomatic skills to developing an
extensive network of governments and international organizations willing
to extend loans and donate aid. The main suppliers were France, South
Africa, the EC, the conservative Arab states, the World Bank and related
organs, and regional financial institutions such as the Arab Bank for
Economic Development in Africa and the African Development Bank. Some
assistance went to projects of indisputable value, such as efforts to
create independent news media and improve telephone communications with
the outside world. Much of the aid, however, was questionable--for
example, loans and grants to help the republic meet the payroll for its
oversized civil service. Other more plausible projects, such as the
protracted development of a seaport at the town of Mutsamudu,
construction of paved ring roads linking each island's coastal
settlements, and the building of power stations, nonetheless tended to
be instances of placing the cart before the horse. That is,
capital-intensive improvements to infrastructure had not been
coordinated with local development projects; hence, little, if any,
domestic commerce existed to benefit from road networks, electrical
power, and world-class port facilities. The importation of huge
quantities of building materials and construction equipment provided
immediate benefits to importexport firms in the islands, of which Établissements
Abdallah et Fils was the largest. In the meantime, the projects were of
little immediate use to Comorans and were likely to go underused for
years to come.
Throughout the Abdallah period, rice imports drained as much as 50
percent of Comoran export earnings. Projects to increase food
self-sufficiency, as one observer noted, "fail[ed] to respond to
the largesse" provided by international sponsors such as the
European Development Fund and the International Fund for Agricultural
Development. The president joined with vanilla growers in resisting
international pressure to divert vanillaproducing land to the
cultivation of corn and rice for domestic consumption. He also declined
to heed World Bank advice to impose tariffs and domestic taxes on
imported rice. Abdallah's importexport firm was heavily involved in
vanilla exports, as well as in the importation of Far Eastern rice at
three times its price at the source.
Abdallah's firm, whose co-owners included Denard and Kalfane and
Company, a Pakistani concern, also profited from managing the
importation of materials used by South African firms in developing
tourist hotels. Little of the material used in building these resorts
was of Comoran origin. Also, once completed, the resorts would be almost
entirely owned and managed by non-Comorans. Although tourism, mainly by
South Africans who were unwelcome in other African resorts, was widely
considered the only promising new industry in Comoros, Abdallah guided
its development so that resorts benefited few Comorans other than
himself and his associates.
Under Abdallah's tutelage, the Comoran economy finished the 1980s
much as it had started the decade--poor, underdeveloped, and dependent
on export earnings from cash crops of unpredictable and generally
declining value. The critical difference, with enormous implications for
the republic's capacity to have some say in its own destiny, was its new
status as a nation abjectly in debt. By 1988, the last full year of the
Abdallah regime, 80 percent of annual public expenditures were funded by
external aid.
The Demise of Abdallah, 1989
Only weeks before the violent end of the Abdallah regime in late
1989, one observer noted that "Comoros is still run like a village,
with a handful of tough men in charge and supported by foreign
aid." As Comorans prepared for a November 4, 1989, referendum on
constitutional changes that would enable President Abdallah to run for a
third term in 1990, human rights remained in precarious condition, and
the only avenue of economic advancement for most islanders--the civil
service--faced cutbacks at the urging of the World Bank and the
International Monetary Fund (IMF). Even those who would keep their
government jobs, however, were not guaranteed economic security. As
often occurred whenever export earnings slid, civil servants had not
been paid since mid-summer.
The official result of the referendum was a 92.5 percent majority in
favor of the amendments proposed by Abdallah, which now created
"the conditions for a life presidency," warned one opposition
leader. Balloting was marked by the now customary manipulation by the
government. Opposition groups reported that polling places lacked
private voting booths, government officials blocked the entry of
opposition poll watchers, and the army and police removed ballot boxes
before voting ended. Reaction to these abuses was unusually angry. In
Njazidja voters smashed ballot boxes rather than have them carted away
by the army; the governor's office was set on fire in Nzwani, and a bomb
was found outside the home of the minister of finance in Moroni. More
than 100 people were arrested following the election, and in subsequent
weeks the international media described a deteriorating situation in the
islands; the head of state claimed that France "authorizes
terrorism in the Comoros," and leaders of the banned opposition in
bold public statements questioned the legitimacy of the referendum.
President Abdallah was shot to death on the night of November 26-27,
reportedly while asleep in his residence, the Beit el Salama (House of
Peace). At first his death was seen as a logical outcome of the tense
political situation following what was, in effect, his self-appointment
as head of state for life. The recently dismissed head of the Comoran
military was duly blamed for the murder.
Evidence emerged subsequently that Abdallah's assassination resulted
from the late president's proposed actions with regard to the GP. In
September 1989, Abdallah had engaged a French military consultant, who
determined that the GP should be absorbed into the regular army.
Following consultations among Abdallah, the French government, and South
Africa's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a decision was made to expel
Denard and his fellow officers of the GP by the end of 1989. Denard and
his second in command were seen walking with Abdallah only hours before
he died. Although the mercenary initially blamed the assassination on
the Comoran army, he later conceded that he was in Abdallah's office
when the president was killed, but called the shooting "an accident
due to the general state of mayhem" in the Beit al Salama.
Two days later, on November 29, the real reasons for the
assassination emerged when Denard and the GP seized control of the
government in a coup. Twenty-seven police officers were killed, hundreds
of people were arrested, and all journalists were confined to their
hotels. The mercenaries disarmed the regular army, ousted provisional
president Haribon Chebani, who as chief of the Supreme Court had
succeeded Abdallah, and installed Mohamed Said Djohar, who just three
days earlier had become chief of the Supreme Court, as Comoros' third
president in less than a week.
The immediate reaction of the republic's two main supporters, France
and South Africa, was to isolate Denard. South Africa, admitting years
of funding of the GP, cut off all aid. France began a military build-up
on Mahoré and likewise suspended aid. On December 7, anti-Denard
demonstrations by about 1,000 students and workers were violently broken
up by the protests. By then the islands' school system had shut down,
and the civil service had gone on strike. Faced with an untenable
situation, Denard surrendered to French forces without a fight on
December 15. Along with about two dozen comrades, he was flown to
Pretoria and put under house arrest. The French government later
announced that Denard would remain in detention in South Africa pending
the outcome of a French judicial inquiry into Abdallah's death. In
February 1993 he returned to France, where he was initially arrested,
tried, and exonerated of involvement in the death of Abdallah.
Comoros - The Issue of Mahoré
One of the touchiest issues in the negotiations between Comoros and
France over independence in the early 1970s had been whether the 1974
referendum would be considered for the Comoros archipelago as a whole or
on an island-by-island basis. Opposition to independence on Mahoré was
organized by the Mayotte Popular Movement (Mouvement Populaire
Mahorais--MPM), an organization that had been founded in the 1960s by
Zeina M'Dere, a spokeswoman for Mahoré shopkeepers, mostly women, who
had been affected economically when the colonial capital was moved from
the Mahoré town of Dzaoudzi to Moroni on Njazidja in 1962.
The reasons behind Mahoré's 65 percent vote against independence
were several. First, the people of Mahoré considered themselves
culturally, religiously, and linguistically distinct from those of the
other three islands; they felt that their long association with France
(since 1841) had given their island a distinct Creole character like
that of Reunion or Seychelles. Second, given Mahoré's smaller
population, greater natural resources, and higher standard of living,
the Mahorais thought that their island would be economically viable
within a French union and ought not to be brought down to the level of
the other three poorer islands. Third, most Mahorais apparently felt
that Mahoré's future within a Comoran state would not be a comfortable
one, given a perception of neglect that had begun with the much resented
transfer of the capital.
In France and among conservatives on Reunion, the 1974 vote on Mahoré
in favor of continued association with France was greeted with great
enthusiasm. Comoran leaders, in contrast, accused the MPM and its
leader, Marcel Henri, of fabricating the illusion of Mahorais
"uniqueness" to preserve the power of Mahoré's non-Muslim,
Creole elite. The issue poisoned Comoran relations with France,
particularly because the Indian Ocean lobby, whose leaders included
Reunion's deputy to the French National Assembly, Michel Debré, pushed
for a "Mayotte française" (French Mayotte). Apparently
leaning toward the interpretation that the December 1974 referendum was
an island-by-island plebiscite, the French legislature voted in June
1975 to postpone independence for six months and hold a second
referendum. The Abdallah government responded by declaring independence
unilaterally on July 6, 1975, for all Comoro Islands, including Mahoré.
France reacted by cutting off financial aid, which provided 41 percent
of the national budget. Fearing a Comoran attempt to assert control of
Mahoré forcibly, France sent members of the Foreign Legion from Reunion
and a fleet of three vessels to patrol the waters around the island on
July 6-7. On November 12, 1975, the UN General Assembly passed a
resolution giving Comoros UN membership and recognized its claims to
Mahoré, which France opposed.
French policy toward Mahoré had been, in the words of one observer,
"to cultivate a more or less honest majority for reunification
among the uncooperative Mahorais," particularly after the
forthrightly anti-French regime of Ali Soilih ended in 1978. By
contrast, the Mahorais' objective appeared to be full departmental
status such as that of Reunion, where residents enjoyed full rights as
French citizens. In a 1976 referendum, the Mahorais expressed
dissatisfaction with their status as an overseas territory. France then
created a new classification for Mahoré--territorial community (collectivité
territoriale)--under which Mahoré was administered by a prefect
appointed by the French government. Local government consisted of a
popularly elected seventeen-member General Council. The island was
entitled to send elected representatives to Paris, one each to the
National Assembly and the Senate. The French franc served as the
currency of the island. This status still applied in 1993.
After it appeared that Mahoré would not be tempted by the federalist
design of Ahmed Abdallah's 1978 constitution to join the Republic of the
Comoros, the National Assembly in Paris decided in 1979 to prolong the
existence of the collectivité territoriale until a 1984
plebiscite, resolving meanwhile to study the situation and consult with
the islanders. In late 1984, with an overwhelming vote to remain
associated with France in the offing, the French government postponed
the plebiscite indefinitely. By late 1993, it had still not been held,
the Mahorais apparently still eager to remain part of France and as
disinclined as ever to reunite with the three troubled islands to their
immediate west.
Although many politically conservative French relished the Mahorais'
popular vow that nous resterons français pour rester libre
("we will remain French to remain free"), the Mahoré
situation caused some discomfort for France internationally. Every year,
resolutions calling on France to relinquish Mahoré to Comoros passed
with near unanimity in the UN, and the OAU likewise issued annual
condemnations. Although Comoran official distaste for the situation
became more muted in the 1980s and 1990s, the Comoran government
continued to draw French attention to the issue. In May 1990, newly
elected president Said Mohamed Djohar called for peaceful dialogue and
French review of Mahoré's status. But feeling obligated not to change
the Mahorais' status against their will, the French could do little.
Anti-Comoran riots and demonstrations, and the formation of an
anti-immigrant paramilitary group on Mahoré in response to the presence
of illegal Comoran immigrants, were also sources of embarrassment to
France.
The economy of Mahoré in some ways resembles that of Comoros. Rice,
cassava, and corn are cultivated for domestic consumption; ylang-ylang
and vanilla are the primary exports. The main imports, whose value far
outstripped that of exports, are foodstuffs, machinery and appliances,
transport equipment, and metals. Construction, primarily of
French-funded public works, is the only industrial activity.
A five-year development plan (1986-91) focused on large-scale public
projects, principally construction of a deepwater port at Longoni and an
airport at the capital, Dzaoudzi. The plan and its two main projects
were later extended through 1993. Despite Mahoré's great natural
beauty, tourism was inhibited by a dearth of hotel rooms and the
island's isolated location.
Under French administration, Mahoré had generally enjoyed domestic
peace and stability, although tensions appeared to be rising by the
early 1990s. In the summer of 1991, the relocation of people from their
homes to allow the expansion of the airport met with vociferous
protests, mostly by young people. The protests soon grew into violent
demonstrations against the local government's administration of the
island. Paramilitary attacks on Comoran immigrants occurred in June
1992, and a February 1993 general strike for higher wages ended in
rioting. Security forces from Reunion and France were called in to
restore order.
Comoros - PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT
The Comoros archipelago consists of four main islands aligned along a
northwest-southeast axis at the north end of the Mozambique Channel,
between Mozambique and the island of Madagascar. Still widely known by their French names, the islands officially
have been called by their Swahili names by the Comoran government. They
are Njazidja (Grande Comore), Mwali (Mohéli), Nzwani (Anjouan), and
Mahoré (Mayotte). The islands' distance from each other--Njazidja is
some 200 kilometers from Mahoré, forty kilometers from Mwali, and
eighty kilometers from Nzwani--along with a lack of good harbor
facilities, make transportation and communication difficult. The islands
have a total land area of 2,236 square kilometers (including Mahoré),
and claim territorial waters of 320 kilometers.
Njazidja is the largest island, sixty-seven kilometers long and
twenty-seven kilometers wide, with a total area of 1,146 square
kilometers. The most recently formed of the four islands in the
archipelago, it is also of volcanic origin. Two volcanoes form the
island's most prominent topographic features: La Grille in the north,
with an elevation of 1,000 meters, is extinct and largely eroded;
Kartala in the south, rising to a height of 2,361 meters, last erupted
in 1977. A plateau averaging 600 to 700 meters high connects the two
mountains. Because Njazidja is geologically a relatively new island, its
soil is thin and rocky and cannot hold water. As a result, water from
the island's heavy rainfall must be stored in catchment tanks. There are
no coral reefs along the coast, and the island lacks a good harbor for
ships. One of the largest remnants of Comoros' once-extensive rain
forests is on the slopes of Kartala. The national capital has been at
Moroni since 1962.
Nzwani, triangular shaped and forty kilometers from apex to base, has
an area of 424 square kilometers. Three mountain chains--Sima,
Nioumakele, and Jimilime--emanate from a central peak, Mtingui (1,575
meters), giving the island its distinctive shape. Older than Njazidja,
Nzwani has deeper soil cover, but overcultivation has caused serious
erosion. A coral reef lies close to shore; the island's capital of
Mutsamudu is also its main port.
Mwali is thirty kilometers long and twelve kilometers wide, with an
area of 290 square kilometers. It is the smallest of the four islands
and has a central mountain chain reaching 860 meters at its highest.
Like Njazidja, it retains stands of rain forest. Mwali's capital is
Fomboni.
Mahoré, geologically the oldest of the four islands, is thirty-nine
kilometers long and twenty-two kilometers wide, totaling 375 square
kilometers, and its highest points are between 500 and 600 meters above
sea level. Because of greater weathering of the volcanic rock, the soil
is relatively rich in some areas. A well-developed coral reef that
encircles much of the island ensures protection for ships and a habitat
for fish. Dzaoudzi, capital of Comoros until 1962 and now Mahoré's
administrative center, is situated on a rocky outcropping off the east
shore of the main island. Dzaoudzi is linked by a causeway to le
Pamanzi, which at ten kilometers in area is the largest of several
islets adjacent to Mahoré. Islets are also scattered in the coastal
waters of Njazidja, Nzwani, and Mwali.
Comoran waters are the habitat of the coelacanth, a rare fish with
limblike fins and a cartilaginous skeleton, the fossil remains of which
date as far back as 400 million years and which was once thought to have
become extinct about 70 million years ago. A live specimen was caught in
1938 off southern Africa; other coelacanths have since been found in the
vicinity of the Comoro Islands.
Several mammals are unique to the islands themselves. The macao, a
lemur found only on Mahoré, is protected by French law and by local
tradition. Another, Livingstone's fruit bat, although plentiful when
discovered by explorer David Livingstone in 1863, has been reduced to a
population of about 120, entirely on Nzwani. The world's largest bat,
the jet-black Livingstone fruit bat has a wingspan of nearly two meters.
A British preservation group sent an expedition to Comoros in 1992 to
bring some of the bats to Britain to establish a breeding population.
Humboldt's flycatcher is perhaps the best known of the birds native to
Comoros. .
Partly in response to international pressures, Comorans in the 1990s
have become more concerned about the environment. Steps are being taken
not only to preserve the rare fauna, but also to counteract degradation
of the environment, especially on densely populated Nzwani.
Specifically, to minimize the cutting down of trees for fuel, kerosene
is being subsidized, and efforts are being made to replace the loss of
the forest cover caused by ylang-ylang distillation for perfume. The
Community Development Support Fund, sponsored by the International
Development Association (IDA) and the Comoran government, is working to
improve water supply on the islands as well.
The climate is marine tropical, with two seasons: hot and humid from
November to April, the result of the northeastern monsoon, and a cooler,
drier season the rest of the year. Average monthly temperatures range
from 23° C to 28° C along the coasts. Although the average annual
precipitation is 2,000 millimeters, water is a scarce commodity in many
parts of Comoros. Mwali and Mahoré possess streams and other natural
sources of water, but Njazidja and Nzwani, whose mountainous landscapes
retain water poorly, are almost devoid of naturally occurring running
water. Cyclones, occurring during the hot and wet season, can cause
extensive damage, especially in coastal areas. On the average, at least
twice each decade houses, farms, and harbor facilities are devastated by
these great storms.
Comoros - SOCIETY AND CULTURE
The most recent official census by the Comoran government, conducted
in 1991, put the islands' population, exclusive of Mahoré, at 446,817.
Official counts put the population of Mahoré at 67,167 in 1985 and
94,410 in 1991--a 40 percent increase in just six years.
Average population density in Comoros was 183 persons per square
kilometer in 1980. This figure concealed a great disparity between the
republic's most crowded island, Nzwani, which had a density of 470
persons per square kilometer in 1991; Njazidja, which had a density of
250 persons per square kilometer in 1991; and Mwali, where the 1991
population density figure was 120 persons per square kilometer. Overall
population density increased to about 285 persons per square kilometer
by 1994. Mahoré's population density went from 179 persons per square
kilometer in 1985 to 251 per square kilometer in 1991.
By comparison, estimates of the population density per square
kilometer of the Indian Ocean's other island microstates ranged from 241
(Seychelles) to 690 (Maldives) in 1993. Given the rugged terrain of
Njazidja and Nzwani, and the dedication of extensive tracts to
agriculture on all three islands, population pressures on Comoros are
becoming increasingly critical. A similar situation obtains on Mahoré.
The age structure of the population of Comoros is similar to that of
many developing countries, in that the republic has a very large
proportion of young people. In 1989, 46.4 percent of the population was
under fifteen years of age, an above-average proportion even for
sub-Saharan Africa. The population's rate of growth was a relatively
high 3.5 percent per annum in the mid1980s , up substantially from 2.0
percent in the mid-1970s and 2.1 percent in the mid-1960s.
In 1983 the Abdallah regime borrowed US$2.85 million from the IDA to
devise a national family planning program. However, Islamic reservations
about contraception made forthright advocacy and implementation of birth
control programs politically hazardous, and consequently little was done
in the way of public policy.
The Comoran population has become increasingly urbanized in recent
years. In 1991 the percentage of Comorans residing in cities and towns
of more than 5,000 persons was about 30 percent, up from 25 percent in
1985 and 23 percent in 1980. Comoros' largest cities were the capital,
Moroni, with about 30,000 people, and the port city of Mutsamudu, on the
island of Nzwani, with about 20,000 people. Mahoré's capital, Dzaoudzi,
had a population of 5,865 according to the 1985 census; the island's
largest town, Mamoudzou, had 12,026 people.
Migration among the various islands is relatively small. Natives of
Njazidja often settle in less crowded Mwali, and before independence
people from Nzwani commonly moved to Mahoré. In 1977 Mahoré expelled
peasants from Njazidja and Nzwani who had recently settled in large
numbers on the island. Some were allowed to reenter starting in 1981 but
solely as migrant labor.
The number of Comorans living abroad has been estimated at between
80,000 and 100,000; most of them lived in Tanzania, Madagascar, and
other parts of East Africa. The number of Comorans residing in
Madagascar was drastically reduced after anti-Comoran rioting in
December 1976 in Mahajanga, in which at least 1,400 Comorans were
killed. As many as 17,000 Comorans left Madagascar to seek refuge in
their native land in 1977 alone. About 40,000 Comorans live in France;
many of them had gone there for a university education and never
returned. Small numbers of Indians, Malagasy, South Africans, and
Europeans live on the islands and play an important role in the economy.
The Comoran people are a blend of African, Arab, and MalayoIndonesian
elements. A few small communities, primarily in Mahoré, speak kibushi,
a Malagasy dialect. The principal Comoran Swahili dialect, written in
Arabic script, is related to the Swahili spoken in East Africa but is
not easily intelligible to East African Swahili speakers. Classical
Arabic is significant for religious reasons, and French remains the
principal language with which the Republic of the Comoros communicates
with the rest of the world.
A number of ethnically distinguishable groups are found: the Arabs,
descendants of Shirazi settlers, who arrived in significant numbers in
the fifteenth century; the Cafres, an African group that settled on the
islands before the coming of the Shirazi; a second African group, the
Makoa, descendants of slaves brought by the Arabs from the East African
coast; and three groups of Malayo-Indonesian peoples--the Oimatsaha, the
Antalotes, and the Sakalava, the latter having settled largely on Mahoré.
Intermarriage has tended to blur the distinctions among these groups,
however. Creoles, descendants of French settlers who intermarried with
the indigenous peoples, form a tiny but politically influential group on
Mahoré, numbering no more than about 100 on that island. They are
predominantly Roman Catholic and mainly cultivate small plantations. In
addition, a small group of people descended in part from the Portuguese
sailors who landed on the Comoro Islands at the beginning of the
sixteenth century are reportedly living around the town of Tsangadjou on
the east coast of Njazidja.
Shirazi Arab royal clans dominated the islands socially, culturally,
and politically from the fifteenth century until the French occupation.
Eleven such clans lived on Njazidja, where their power was strongest,
and their leaders, the sultans or sharifs, who claimed to be descendants
of the Prophet Muhammad, were in a continual state of war until the
French occupation. Two similar clans were located on Nzwani, and these
clans maintained vassals on Mahoré and Mwali after the Sakalava wiped
out the local nobles in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth
centuries . Although the clan system was weakened by the economic and
social dislocations of the colonial era, the descendants of clan nobles
continue to form a major portion of the educated and propertied classes.
The pre-independence rivalry of Said Mohamed Cheikh and Prince Said
Ibrahim, leaders, respectively, of the conservative Parti Vert and the
Parti Blanc, was interpreted by some as a revival of old clan
antagonisms. Yet many descendants of nobles live in poverty and
apparently have less influence socially and politically on Nzwani than
on Njazidja.
The present-day elite, although composed in part of those of noble
ancestry who took advantage of the opportunities of the cash crop
economy established by the French, is mainly defined in terms of wealth
rather than caste or descent. This focus on wealth is not unusual,
considering that the original Shirazi settlers themselves were traders
and that the precolonial sultans were actively involved in commerce.
Conspicuous consumption continues to mark the lifestyle of the elite.
Especially well regarded are those individuals who hold the grand
mariage, often after a lifetime of scrimping and saving. This
wedding ceremony, which can cost as much as the equivalent of US$20,000
to US$30,000, involves an exchange of expensive gifts between the
couple's families and feasts for an entire village. Although the gift
giving and dancing that accompany the grand mariage have helped
perpetuate indigenous arts in silversmithing, goldsmithing, folk song,
and folk dance, the waste involved has disastrous consequences for an
economy already short on domestic resources. A ban or curb on the grand
mariage was on the agenda of many reformers in the period preceding
the radical regime of Ali Soilih, who himself had taken the almost
unheard-of step of declining to participate in the ritual. However, the
efforts of the Soilih government to restrict the custom aroused great
resentment, and it was restored to its preeminent place in Comoran
society almost immediately after Soilih was deposed in 1978. Although
its expense limits the number of families that can provide their sons
and daughters a grand mariage, the ritual is still used as a
means of distinguishing Comoran society's future leaders. Only by
participating in the ceremony is a Comoran man entitled to participate
in his village's assembly of notables and to wear the mharuma,
a sash that entitles him to enter the mosque by a special door. Few, if
any, candidates win election to the National Assembly without a grand
mariage in their pasts. For these reasons in particular, critics of
traditional Comoran society condemn the grand mariage as a
means of excluding people of modest resources from participating in the
islands' political life.
Those who can afford the pilgrimage to Mecca are also accorded
prestige. The imams who lead prayers in mosques form a distinct elite
group.
Despite the weakening of the position of the Shirazi elite, one
observer reports that in many subtle ways old distinctions persist. The
descendants of slaves, formally emancipated in 1904, are mostly
sharecroppers or squatters, working the land that belonged to their
ancestors' former owners, although some have gone abroad as migrant
laborers (a greatly restricted option since Madagascar's expulsion of
thousands of Comorans in the late 1970s). Men of "freeborn"
families choose "freeborn" wives, holding, if possible, a grand
mariage; but if they take second wives, these women often are of
slave ancestry.
Comoros - Status of Women
Among men who can afford it, the preferred form of marriage appears
to be polygyny with matrilocal residence. Although possible, the first
marriage is formally initiated with the grand mariage when
possible, subsequent unions involve much simpler ceremonies. The result
is that a man will establish two or even more households and will
alternate residence between them, a reflection, most likely, of the
trading origins of the Shirazi elite who maintained wives at different
trading posts. Said Mohamed Djohar, elected president in 1990, had two
wives, one in Njazidja and the other in Nzwani, an arrangement said to
have broadened his appeal to voters. For men, divorce is easy, although
by custom a divorced wife retains the family home.
Islamic law recognizes only male ownership and inheritance of land.
In Comoros, however, certain landholdings called magnahouli are
controlled by women and inherited through the female line, apparently in
observance of a surviving matriarchal African tradition.
Despite their lower economic status, women married to farmers or
laborers often move about more freely than their counterparts among the
social elite, managing market stands or working in the fields. On Mwali,
where traditional Islamic values are less dominant, women generally are
not as strictly secluded. Women constituted 40.4 percent of the work
force in 1990, a figure slightly above average for sub-Saharan Africa.
Girls are somewhat less likely than boys to attend school in Comoros.
The World Bank estimated in 1993 that 67 percent of girls were enrolled
in primary schools, whereas 82 percent of boys were enrolled. In
secondary school, 15 percent of eligible Comoran girls were in
attendance, in comparison with about 19 percent of eligible boys.
Although the 1992 constitution recognizes their right to suffrage, as
did the 1978 constitution, women otherwise play a limited role in
politics in Comoros. By contrast, in Mahoré female merchants sparked
the movement for continued association with France, and later, for
continued separation from the Republic of the Comoros.
Comoros accepted international aid for family planning in 1983, but
it was considered politically inexpedient to put any plans into effect.
According to a 1993 estimate, there were 6.8 births per woman in
Comoros. By contrast, the figure was 6.4 births per woman for the rest
of sub-Saharan Africa.
In one of Comoran society's first acknowledgments of women as a
discrete interest group, the Abdallah government organized a seminar,
"Women, Family, and Development," in 1986. Despite
participants' hopes that programs for family planning and female
literacy would be announced, conference organizers stressed the role of
women in agriculture and family life. Women fared slightly better under
the Djohar regime. In February 1990, while still interim president,
Djohar created a cabinet-level Ministry of Social and Women's Affairs,
and appointed a woman, Ahlonkoba Aithnard, to head it. She lasted until
a few weeks after Djohar's election to the presidency in March, when her
ministry was reorganized out of existence, along with several others.
Another female official, Situ Mohamed, was named to head the second-tier
Ministry of Population and Women's Affairs, in August 1991. She lost her
position--and the subministry was eliminated--hardly a week later, in
one of President Djohar's routine ministerial reshufflings. Djohar made
another nod to women in February 1992, when he invited representatives
of an interest group, the Women's Federation, to take part in
discussions on what would become the constitution of 1992. Women only
apparently organized and participated in a large demonstration critical
of French support of the Djohar regime in October 1992, following
government suppression of a coup attempt.
Comoros - Religion and Education
During the colonial period, the French and local leading citizens
established plantations to grow cash crops for export. Even after
independence, French companies, such as Société Bambao and Établissements
Grimaldi--and other concerns, such as Kalfane and Company and later,
President Abdallah's Établissements Abdallah et Fils--dominated the
Comoran economy. These firms diverted most of their profits overseas,
investing little in the infrastructure of the islands beyond what was
needed for profitable management of the plantations, or what could
benefit these businesses' associates or related concerns. A serious
consequence of this approach has been the languishing of the food-crop
agricultural sector and the resultant dependence on overseas food
imports, particularly rice. In 1993 Comoros remained hostage to
fluctuating prices on the international market for such crops as
vanilla, ylang-ylang, and cloves.
Comoros is one of the world's poorest countries; its per capita gross
national product (GNP) was estimated at US$400 in 1994, following the
January devaluation of the Comoran franc. Although GNP increased in real
terms at an average annual rate of 3.1 percent during the 1980s, rapid
population growth effaced these gains and caused an average annual
decrease in per capita GNP of 0.6 percent. Gross domestic product (GDP)
grew in real terms by 4.2 percent per year from 1980 to 1985, 1.8
percent from 1985 to 1988, and 1.5 percent in 1990. In 1991, because of
its balance of payments difficulties, Comoros became eligible for the
IDA's Special Program of Assistance for debt-distressed countries of
sub-Saharan Africa.
The economy is based on private ownership, frequently by foreign
investors. Nationalization, even during the Soilih years, has been
limited. Soilih did expropriate the facilities of a foreign oil company,
but only after the government of Madagascar took over the company's
plants in that country. The Abdallah government, despite its openness to
foreign participation in the economy, nationalized the Société Bambao
and another Frenchcapitalized firm, the Comoran Meat Company (Société
Comorienne des Viandes--Socovia), which specialized in sales of meat and
other foods in the islands. The nationalization was short-lived,
however, because Socovia and other government-held enterprises were
either liquidated or privatized as part of economic restructuring
efforts in 1992.
Following the Abdallah regime's rapprochement with France in 1978,
the Comoran economy became increasingly dependent on infusions of French
aid, along with assistance from other governments and international
organizations. By 1990, the year Comoros concluded negotiations with the
IMF for an economic restructuring program, the republic's total external
public debt was US$162.4 million, an amount equal to about
three-quarters of GNP. The government delayed implementing the
structural adjustment plan and was directed by the World Bank and the
IMF to do so by September 1992. The plan recommendations entailed
discharging about 2,800 of 9,000 civil servants, among other unpopular
measures. The IMF granted Comoros a new credit for US$1.9 million in
March 1994 under the Structural Adjustment Facility. For the period
1994-96, Comoros sought an economic growth rate of 4 percent as well as
an inflation rate of 4 percent for 1995-96. The growth rate for 1994,
however, was estimated only at 0.7 percent and the inflation rate at 15
percent. Meanwhile, in a move designed to encourage private enterprise
and reduce unemployment, in May 1993 the UN Development Programme had
given Comoros a credit of US$2 million for programs in these areas. In
January 1994, the European Development Fund (EDF) granted 1.3 million
European Currency Units (ECUs) to Comoros to develop small businesses.
Comoros also received 5.7 million French francs from the French Aid and
Cooperation Fund for agriculture and rural development.
The results of foreign aid to Comoros have been mixed at best. The
purposes of the aid ranged from helping the government cover its payroll
for such huge, seemingly endless projects as expanding the seaport at
Moroni and developing a new port at Mutsamuda on Nzwani. Neither project
had shown much promise by early 1994. Meanwhile, the islands have been
unable to develop local resources or create the infrastructure needed
for economic development. The few successes included the creation of
national news media and limited improvements in public health,
education, and telecommunications. Developmental assistance from the
United States, which totaled US$700,000 in fiscal year (FY) 1991, was
administered by CARE, the nongovernmental organization, and focused
primarily on reforestation, soil conservation, and sustainable
agriculture.
The overall effect of the republic's dependence on aid has been
perennial trade deficits accompanied by chronic budget deficits. In 1992
total exports had a value of US$21 million, and total imports were
valued at US$50 million. In 1991 receipts totaled about US$34.7 million
(CF9.7 trillion; CF--Comoran franc) whereas expenditures totaled about
US$93.8 million (CF26.2 trillion). The shortfall, which equaled about
170 percent of receipts, was financed by international grants and loans,
by draws upon existing lines of credit, and by debt rescheduling.
In 1991 France received 55 percent of Comoran exports, followed by
the United States (19 percent) and Germany (16 percent). The main export
products were vanilla, ylang-ylang, and cloves. The republic's primary
suppliers were France (56 percent of imports), the Belgium-Luxembourg
economic union (11 percent), and Japan (5 percent). Imports consisted of
basic foodstuffs (rice and meat), petroleum, and construction materials.
Comoros has officially participated in the African Franc Zone
(Communauté Financière Africaine-- CFA) since 1979. The CFA franc was devalued by 50 percent on
January 12, 1994, causing the exchange rate to become 100 CFA francs for
one French franc. Subsequently, the Comoran franc was devalued so that
instead of being directly aligned with the CFA franc, seventyfive
Comoran francs equaled one French franc.
The banking system consists of the Central Bank of Comoros (Banque
Centrale des Comores) established in 1981; the Bank for Industry and
Commerce (Banque pour l'Industrie et le Commerce-- BIC), a commercial
bank established in 1990 that had six branches in 1993 and was a
subsidiary of the National Bank of Paris-- International (Banque
Nationale de Paris--Internationale); BIC Afribank, a BIC subsidiary; and
the Development Bank of Comoros (Banque de Développement des Comores),
established in 1982, which provided support for small and midsize
development projects. Most of the shares in the Development Bank of
Comoros were held by the Comoran government and the central bank; the
rest were held by the European Investment Bank and the Central Bank for
Economic Cooperation (Caisse Centrale de Coopération Économique--CCCE),
a development agency of the French government. All of these banks had
headquarters in Moroni.
A national labor organization, the Union of Comoran Workers (Union
des Travailleurs des Comores), also had headquarters in Moroni. Strikes
and worker demonstrations often occurred in response to political
crises, economic restructuring mandated by international financial
organizations, and the failure of the government--occasionally for
months at a time--to pay civil servants.
Comoros - Agriculture, Livestock, and Fishing
Agriculture supported about 80 percent of the population and supplied
about 95 percent of exports in the early 1990s. Two agricultural zones
are generally defined: the coastal area, which ranges in elevation from
sea level to 400 meters and which supports cash crops such as vanilla,
ylang-ylang, and cloves; and the highlands, which support cultivation of
crops for domestic consumption, such as cassava, bananas, rain rice, and
sweet potatoes. As the population increased, food grown for domestic use
met fewer and fewer of Comorans' needs. Data collected by the World Bank
showed that food production per capita fell about 12 percent from 1980
to 1987. The republic imported virtually all its meat and vegetables;
rice imports alone often accounted for up to 30 percent of the value of
all imports.
Comoros is the world's principal producer of ylang-ylang essence, an
essence derived from the flowers of a tree originally brought from
Indonesia that is used in manufacturing perfumes and soaps. Ylang-ylang
essence is a major component of Chanel No. 5, the popular scent for
women. The republic is the world's second largest producer of vanilla,
after Madagascar. Cloves are also an important cash crop. A total of 237
tons of vanilla was exported in 1991, at a price of about CF19 per
kilogram. A total of 2,750 tons of cloves was exported in 1991, at a
price of CF397 per kilogram. That year forty-three tons of ylang-ylang
essence were exported at a price of about CF23,000 per kilogram. The
production of all three commodities fluctuates wildly, mainly in
response to changes in global demand and natural disasters such as
cyclones. Profits--and therefore, government receipts-- likewise
skyrocket and plummet, wreaking havoc with government efforts to predict
revenues and plan expenditures. Stabex
(Stabilization of Export Earnings), a system of the EC,
provides aid to Comoros and other developing countries to mitigate the
effects of fluctuations in the prices of export commodities.
Long-term prospects for the growth and stabilization of the markets
for vanilla and ylang-ylang did not appear strong in the early 1990s.
Vanilla faced increased competition from synthetic flavorings, and the
preferences of perfume users were moving away from the sweet fragrance
provided by ylang-ylang essence. Copra, the dried coconut meat that
yields coconut oil, once an important Comoran export, had ceased to be a
significant factor in the economy by the late 1980s, when the world's
tastes shifted from high-fat coconut oil toward "leaner"
substances such as palm oil. Although clove production and revenues also
experienced swings, in the early 1990s cloves did not appear to face the
same sorts of challenges confronting vanilla and ylang-ylang. Most
Comoran vanilla is grown on Njazidja; Nzwani is the source of most
ylangylang .
Numerous international programs have attempted to reduce the
country's dependence on food imports, particularly of rice, a major
drain on export earnings. Organizations initiating these rural
development programs have included the EDF, the IFAD, the World Food
Program, the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa, the UN Food
and Agriculture Organization, and the governments of France and the
United States. Despite these international efforts, which numbered as
many as seventeen in 1984, food production per capita actually declined
in Comoros during the 1980s. The major clove and vanilla growers, whose
plantations occupy the islands' fertile coastal lands, generally
resisted these restructuring efforts, as did rice-importing firms,
including the country's largest, Établissements Abdallah et Fils.
Crowded onto the mountain slopes by the cash crop plantations,
food-crop farmers have caused deforestation and the erosion of the
highlands' thin, fragile soil. In response, aid providers have dedicated
an increasing amount of agricultural assistance to reforestation, soil
restoration, and environmentally sensitive means of cultivation. For
example, all United States agricultural aid in 1991 (US$700,000) was
directed to such projects, as was a US$4 million loan from the IFAD to
help initiate a small producers' support program on Nzwani.
The livestock sector is small--some 47,000 cattle, 120,000 goats,
13,000 sheep, and 4,000 asses in 1990. Comoros continues to import most
domestically consumed meat.
Since the latter part of the 1980s, Comoros has made headway in
developing fisheries as a source of export earnings. In 1988 the
government concluded a three-year agreement with the EC by which forty
French and Spanish vessels would be permitted to fish in Comoran waters,
primarily for tuna. In return, Comoros would receive ECU300,000, and
ECU50,000 would be invested in fisheries research. In addition, fishing
vessel operators would pay ECU20 per ton of tuna netted. Although the
deep waters outside the islands' reefs do not abound in fish, it has
been estimated that up to 30,000 tons of fish could be taken per year
from Comoran waters (which extend 320 kilometers offshore). The total
catch in 1990 was 5,500 tons. Japan has also provided aid to the fishing
industry. Fisheries development is overseen by a state agency, the
Development Company for Small-Scale Fisheries of Comoros (Société de Développement
de la Pêche Artisanale des Comores).
Comoros - Industry and Infrastructure
In the immediate aftermath of the Abdallah assassination and
subsequent events of late 1989, a limited amount of political healing
occurred in Comoros. Denard and his fellow mercenaries were expelled,
although the fate of their vast financial holdings in the islands
remained unclear. With the South African government temporarily out of
the picture, French officials now oversaw the police and the army, and
the remnants of the GP were under the watchful eye of French
paratroopers. Among those released in a general amnesty for political
prisoners was Mustapha Said Cheikh, leader of the opposition FD who had
been imprisoned for four years for alleged involvement in the
unsuccessful March 1985 coup. He was quickly proposed as a possible
presidential candidate. Also suggested was Mohamed Taki, one-time
National Assembly president whose power had been diminished by
Abdallah's constitutional maneuvers; he had subsequently gone into exile
in France, where his entourage reportedly included two mercenary
bodyguards. Also announcing for the presidency was Said Ali Kemal, who
had been living in quiet exile in Paris since being exposed as the
sponsor of Australian mercenaries who had plotted to overthrow the
Abdallah government in 1983. In late December 1989, members of the
formerly banned opposition, along with President Djohar, decided to form
a provisional "national unity" government and to hold a
multiparty presidential election in 1990.
In an awkward but somehow effective campaign to keep himself in
power, Djohar spent much of the early 1990s playing a political shell
game with the opposition. He moved election dates backward and forward
and sanctioned irregularities, giving his opponents little choice but to
condemn the balloting as invalid. Djohar began this strategy within
weeks of his installation as interim president, rescheduling the
presidential election set for January 14, 1990 to February 18. Djohar's
decision was met with demonstrations and violence that marked an abrupt
end to the post-Abdallah period of national unity, hardly three weeks
after Bob Denard had been expelled from the country. The February 18
balloting broke down shortly after the polls opened. The government was
accused of widespread fraud, including issuing multiple voting cards to
some voters and opening the polls to voters who looked well below the
minimum age of eighteen.
Elections were rescheduled for March 4, 1990 with a runoff on March
11; Djohar was the official victor, claiming 55 percent of the vote over
runner-up Mohamed Taki's 45 percent. Djohar had run under the banner of
the Union Comorienne pour le Progrès (Udzima- -Comoran Union for
Progress), basically a recycled version of Ahmed Abdallah's old UCP,
whereas Taki had represented the National Union for Comoran Democracy
(Union Nationale pour la Démocratie Comorien--UNDC). As would be the
case in other Comoran elections in the 1990s, the sole major issue
appeared to be the character and ability of the incumbent president
rather than any matter of public policy or ideology. The Supreme Court
certified the results of the election, despite strong evidence that the
Ministry of Interior had altered the vote count, especially in the first
round, to favor Djohar at Taki's expense.
In March 1992, with two of the government's Udzima ministers having
broken away to form a new party and conflict among the remaining Udzima
ministers growing, Djohar headed off the complete collapse of his
government by convening a multiparty constitutional convention. He
scheduled a referendum on the new document in May, with general
elections in June and balloting for local offices in July. After one
postponement, the referendum was held on June 7. The Constitution of
1992 passed with about 74 percent of the vote, despite intensive
campaigning against it by the FD and Udzima, which by this point opposed
President Djohar. Among the new document's elements were articles
calling for a bicameral legislature and a limit on presidential tenure
to two five-year terms.
The legislative elections, postponed several times, finally were held
on November 22 and 29, 1992. They were preceded in late September by an
attempted coup by junior army officers, allegedly with the support of
opposition politicians. Possible motives for the coup were an unpopular
restructuring program mandated by the World Bank, which entailed sharp
reductions in the number of civil servants, and President Djohar's
ambiguous threat on September 10 that his main opponents would "not
be around for the elections." Djohar used the coup attempt as an
opportunity to jail six military men and six opposition leaders
"under conditions of extreme illegality," according to the
Comoran Association of Human Rights (Association Comorienne des Droits
Humains--ACDH).
Although a trio of French public officials sent to observe the
balloting judged the election generally democratic, President Djohar's
most prominent and determined opponents spent the voting days either in
hiding or in jail. Two of the most important of the republic's
twenty-four political parties, Udzima and the UNDC, boycotted the
election. Given the president's own lack of party support, he spent most
of 1993 cobbling together one government after another; at one point, in
late spring 1993, he formed two governments in the space of three weeks.
The events of a single day in July 1993 perhaps summed up the
near-term prospects of politics in Comoros. On July 23, heeding demands
that he call legislative elections (he had dissolved parliament on June
18 because of its inability to agree to a candidate for prime minister
and because of the lack of a government majority) or else face the
prospect of "other forms of action" by the opposition, Djohar
scheduled voting for late October. That same day, his government
arrested two opposition leaders for public criticism of the president.
The scheduled elections were again postponed--for the fourth
time--until December 1993. On November 17, 1993, Djohar created a new
National Electoral Commission, said to be appropriately representative
of the various political parties. Meanwhile Djohar had established a new
progovernment party, the Rally for Democracy and Renewal (Rassemblement
pour la Démocratie et le Renouveau--RDR). In the first round of
elections on December 12, which featured twenty-four parties with 214
candidates for fortytwo seats, various voting irregularities occurred,
including the failure to issue voting cards to some 30 percent of
eligible voters. The government announced that Djohar's party had won
twenty-one seats with three seats remaining to be contested. Most
opposition parties stated that they would not sit in the assembly and
also refused to participate in the postponed second stage elections,
which were supervised by the Ministry of Interior and the gendarmerie
after the National Electoral Commission disintegrated. As a result, the
RDR gained a total of twenty-two seats, and Djohar appointed RDR
secretary general Mohamed Abdou Madi as prime minister.
Denouncing the proceedings, on January 17, 1994, thirteen opposition
parties formed a combined Forum for National Recovery (Forum pour le
Redressement National--FRN). The Udzima Party began broadcasting
articles about Comoros appearing in the Indian Ocean Newsletter,
including criticisms of the RDR. In consequence, its radio station, Voix
des Îles (Voice of the Islands) was confiscated by the government in
mid-February 1994-- in September 1993, the radio station belonging to
Abbas Djoussouf, who later became leader of the RDR, had been closed.
Tensions increased, and in March 1994 an assassination attempt against
Djohar occurred. At the end of May, civil service employees went on
strike, including teachers, and violence erupted in mid-June when the
FRN prepared to meet.
Comoros - Foreign Affairs
