By Massy Megatti
Kabylia deserves a place among free and independent nations and peoples
This only happens in Kabylia and nowhere else in the world. Sanitary confinement in order to combat the progression of the pandemic is widely observed, despite there being no decree by the Algerian state or pressure from its representatives installed in Kabylia.
For those not aware, or those who have forgotten certain irrefutable elements of history, the socio-political organization of Kabylia attracted the interest of many scientists and philosophers at the end of the 18th and during the 19th century. This organization, unique in its kind, attracted their great admiration and, cleverly, all their intellectual respect.
On the societal level, the French renaissance philosopher Ernest Renan, described the system adopted by the Kabyle people to manage the affairs of the city as an ideal democratic model, even compared to Western societies which strove to achieve a civilizing mission in Africa and in Asia, who failed to achieve such a cheap model of democracy! This is also what makes Briton Hugh Roberts say these days that Kabylia was ahead of Europe in terms of organization and democracy.
In socioeconomic terms, it had greatly interested Karl Marx and Frédérick Engels, the two theorists of scientific socialism. After his medical stay in Kabylia, Marx left enamored with the organization of Kabyle villages. “I did not know that there existed in Kabylia all these small republics, otherwise I would have changed a good volume of my Capital”, he regretted.
As for the aspect of religious practice, the French colonists tried firstly to colonize in this manner, but were not successful. Instead they were even amazed how the assembly of the village (which constituted the undisputed political authority for each village) was of a secular essence in which the religious, or the imam, had no right to interfere. And that all citizens, whatever their religious and spiritual convictions, were all equal in duties and rights.
It should be noted in particular that Kabylia has never known, throughout history, religious conflicts which duly ravaged communities and nations in the four corners of the world. Thanks to its secular culture, it has managed to preserve its social cohesion where the different beliefs of peace and total harmony coexist.
It is clear that the Kabyle people are inhabited by a collective creative impulse, just as it is strongly characterized by the gestures that forge their democratic tradition, the source of their cultural resilience and their political health. In short, if Kabylia comes to gain its political independence, the Kabyle state will be a positive and considerable contributing force for Africa and for all humanity.
The day will come that all the oppressed, downtrodden peoples in this world will obtain their total freedom at last. We are currently undergoing an age of system change and have reached the turning point, where these mass-murderous nation states, that are all build on genocide, forced assimilation, femicide, ecocide, fascism and so on…, have reached a wall. This cannibalistic capitalist modernity that is ravaging the world unrestrained will be replaced by the democratic modernity and democratic nation, as is happening in Rojava, where grassroot democracy, gender equality (co-presidency, women-quota), ethnic and religious freedom, communal life, local self-administration…. is being realized. This revolution is a women’s revolution. Against the patriarchal rape culture, Matriarchal values that know no injustice, inequality, selfish hoarding etc. are implemented and manifested. I’ve read somewhere that the Kabyle have also preserved their matriarchal culture to some extent that has survived to this day despite all the assimilation practices they have been subject to. Hopeful to see a free Kabyle, free Kurdistan soon. Solidarity greetings