Our media perception meets a new type of violence. The ‘black violence’ that arises from Black Africa took its place among the world news. Boko Haram, who is responsible for the assaults that partly targeted Christians and partly Muslims was in fact made to be a potential criminal involved with Al-Qaeda.

In the last days, the unusual actions took more notice and invoked a huge reaction because of the fact that many young girls were kidnapped and made hostages.

There is some truth to every comment regarding what took place. Among them are those: that this organization’s actions are manipulated according to the western policy of Africa and while thousands of people are slaughtered in Africa, the issue is overlooked under the surveillance of westerners, a derivative organization of Al-Qaeda is stigmatized and that the US uses such organizations for its military and strategic intervention objectives in the region due to the competition between the US and China, and that such organizations arose as a result of massive Muslim reactions in a country like Nigeria which possesses the greatest economy in Africa and which consists of Christian and Muslim populations and as a result of Al-Qaeda ideas spreading across the Sub-Saharan regions the strategy of labeling Islam with terrorism is promoted in the world through the actions of such organizations.

It is true especially when we experience a new age of imperialism in which the world has become a game field of states and where there is no longer awkward feeling for global colonialists to activate local actors in accordance with the interests of colonialists as in the example of Africa.

There is this wave of violence phenomenon whose controller we are unable to detect. The escalation of violence and its timing and its internationalization through media is not a coincidence.

The escalating tension that revives the Islamophobic propaganda in the west and that justifies actions of the western powers in the African strategies as an available means of propaganda, conditions bear violence and its realization structures do not change.

I think through this medium the common properties regarding the nature of colonization and violence in the Islamic world must be re-discussed. No matter how the official face of colonization is abolished in the legal framework, it does not mean that its de facto effects vanished.

Years ago when I visited Nigeria, even in the capital Abuja there were some security problems. However, what really took my notice was the communication style of people with foreigners, especially white strangers. The storekeeper’s act of behavior simply reminds you of the behaviors which a master-slave would possess.

In their behavior, there was an extreme level of timidity, exaggerated affection and obedience. Unlike the case of usual hospitality, their settled codes of acting in the public which can be accounted for being a colonized society stand out as a part of their daily life.

Where there is no political freedom and no medium for political demands, the absence of justice and the feeling of deprivation rooted in certain countries. Political groups dive into the underground life and become ready to intervene political life with violence.

In this way, either by the state or other powers, such groups are made to be manipulated or by being pushed into a roll of violence, they are wanted to be deprived of their society support and justification. This does not mean that all the social and revolutionary movements which appeal to violence are puppets. However, we know that the struggle for sovereignty attracts more powerful forces.

Among the Islamic countries after the Cold War the most violent incidents broke out in the dictatorship-ruled countries which claimed the old colonial inheritance. Its essential example is Algeria. The Independence of Algeria was achieved through a highly violent struggle – which was the characteristic of the French colonialism.

The British acted more politically and thus they shaped the postcolonial transition period. The local dictators who copied the French model were equally ruthless with their original ones and never hesitated to appeal to a bloody solution when they considered it necessary while the British applied a soft power based political line as in the postcolonial transition process.

However, be it the French or the British or in the last period the American experience in Afghanistan and Iraq, colonialism affects social reactions too. Colonialism uproots not only the economy of societies but as their natural reflexes.

Both the anger of postcolonial societies, their relationship with the western and their leaders’ treatment of these societies portrays quite a reactionary picture.

The witnessing of such savage violence ranging from Algeria to Nigeria and the questions as to why people kill and are being killed in Iraq is becoming meaningless and cannot be discussed without considering what the complex of the colonized has deformed on the social fabric.

Ýlgili YazýlarEnglish