On May 11, 1973, the Senegalese intellectual and activist Omar Blondin Diop died at the age of 26. Fifty-one years later, to the day, Jimsaan Editions published his biography, signed by researcher Florian Bobin: This long quest – Life and death of Omar Blondin Diop.
Prestigious preface, the writer Boubacar Boris Diop underlines the importance of the character by recalling that another great literary figure, the Cameroonian Mongo Béti, had dedicated his novel to the Senegalese revolutionary Remember Ruben, dedicated to Ruben Um Nyobè, figure of Cameroonian independence, with these words: “ To Diop Blondin. Proud black child, my young brother, murdered in the atrocious jails of an African dynast. Africa, stepmother too fertile in mercenary tyrants. »
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It took five years of investigation, meetings and analyzes for Florian Bobin to develop this reconstruction, the first of such magnitude, dedicated to the man who, despite his youth, had a profound impact on marks the political history of Senegal. The result proves to be both erudite and fascinating, both for what it unearths from the journey of Omar Blondin Diop, and for the echoes of this activism in the current social and geopolitical context.
Son of Ibrahima and Adama Blondin Diop, respectively “African doctor” and midwife, trained in the 1930s at the famous Normal Schools of Dakar and Rufisque, young Omar is a brilliant student. He passed his baccalaureate in France, during his parents’ stay of several years who came there to complete their training. He will stay there to prepare for the competitive exams for the grandes écoles at the Louis-le-Grand high school when his family returns home.
First Senegalese normalien in France
In France, the student discovers a society that is both curious and condescending towards him, as sure of its superiority as it is ignorant of its former colonial empire, but which is interested in this intelligent black man who will succeed with flying colours. the competition of the Ecole Normale Supérieure of Saint-Cloud. Omar Blondin Diop becomes the first Senegalese normalien in France, a small earthquake, thus beginning the cycle of notoriety which will take various forms but will never cease.
He formed strong friendships and made significant encounters within the Parisian intelligentsia, from Antoine Gallimard, grandson of the creator of the editions, to the filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard, who made him film in The Chinese through the philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre. This is the France of the Tour de France, the Household Arts Show and the yé-yé singers promoted by the magazine Hi buddies. As the years passed, he became interested in jazz, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and African-American music. He frequents the drugstore on the Champs-Elysées and goes out dancing at the Bus Palladium.
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With higher education, “cafe terraces turn into chat tables”writes Florian Bobin. The time is for reading theoretical essays, for in-depth intellectual debates, to the expression of the most affirmed convictions. Those of Omar clearly lean to the left, on the side of communism, the unions and what he considers to be the alienated fringes of the population, French workers and immigrants.
His life will be built around the nodal point of activism. “How are you going to reconcile your Marxist-Leninist convictions with the destiny that has been mapped out for us? Do you see yourself opposing in your country? In permanent exile? “, a friend asks.
In Senegal, May 68 was also an outbreak
In France he experienced the student conflagration of May 68 in which he actively participated, alongside his wingmen, forever friends, Alioune Sall known as “Paloma” and the Moroccan Mustapha Saha. From political meetings to demonstrations, between Paris and Dakar, the book shows him day after day, involved in the movement, speaking with a keen sense of the formula.
In Senegal too, May 68 was an outbreak, repressed with violence by the police forces of President Léopold Sédar Senghor. Omar Blondin Diop will particularly fight the latter’s policy, which he considers to be a supplement to the pay of the French state.
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“There has never been independence in Africa! “, he said one day in an amphitheater at the Free University of Brussels, before demonstrating it “ by describing the forms of imperialism on African societies prey to the predation of its ruling elites, endorsed by Western powers”according to Florian Bobin.
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Very documented, lively, peppered with quotes and dialogues, Florian Bobin’s book paints the portrait of a courageous young intellectual whose destiny comes to an end. Left with his peers to train in armed struggle with the Palestinian Fatah in Syria and the Black Panthers in Algeria in the hope of freeing comrades imprisoned in Senegal, he was arrested in Mali, where part of his family lived, in November 1971 and extradited to his native country. Tried for “endangering state security”, he was sentenced in 1972 to three years of incarceration after an exceptional trial and ended up dying in prison on the island of Gorée.
“Everyone immediately felt orphaned by the passion and impatience of the sparkling Omar, who was rushing with such great strides towards the future,” writes Boubacar Boris Diop. But the memory of the committed intellectual is stifled by the Senegalese government, which claims that the activist suffered from a drug addiction and committed suicide by hanging.
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So much so that over the weeks and months following his death, the figure of the martyr is superimposed on that of the activist. In passing, it is the darkest side of President Senghor’s regime that is revealed, particularly in its brutality towards the opposition.
Living in his flesh the adventure of the revolution, not hesitating to endure precariousness in order to follow through on his ideas of social justice, Omar Blondin Diop demonstrated the capacity of Senegalese youth to mobilize for change and remains an emblematic figure in this regard. Healthy reading, This long quest – Life and death of Omar Blondin Diop takes us back to the atmosphere of a revolutionary era… and perhaps not a bygone one.
This long quest – Life and death of Omar Blondin Diop, by Florian Bobin (ed. Jimsaan, Senegal, 288 pages).
Presentation of the book and tributes to Omar Blondin Diop with Florian Bobin, Felwine Sarr and Dialo Diop at the L’Harmattan bookstore in Dakar, May 11 from 4 p.m.
