“Hale!” “Halele!”
In 1865, Queen Djoumbé Fatima signed a contract with a Frenchman, Joseph Lambert, granting him vast lands on Mwali to create plantations. Lambert was an adventurer and businessman based in Mauritius, who had already frequented the court of Madagascar. Before long, the queen and the Mohélians realised that they had given away far too much.
To undo what had been signed, the queen had an idea: she abdicated in favour of her eldest son, Mohamed, still a child, and the new sultan immediately repudiated the contract. But Lambert did not give up. Backed by the government of Mayotte, he appealed to France, and warships came to bombard Mwali. The queen had to flee to Zanzibar.
She did not resign herself. With the support of the British, she set sail for Europe. In 1868, she landed in Marseille, then went on to Paris to ask Emperor Napoleon III to arbitrate the dispute.
Paris had never before seen a queen of the Comoros. The illustrated papers published her portrait and the story of her arrival; the caricaturist André Gill drew her for the cover of L'Éclipse. But behind the curiosity, there was no justice: the journey changed nothing for Mwali.
In January 1871, Djoumbé Fatima managed to return to her island. Her return roused the Mohélians against Lambert. The response was swift: on 3 June 1871, the French navy bombarded Fomboni and almost entirely destroyed the old town.
The queen nevertheless regained her throne in 1874 and kept it until her death in 1878. Her daughter Salima Machamba, born of her union with the Frenchman Émile Fleuriot de Langle, was to be the last queen of Mwali.
A small kingdom can make its voice heard; but someone has to be willing to listen.
What we know about it
This story is historical: the contract with Joseph Lambert (1865), the abdication in favour of the eldest son, the first bombardment, the exile in Zanzibar, the journey to France in 1868 and the destruction of Fomboni on 3 June 1871 are documented by French sources and studied by Jean Martin. The Comorian website Muzdalifa House has devoted several articles to this period and to the founding of Fomboni. The Parisian illustrated press of 1868 (Le Monde illustré, L'Univers illustré, L'Éclipse) left several images of the queen, whom her contemporaries called Djombé-Fatouma.
The Comorian author Mohamed Rachidi staged her return to Mohéli in a play, La Régence de Djoumbé Fatima (2021). Read also: Fomboni, the town of seven villages and The colonial period.
Further reading
- Outside view Jean Martin, Comores : quatre îles entre pirates et planteurs (2 tomes), 1983 – 1984. L'Harmattan.
- Voices of the archipelago Muzdalifa House, Djumbe Fatima, Ramanetaka, Makadara, Lambert et Fleuriot, 2019.
- Voices of the archipelago Muzdalifa House, Fomboni fondation et bombardements, 2022.
- Outside view Alfred Gevrey, Essai sur les Comores, 1870. Pondicherry, A. Saligny.