Haramuya

An African city and its shantytowns… Abundance in the modern city and poverty in the suburbs live side by side. Fousséni is an ordinary man. He belongs to the fishermen ethnic group who used to live on the banks of the marigot where the urban area has developed. An Animist, he was converted to Islam by the Dioulas, mulsuman traders who welcomed him to a suburb of the town. He has two wives and two sons. Fousséni is an upright and honest man, firmly attached to his faith and traditions; he tries to make his family live according to the old precepts and a code of honour. But when his sons leave the concession, their only point of reference is the town, where they work to support the family. They rub shoulders with a whole community of outcasts and lost souls. Fearing to disappoint his father, the youngest son is led to steal. Excluded and banished, he is left to live with the misery of the slums. With its interwoven situations and its many intersecting characters, ‘La Proscription’ describes a tangle of relationships and a stinging observation of the failure of family education in the face of the injustices of social organisation. A wonderful hymn to life and solidarity.