Senegalese activist turns brother’s death on Atlantic migration route into campaign for change

The death of her younger brother, Mbaye Diop, during an Atlantic crossing to Spain has transformed Ndeye Fall Dieye’s life from one marked by grief and unanswered questions into a determined campaign to ensure that migrants who die on dangerous routes are not forgotten.

Diop was among migrants who lost their lives after a boat carrying people towards the Canary Islands capsized near El Hierro in April 2024.

For Dieye, the tragedy began with a phone conversation that would become her last with her brother.

“The last time I spoke to him was just before he and his companions set out on the ocean crossing,” she recalled, describing the days that followed as a period of intense fear and uncertainty.

For more than a week, the family waited desperately for news. Eventually, they learnt that the boat had met with disaster near the Canary Islands.

“All we received as an answer was the chilling image of a pirogue capsizing,” she said. “That image only added to our anxiety, doubts and endless questions.”

According to Dieye, her brother did not leave home recklessly. He was pursuing what he believed would be a better future.

Football, she said, was his greatest passion, and he dreamed of finding opportunities beyond the hardship and economic uncertainty that surrounded him.

“He was not leaving on a whim,” she said. “For him, football was everything. He wanted a bigger field, a better future and a way out of poverty.”

But the ocean swallowed those dreams.

Grief that refuses to disappear

More than two years after his death, Dieye said the pain remains deeply embedded in her daily life.

She described moments when she instinctively reaches for her phone, thinking she might still call her brother, despite knowing he will never answer. At other times, a notification or a memory triggers a brief, painful hope that he may somehow still be alive.

The grief, she said, is made more difficult by people who expect families to “move on.”

“The memories remain intact in our minds,” she said. “People ask us to forget, but that is impossible.”

Her brother, she added, was more than a sibling.

“Mbaye was my little brother, my confidant, my other half,” she said.

His presence, she explained, continues to return in dreams, where she briefly feels as though he is still alive before waking to the reality of his absence.

Finding strength among other bereaved families

Rather than endure the grief alone, Dieye eventually found support among other families who had lost relatives on migration routes.

Through networks including the Collective of Victims of Migration in Senegal (COVES) and the CommémorAction movement, she met other mothers, fathers, sisters and relatives carrying similar burdens.

The gatherings have provided families with a space to speak openly about their losses, share memories and resist what they describe as the reduction of migrant deaths to statistics.

“Being able to talk about my brother and his passion for football with other mothers and sisters who share the same pain helps us transform our enormous grief into collective strength,” she said.

Dieye participated in commemorative activities in Senegal, including a major gathering in Dakar, where families lit candles and remembered relatives who died while attempting dangerous migration journeys.

The aim, she said, is to ensure that the names, faces and stories of the dead do not disappear into silence.

Taking the campaign beyond Senegal

Her search for solidarity also took her to Cameroon, where she met families who had experienced similar losses.

The visit, she said, reinforced her understanding that her family’s tragedy was part of a much wider crisis affecting communities across Africa and beyond.

“It was there that I truly realised my tragedy was not an isolated one,” Dieye said.

During meetings and exchanges with bereaved families, participants listened to accounts of extreme poverty, isolation, broken families and the pressures that often push young people to undertake dangerous journeys.

Some parents, she said, blamed themselves for being unable to provide enough opportunities for their children.

Dieye and other activists sought to challenge that sense of guilt, arguing that families should not be held responsible for wider conditions that leave young people feeling they have no future at home.

“The parents are not responsible,” she said. “The real problems are closed borders, inequality and the lack of prospects for our young people.”

‘The ocean must not have the last word’

At the heart of the campaign is a demand for recognition, remembrance and greater attention to the circumstances that drive thousands of young Africans to risk their lives on land and sea routes.

Dieye believes poverty, inequality, social pressure and restrictive migration policies have combined to create conditions in which many young people see dangerous journeys as their only path towards a dignified life.

She said the commemorations and campaigns are therefore not only about mourning the dead but also about challenging the conditions that continue to put migrants at risk.

During a final commemoration with families from different countries, Dieye said national boundaries appeared to disappear as people came together around a shared experience of loss.

Today, she said, her brother’s memory has become part of a wider struggle.

“My brother no longer lives only in our regrets,” she said. “He continues to live through our struggles.”

Alongside families who have lost brothers, sons, daughters and other loved ones on migration routes, Dieye said she would continue to march, speak out and commemorate the dead.

“We will continue to walk, gather and remember,” she said, “so that their memories can light our path and so that the ocean will never have the last word.”