evidence: Despite being part of the Comorian archipelago, Mayotte is a French department enjoying a significantly higher standard of living than the three other islands of the group, which constitute the independent state of the Union of the Comoros. Mayotte’s relative wealth exerts an irresistible lure on the people of the underdeveloped and overpopulated island of Ndzuani, and they travel, clandestinely and in large numbers, to Mayotte in search of a better life. However, on Mayotte Wandzuani are cast as the source of all ills: attracted by the potential for a better standard of living, better health care, a decent education for their children, they are also, according to popular discourse, responsible not only for the failure of these very services, which, for lack of funding, are unable to cope with demand, but for the general state of insecurity on the island, coming out at night from their illegally constructed huts to rob and steal, pillage and plunder.