Malian Hero Saves Boy Dangling from Balcony in Paris2 min read

A viral video of Malian migrant Mamoudou Gassama saving a boy dangling from a balcony in Paris has gone viral in the last couple of days.

Dubbed the ‘Mali Spiderman’, by the internet, Gassama has been thanked by the rest of France for saving the child’s life.

A video shows him climbing the balconies of a multiple story block before finally grabbing hold of the dangling boy after scaling four floors.

The four-year-old boy’s father is facing charges for negligence after the French authorities took the child into custody.

It has been revealed by the prosecutors that the father had delayed going home in order to play Pokemon Go.

The child had managed to fall two stories off of his own balcony before grabbing on to the ledge of someone else’s apartment.

The a neighbouring man managed to grab onto one of the kid’s hands from his balcony, he explained to the press that he was unable to pull the child to safety due to a barrier between them.

After rescuing the boy, the 22-year-old Malian had received much praise both from the press and the authorities.

As a result of his bravery, Gassama had a chance to meet France leader Emmanuel Macron, who gave him a medal for courage as well as French Citizenship on Tuesday.

The young man came to Europe through the Sahara desert route most migrants have used as he travelled from Burkina Faso, Niger and Libya before crossing the Mediterranean sea into Italy.

Before Europe, he spent a year working in Libya where migrants have been exploited and forced into slave labour.

Gassama managed to get into Italy in his second attempt to migrate but ended up going to France to reunite with his brother.

Despite not applying for Asylum in the French capital, the Malian man worked for cash-in-hand jobs at building sites trying to survive on the smallest of wages.

With his French citizenship, Gassama has also been offered a formal internship contract with the Paris Fire Service.

It was indeed an almost tragic event turned into a success story.

Cases like these should be used as examples went talking about the migrant crisis.

Many in Europe have seen immigrants who search for a better quality of life in a negative light.

However, Gassama’s bravery proves that we need to stop judging people based on borders and rather support them for their acts of humanity.