What makes us young? Column Chetan Ramchurn L’express weekly/ 11.06.2010
•June 12, 2010 • Leave a Comment (Edit)
[Column ] What makes us young? /Chetan Ramchurn L’Express Weekly/ 11/06/10
Monday evening. I’m cruising through Curepipe’s cold streets. The traffic, as I most hate it, loud and slow. For once, my windows are up… lest I lose some of that John Legend’s soulful music amidst the blaring horns. I am musing on the fact that this subject could be penned from several viewpoints. But my thoughts go back to decades ago, to Curepipe’s fateful tryst with our country’s first political assassination; Azor Adelaide’s martyrdom reminding me that being young back in 1971 also meant risking one’s life.
The condescending way in which the present young generation is viewed shall be the first of my themes. An outer view would thus be a good starting point; how our more seasoned peers tend to view GenYers as self- obsessed whiners that sulk all the time, that are more concerned with their latest Facebook avatars than the numerous societal wrongs they witness every single day, believing that they know best when all they’ve done is put their minds to sleep. Too often are we seen as modern Oblomovs… unwilling to do much, caught in indecision… Our critics are partly justified.
For the current Mauritius’s absence of ideologies and celebration of status quo should also be attributed to those at its helm… those that were brimming with leftist ideals back in the 70s.
And this is what reassures me. The Che- inebriated generation so long touted as the creators of a new world order are also those that left their dreams for the comfort of capitalism. Maybe, and I’m hoping that this is the case, our less vocal young generation might have a more telling change on the society. For has anything changed for real? Sartre has been replaced by Houellebecq, Rock has been replaced by Hip Hop and racism is still ubiquitous. The form of rebellion has certainly changed, but the philosophy has sustained the test of time.
Youth gone wild?
What should be of real concern to those who care and have the ability to change things is the rotten state of some of our country’s academic institutions, meant to act as vivier d’idées. How on university campuses across the island, racism is openly preached and practised during election time; how the vulnerability of young minds has not been alleviated with the greater imparting of moral values and education on the myriad of cultures gracing our land; how meritocracy is often forgotten and forsaken by young graduates whose first instinct is to use the easiest and cheapest of moves to secure a monthly paycheck…
Everyone is the age of their heart.( Guatemalan Proverb)
But being young is not solely about age. That which makes us youthful is also that which prevents us from falling prey to fear. And it is fright that manacles our minds, that turns well irrigated brains into dried ones, which makes us see change as an insurmountable hurdle and that forces us to see a foe in the one who is different. But being young is most importantly about being true to one’s human values and being tolerant of others.
Here’s my appeal to the naysayers: Understand that the youth of today has its share of contradictions. The pettifogger deeply engrossed in trying to increase the number of virtual friends and the thinker trying to change the world. Helping the second of these facets to bloom would do our Motherland a lot of good.
And here’s my advice to my young comrades: You don’t age unless you choose to…
Chetan Ramchurn
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Nil desperandum by Chetan Ramchurn/L’Express Weekly 14.05.2010
•May 14, 2010 • Leave a Comment (Edit)
“ Nil desperandum”
Hardly a week has elapsed… the gash in most purple hearts still hurting.
Still, neither have our heads gone down nor has our resolve flinched. And if there was any misunderstanding on where the MMM stood on the political spectrum, it has been cleared. Those with real militan blood have, to the best of their socialist drive, managed to fight for that which they believed in; a bona fide democratisation of the economy, greater transparency in public affairs and real change in the education sector.
I know not all the answers to the MMM’s defeat. What I know is that playing the ostrich game would do us no good and party heads might, in line with our long history of participative democracy, want to ask for the input of the soldiers on the battleground on how to correct some of the mistakes made over the last month.
My reading of things is that Mauritians in the third millennium need to assess whom they are giving the golden ticket for a power ride to. Churchill, as gifted he was a leader as talented he was with words once said “ The best argument against democracy is a five- minute conversation with the average voter.” Lest I be condescending, I would rather believe that we never were able to reach the majority of voters.
Yes readers, the much hyped majorité silencieuse is not only mum but also, and on an even more unfortunate note for the MMM, suffers from some form of hearing impairment.
For some of the results are baffling; former political nominees that were horrendous when at the head of institutions have been offered the green light by the venerable pep admirab to further tarnish the political playfield, non- descript candidates winning their respective battles against talented ones and let us never forget the use of racist speeches; all adding up to turn May 2010 into the most grotesque of months in recent times.
My disenchantment has somewhat been alleviated with competent minds such as Kee Cheong, Obeegadoo and Boollel perfectly placed to be our voice in what promises to be a cauldron of a parliament. The next five years shall be determining, for Mauritius first of all but also for the MMM as a party. First and foremost, it is key to rethink and rejuvenate ourselves, convince with bold ideas those constituencies and voters that have remained immune to our leftist words that there is an alternative. And I have no fear that this can and will be achieved.
The time is right to draw significant teachings from our past defeats and on finding the best of strategies and tactics to be the most dominating force in Mauritian politics once again.
Campaigning for the greater regulation in political financing should be high up the agenda for these elections have showed even more than the previous ones that the defining rule in politics in our era is ‘ Pay to Play’ . A real commission on the fairer distribution of wealth would also do much good to the MMM, so long and unfairly accused of siding with part of the private sector.
2010 was the year where incompetence prevailed, the slugfest of ideas was replaced with that of insults and our country’s date with destiny was missed.
2015 shall be the year of the purple.
The “ majorité silencieuse” is not only mum but also suffers from some form of hearing impairment.
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags: Chetan Ramchurn, Elections 2010, Labour Party, MMM
Revey toi n ti poem avant elections
•May 5, 2010 • Leave a Comment (Edit)
Revey toi…
Mone lire ene jour ki somey ek la mort presk identik
Dayer dans Illiad, Hypnos ek Thanatos c’est deux freres jumo, fils de Nix
Pou conscience aussi imper mem trik
Pna difference entre ene kine endormi ek ene kine mort so sens civique
Kamarad, pas laisse toi fermer par ban lespri racistes
Tous dimoun pareil dapres dna so helix
Anou empeche nou pays vine encore pli triste
Mercredi to ena sa chance unik sanz disc
Ek choisir vote pou competence au lieu ene clique
De petits copains ek jouisseurs sans moralite ou ethique
Ki to appel Stephanie, Vijay, Yogen ou Faeza
Nou tou zenfan sa pays la, pou nou li ene mama
Si tone comprend sa ban mots la bien
To leker p bat mem rythme ki moi, parole ene morisyen
Ki le 5 Mai pou change avec so vote nou Maurice so destin.
Chetan
Posted in Uncategorized
Tags: Chetan, Ramchurn, Revey toi
Economic Order: Now is the time for change/L’Express ID/27.04.2010
•April 27, 2010 • Leave a Comment (Edit)
Economic order : “ Now is
the time for change”
Chetan RAMCHURN
Like a few others in Mauritius, I have always had a thing against staunch market fundamentalists who live and die by the invisible hand. I fear they might come to me one day and say smilingly, “ Dear Chetan, we have evaluated the market demand for socialists and it stands at nil at the moment. So we have decided, with the consent of the Society of Mauritian Liberals and Proponents of Economic Inequality, to terminate you while waiting for better market conditions for humanists”. I fear, more seriously, that they might continue to put economic concerns before human ones.
There is no invisible hand. Nobel Prize winners in Economics Daniel Kahneman and Vernon Smith explained that the predictability of human behaviour cannot be ascertained with enough precision and subsequently the fundamental economic concepts do not always apply in real life. And in this young democracy of ours, what has been dubbed as “ simplistic market economics” seem to have won it against the need for a stronger government that would act as a facilitator and regulator of economic affairs. Thus, with several of our governments being led by a neo- liberal agenda, government intervention has been kept to the strictest of minimum with the few continuing to benefi t and the many continuing to suffer.
Our colonial past and post- independence years bear testimony to an economic environment marred by inequalities.
Few have tackled the socio- economic divide and tried to bring the Gini coeffi cient within acceptable norms.
Unfortunately for us, the Ramgoolam/ Rama tandem was not one of them with the gap between the rich and the poor that has widened and a large part of the private sector that has fl ourished to indecent proportions. The last government using levies, with as much aversion as a world- relinquishing monk would use money, has never been able to bring some form of equilibrium in the distribution of wealth. But then again, we had been compelled to accept that this was the only way and that Sithanen was the economic maestro that had salvaged the destiny of our motherland from the brink of doom. Few opposing voices, that included the likes of Bizlall, Subron and Kee Cheong Li Kwong Wing, were heard as the ideological warfare was being won by free marketholics.
Now is the time for change.
Any country with real concern for its citizens would follow in the footsteps of Bhutan which has decided to forgo the traditional GDP measure for a more people centric one using its now celebrated Gross National Happiness Index to gauge the prosperity of its nation. If it sounds like a term borrowed from Lewis Caroll’s book, think again. For economic thought leaders as celebrated as Amartya Sen and Joseph Stiglitz consider it as a more than credible alternative to the now passé GDP. What we need at this defi ning moment of our country’s destiny is a Welfare State that truly ensures that basic human needs are catered for. With our public schooling that has increasingly lost its sheen in favour of an expensive private one, the absence of price control resulting in the loss of purchasing power, the huge costs of insecurity resulting in the loss of human lives and an inbred form of fear and despair, the mood of Mauritians demands to be uplifted with a more caring government.
Policies that are in dire need are those that would upgrade the levels of services offered with real benchmarks of quality and effi ciency. Measures that would encourage the greater participation of entrepreneurs could include the offering of a safety net and more public- private sector partnerships that would enable the fostering of innovation and help in the creation of new sectors.
Singapore, often cited as an example to follow by our Prime Minister, is a State where the government remains, still today, a key partner in economic affairs offering a form of paternalistic benevolence in a global economic sphere where cold capitalism reigns. Lee Kuan Yew believed that high quality schools, health care and public services should be foremost in the country’s agenda. I’ll end this column with a quote from the coronation address of the King of Bhutan in 2008 : “ Our most important goal is the peace and happiness of our people and the security and sovereignty of the nation.” Qui potest capere capiat… Let him accept it who can…
Showing posts with label Berenger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Berenger. Show all posts
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Saturday, December 26, 2009
2009: Another Year in Paradise
2009: Another Year in Paradise
The author shares his insights on the present situation of Mauritius before the ‘peuple admirable’ gets ready to forget the many injustices it endured during the year choosing to embark on that safe selective retention mode while the country’s democratically elected Chief Entertainer gets ready for his white X-Mas. In an annum marked by Navin’s multiple historic trysts with world greats, the No.8 elections and numerous other scandals arising from the laissez faire style of the country heads, the unthinking majority chose yet again to postpone its baptism in active citizenship sine die.
What you should not forget...but you’ll forget anyway
No exit clause, no excuses: We witnessed how at the Air Mauritius, a real life version of Pope’s The Rape of the Lock unfolded where poor decisions resulting from the incompetence of some meant that the company had to compromise its short and medium term profitability. In the process, our Phaeton Rubicola effectively lost its credibility but the situation also highlighted the inability of the Great One to put the right people in the right place.
And Justice for all?: The travesty of justice in several cases continued to grab headlines with favouritism now openly practiced with the rooting for the interests of family members, political acquaintances and corporate entities (read political financiers). The King of hollow speeches shouted with all his might that he has managed to turn this country around and thereby salvaged our collective destinies from ‘l’oligarchie sucrière’. The majority of the population heeded his words believing that the much needed democratisation of the economy would materialise. Unfortunately for our motherland, the sly fox had been veiled as the protective shepherd back in 2005 and we failed to notice it.
Capitalism x 2: A double dose of Sithanenomics in this post-crisis year, with most experts close to the nantis lauding the greatness and profound intelligence of the Minister while the public, as is customary now, unable to overstand the many issues now accepting the visionless minister’s actions as a boon. How our national maven, for all his knowledge in economics and political science, managed to submit his resignation to the wrong person in 2007 still riddles our minds. Till today, many of us still rue this missed opportunity.
Welcome to the Navin Show:
Our glorious leader managed a master stroke by garnering all the credit for Pravind's win in the No.8 family feud.However, his haughtiness reached new heights with his ever growing desire to be perceived as someone highly important at global level. And who has to put up with the renditions of his discussions with the heads of economic powerhouses? We do. Puerility on Navin’s behalf? No, more pernicious than that, pure unbridled adulation of oneself. Part of the press that answers to Ramgoolam’s every beck and call also managed to instill in our minds the idea that the outcome of the next elections was already finalised.
Protection Montagne: How we managed to let ethnicity be the leverage for success, or how politics was perverted to tolerate illegality (with the latest example being the efforts of the former Lord Mayor squashed as a means of ethnic baiting) was another defining feature of 2009.
Occult forces continued to operate in several sectors providing an almost endless supply of money to fuel businesses. Of special interest was the greater use of greeting codes that are now that all powerful sesame and which possess the unique ability to open locked doors. This today offers the ability to show one’s appartenance to the right clique in public (extending to radio waves) and private spheres thus resulting in a flawed system where some of us are allowed undue privileges because of their racial affiliations.
The No.8 elections showed that the new king makers were vain individuals from socio-cultural organizations that continued to let their destructive influence tarnish an already soiled democratic space. A long way from “Ene sel lepep, ene sel nation”.
Other Issues: The MMM? Still lost.Pravind? Sans envergure.
A glimmer of hope.
Eliminating the rat race: Bunwaree laid the foundations for a thinking society with such bold propositions that included the projected scrapping of the elitist system. This was followed, as expected, by such simplistic comments from pseudo experts as “akoz ou zenfant pas laureat ou p dire sa”. This is far from being an issue springing out of any form of jealousy or feeling of resentment. It has to do with the simple realization that this present system which thrives on parrot learning is ending up doing more harm than good. It also has to do with the return on investment which is simply not worth the amount of money devoted to such an endeavour. Especially so, if the greater part of the country’s nationally funded eminence grise’s only aim is to pad its bank accounts by working abroad. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But not with studies financed by taxpayers’ money.
Others claimed that they would not return to the country because of the lack of meritocracy and corruption that phagocytes it. But are those acute issues pertinent to Mauritius only? Are they not present in even the most developed of countries? The greatness of all responsible citizens consists in helping change their country for the better instead of deciding to escape to foreign shores. Equally vile were the attacks on the Minister’s reforms were the conservatives’ claim that it constituted a form of ethnic bashing. Until we extirpate the debate on education from the communal gutter, no expected outcome will ever be translated into reality.
The Mauritian(s) of the year award:
2009 belongs to Sam Lauthan and Jack Bizlall. The former for being noble in a party that is no longer so and for having the class of leaving politics untainted selecting to stick to his beliefs while others have long succumbed to their gluttony for power. The second one for having the ability to say things in the ‘overcrowded baracoon’ that confirms that not all of us have given up their quest for a better society. Both of them militans (the coaltar not the caviar versions). The rarest of breeds these days.
The untimely departed
James Burty David, that quick-witted, courageous soldier, peerless in loyalty among labourites shall be missed by many. Hardworking with an unwavering attachment to the venerable institution that the Labour Party is, JBD shall be an example for many aspiring and practicing politicians. Chapeau bas!
Vivement 2010.
Chetan Ramchurn
The author shares his insights on the present situation of Mauritius before the ‘peuple admirable’ gets ready to forget the many injustices it endured during the year choosing to embark on that safe selective retention mode while the country’s democratically elected Chief Entertainer gets ready for his white X-Mas. In an annum marked by Navin’s multiple historic trysts with world greats, the No.8 elections and numerous other scandals arising from the laissez faire style of the country heads, the unthinking majority chose yet again to postpone its baptism in active citizenship sine die.
What you should not forget...but you’ll forget anyway
No exit clause, no excuses: We witnessed how at the Air Mauritius, a real life version of Pope’s The Rape of the Lock unfolded where poor decisions resulting from the incompetence of some meant that the company had to compromise its short and medium term profitability. In the process, our Phaeton Rubicola effectively lost its credibility but the situation also highlighted the inability of the Great One to put the right people in the right place.
And Justice for all?: The travesty of justice in several cases continued to grab headlines with favouritism now openly practiced with the rooting for the interests of family members, political acquaintances and corporate entities (read political financiers). The King of hollow speeches shouted with all his might that he has managed to turn this country around and thereby salvaged our collective destinies from ‘l’oligarchie sucrière’. The majority of the population heeded his words believing that the much needed democratisation of the economy would materialise. Unfortunately for our motherland, the sly fox had been veiled as the protective shepherd back in 2005 and we failed to notice it.
Capitalism x 2: A double dose of Sithanenomics in this post-crisis year, with most experts close to the nantis lauding the greatness and profound intelligence of the Minister while the public, as is customary now, unable to overstand the many issues now accepting the visionless minister’s actions as a boon. How our national maven, for all his knowledge in economics and political science, managed to submit his resignation to the wrong person in 2007 still riddles our minds. Till today, many of us still rue this missed opportunity.
Welcome to the Navin Show:
Our glorious leader managed a master stroke by garnering all the credit for Pravind's win in the No.8 family feud.However, his haughtiness reached new heights with his ever growing desire to be perceived as someone highly important at global level. And who has to put up with the renditions of his discussions with the heads of economic powerhouses? We do. Puerility on Navin’s behalf? No, more pernicious than that, pure unbridled adulation of oneself. Part of the press that answers to Ramgoolam’s every beck and call also managed to instill in our minds the idea that the outcome of the next elections was already finalised.
Protection Montagne: How we managed to let ethnicity be the leverage for success, or how politics was perverted to tolerate illegality (with the latest example being the efforts of the former Lord Mayor squashed as a means of ethnic baiting) was another defining feature of 2009.
Occult forces continued to operate in several sectors providing an almost endless supply of money to fuel businesses. Of special interest was the greater use of greeting codes that are now that all powerful sesame and which possess the unique ability to open locked doors. This today offers the ability to show one’s appartenance to the right clique in public (extending to radio waves) and private spheres thus resulting in a flawed system where some of us are allowed undue privileges because of their racial affiliations.
The No.8 elections showed that the new king makers were vain individuals from socio-cultural organizations that continued to let their destructive influence tarnish an already soiled democratic space. A long way from “Ene sel lepep, ene sel nation”.
Other Issues: The MMM? Still lost.Pravind? Sans envergure.
A glimmer of hope.
Eliminating the rat race: Bunwaree laid the foundations for a thinking society with such bold propositions that included the projected scrapping of the elitist system. This was followed, as expected, by such simplistic comments from pseudo experts as “akoz ou zenfant pas laureat ou p dire sa”. This is far from being an issue springing out of any form of jealousy or feeling of resentment. It has to do with the simple realization that this present system which thrives on parrot learning is ending up doing more harm than good. It also has to do with the return on investment which is simply not worth the amount of money devoted to such an endeavour. Especially so, if the greater part of the country’s nationally funded eminence grise’s only aim is to pad its bank accounts by working abroad. Not that there is anything wrong with that. But not with studies financed by taxpayers’ money.
Others claimed that they would not return to the country because of the lack of meritocracy and corruption that phagocytes it. But are those acute issues pertinent to Mauritius only? Are they not present in even the most developed of countries? The greatness of all responsible citizens consists in helping change their country for the better instead of deciding to escape to foreign shores. Equally vile were the attacks on the Minister’s reforms were the conservatives’ claim that it constituted a form of ethnic bashing. Until we extirpate the debate on education from the communal gutter, no expected outcome will ever be translated into reality.
The Mauritian(s) of the year award:
2009 belongs to Sam Lauthan and Jack Bizlall. The former for being noble in a party that is no longer so and for having the class of leaving politics untainted selecting to stick to his beliefs while others have long succumbed to their gluttony for power. The second one for having the ability to say things in the ‘overcrowded baracoon’ that confirms that not all of us have given up their quest for a better society. Both of them militans (the coaltar not the caviar versions). The rarest of breeds these days.
The untimely departed
James Burty David, that quick-witted, courageous soldier, peerless in loyalty among labourites shall be missed by many. Hardworking with an unwavering attachment to the venerable institution that the Labour Party is, JBD shall be an example for many aspiring and practicing politicians. Chapeau bas!
Vivement 2010.
Chetan Ramchurn
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
Nail in The Coffin by Chetan Ramchurn (Le Mauricien 29.09.09)
1969-2009-MMM
NAIL IN THE COFFIN
Time to annihilate this archaic version of the MMM… let the vitriol from my Parker Sonnet flow…
My faith in the Purple Heart has not wavered since I chose to be part of it. Has not faltered, despite the hateful salvos of the arrogance-inebriated propagandists so keen on reducing the party to néant and has not vacillated in the face of accusations of our supposed surgically-precise partitioning of different communities. But the fact that we are stuck in that damning navel gazing mode where we celebrate our past glories and overlook the many inglorious episodes that have led us to be branded as obsolete have made the last few months the nadir of my young political days.
Succinctly, before our eyes, plagued by an abysmal absence of vision, the party mires into fibrillation with an intellectual side that has stopped pumping for far too long. What we should ask ourselves at this defining moment of the party’s existence is how we never managed to shake off that infamous “Le Parti des Minorités” tag that others slapped on us or how when in power we failed to bring much needed changes with electoral reforms or more transparency in the public and private sectors and as importantly in political financing, or as from 1983 onwards how everything that we stood for became confined to the realm of ideas and was never translated into action (bar the reform of the education sector), how corruption that lynchpin of so many other societal wrongs was seen to be tolerated by us…or that the self-professed Noble Party witnessed backroom shenanigans where worthless candidates were promoted in favour of more able ones for positions of power to suit the whims and wishes of some of the party heads.
Trapped in culpable inaction, the Militans, guardians of the moral sacredness of the MMM need to understand that if they follow this treacherous path, no return to the genesis of the party can be achieved. No longer can they let themselves be frogmarched into accepting the unacceptable; the promotion of insipid figures chosen because of their past affiliations, the loss of ideological foundations to our lutte. Or the relinquishing of that ingredient that was at the origin of this whole journey; the fight against all forms of racial divisions and the celebration of Mauritianism (Ene sel lepep, ene sel nation). Indeed, has the party that advocated class warfare stooped so low that our winning formula for the next elections resides in the return of that crucial missing piece that led to our defeat in the 2005 elections? (“Aujourd'hui la désillusion de l'électorat musulman face à l'Alliance Sociale est totale et il revient en masse vers le MMM.” Bérenger/ Week-End 20/09/09).
But maybe I am veering away from what I should be doing as the archetypal ‘militan’, going beyond merely being a beni-oui-oui and engaging in something that is so rare within the MMM ranks these days; thinking. My interest in and subsequent decision to be a contributor to Mauritian politics was strongly motivated by the Kaya Riots and l’Affaire Amicale, both incidents showing the sinister side of Paradise Island. The first one reminding us of the frailty of our society and the second one demonstrating the intolerance the human kind was capable of. In 2008, I joined the MMM. Convinced that if there was one party that could prevent our motherland from falling prey to intestinal divisions, it would be one that combined the teachings of former Labour greats with that of Marx and which had an unrivalled history in its formative years of fighting for the proletariat.
Listening to the self-professed opinion leaders pullulating on our radio waves, the conclusion would be that Bérenger is the root cause of all woes within the MMM. With his place alongside the likes such illustrious Mauritians like Anquetil, Curé ,Rozemont, Bissoondoyal and SSR now firmly enshrined, the leader of the MMM might have slipped into solipsism choosing to heed only to himself and has failed (until recently, with le retour aux sources) to give the needed strategic thrust to the party. And in the meantime, philanderers of the MMM temple abounded, all indulging in some form of ideological molesting with a party conceptualised by utopians.
The time has come for us to change the way we do politics. We should refrain from mechanical mudslinging and abstain from what Navin did back in 2005, rely on demagogic “Le Grand Soir” style discourses and foster ideas that are adapted to modern realities. Let us genuinely strive to alter how party members view their role and ensure that the now famous line “Dans la lutte pena recompense” is an ode to meritocracy and not simply used to thwart those petits copains that the party fails to serve. Let us stop playing the ostrich game and question ourselves and start from scratch with militans that genuinely care about the future of this nation.
I am not worried about what lies ahead. The MMM will rise again from its present ideological and intellectual blackout. Having read with optimism the paper “Qu’est-ce qu’être militan en 2009” and having spoken to some of my peers, I know that there are other inhabitants of Planet MMM that share my views. Yet, more than ever now, there is the need to discard those ideas and people that have made us so hollow over the years. The ambition of the party at its creation was to eradicate the trenches between the different communities and was based on socialist principles such as the establishment of a more egalitarian society… ideals that like the MMM simply will never die.
Here is my cri de coeur, “Thinking militans, unite”
Chetan Ramchurn
A Young Member of the MMM
NAIL IN THE COFFIN
Time to annihilate this archaic version of the MMM… let the vitriol from my Parker Sonnet flow…
My faith in the Purple Heart has not wavered since I chose to be part of it. Has not faltered, despite the hateful salvos of the arrogance-inebriated propagandists so keen on reducing the party to néant and has not vacillated in the face of accusations of our supposed surgically-precise partitioning of different communities. But the fact that we are stuck in that damning navel gazing mode where we celebrate our past glories and overlook the many inglorious episodes that have led us to be branded as obsolete have made the last few months the nadir of my young political days.
Succinctly, before our eyes, plagued by an abysmal absence of vision, the party mires into fibrillation with an intellectual side that has stopped pumping for far too long. What we should ask ourselves at this defining moment of the party’s existence is how we never managed to shake off that infamous “Le Parti des Minorités” tag that others slapped on us or how when in power we failed to bring much needed changes with electoral reforms or more transparency in the public and private sectors and as importantly in political financing, or as from 1983 onwards how everything that we stood for became confined to the realm of ideas and was never translated into action (bar the reform of the education sector), how corruption that lynchpin of so many other societal wrongs was seen to be tolerated by us…or that the self-professed Noble Party witnessed backroom shenanigans where worthless candidates were promoted in favour of more able ones for positions of power to suit the whims and wishes of some of the party heads.
Trapped in culpable inaction, the Militans, guardians of the moral sacredness of the MMM need to understand that if they follow this treacherous path, no return to the genesis of the party can be achieved. No longer can they let themselves be frogmarched into accepting the unacceptable; the promotion of insipid figures chosen because of their past affiliations, the loss of ideological foundations to our lutte. Or the relinquishing of that ingredient that was at the origin of this whole journey; the fight against all forms of racial divisions and the celebration of Mauritianism (Ene sel lepep, ene sel nation). Indeed, has the party that advocated class warfare stooped so low that our winning formula for the next elections resides in the return of that crucial missing piece that led to our defeat in the 2005 elections? (“Aujourd'hui la désillusion de l'électorat musulman face à l'Alliance Sociale est totale et il revient en masse vers le MMM.” Bérenger/ Week-End 20/09/09).
But maybe I am veering away from what I should be doing as the archetypal ‘militan’, going beyond merely being a beni-oui-oui and engaging in something that is so rare within the MMM ranks these days; thinking. My interest in and subsequent decision to be a contributor to Mauritian politics was strongly motivated by the Kaya Riots and l’Affaire Amicale, both incidents showing the sinister side of Paradise Island. The first one reminding us of the frailty of our society and the second one demonstrating the intolerance the human kind was capable of. In 2008, I joined the MMM. Convinced that if there was one party that could prevent our motherland from falling prey to intestinal divisions, it would be one that combined the teachings of former Labour greats with that of Marx and which had an unrivalled history in its formative years of fighting for the proletariat.
Listening to the self-professed opinion leaders pullulating on our radio waves, the conclusion would be that Bérenger is the root cause of all woes within the MMM. With his place alongside the likes such illustrious Mauritians like Anquetil, Curé ,Rozemont, Bissoondoyal and SSR now firmly enshrined, the leader of the MMM might have slipped into solipsism choosing to heed only to himself and has failed (until recently, with le retour aux sources) to give the needed strategic thrust to the party. And in the meantime, philanderers of the MMM temple abounded, all indulging in some form of ideological molesting with a party conceptualised by utopians.
The time has come for us to change the way we do politics. We should refrain from mechanical mudslinging and abstain from what Navin did back in 2005, rely on demagogic “Le Grand Soir” style discourses and foster ideas that are adapted to modern realities. Let us genuinely strive to alter how party members view their role and ensure that the now famous line “Dans la lutte pena recompense” is an ode to meritocracy and not simply used to thwart those petits copains that the party fails to serve. Let us stop playing the ostrich game and question ourselves and start from scratch with militans that genuinely care about the future of this nation.
I am not worried about what lies ahead. The MMM will rise again from its present ideological and intellectual blackout. Having read with optimism the paper “Qu’est-ce qu’être militan en 2009” and having spoken to some of my peers, I know that there are other inhabitants of Planet MMM that share my views. Yet, more than ever now, there is the need to discard those ideas and people that have made us so hollow over the years. The ambition of the party at its creation was to eradicate the trenches between the different communities and was based on socialist principles such as the establishment of a more egalitarian society… ideals that like the MMM simply will never die.
Here is my cri de coeur, “Thinking militans, unite”
Chetan Ramchurn
A Young Member of the MMM
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