Making remakes of namesakes

So Dr. Navin Ramgoolam is definitely staging a comeback in politics. There could be no better time for him to do so. The uncertainty that characterizes the political future of his main opponent, Mr. Pravind Jugnauth, added to other circumstances, could prove favourable for him. Speaking to the media on Wednesday, following a meeting of the politburo of the Labour Party, he gave details of the programme that the Labour Party has prepared in the context of its strategy to woo back voters. These include the holding of a national congress, on Sunday 21 February next, to mark the 80th anniversary of the founding of the party, a series of meetings across the island and the celebration of Labour Day on May 1 next. The fact that the Municipal Council of Vacoas/Phoenix has refused to give permission to the Labour Party to hold a public meeting at Place Bazar, Vacoas on May 1, 2016, brings grist to the mill of the Labour Party, especially that the argument put forward by the Mayor of Vacoas/Phoenix, Mr. Navin Ramsoondar is very simplistic. While recognizing that the Labour Party had applied much earlier for using that public place, Mr. Ramsoondur naïvely said that the municipal council of Vacoas/Phoenix preferred to give permission to the Mouvement Socialiste Militant (MSM) because this party has been regularly using Place Bazar to hold its meetings! Now, the Labour Party is taking the matter to court, praying for a judicial review, and it would be interesting to see how this conflict is resolved.  In fully committing himself to the affairs of the party, Dr. Ramgoolam tries to achieve several objectives at the same time. He minimizes the importance of numerous police cases against him, cuts short the ambition of some of his own close collaborators and attempts to gain ground on the political front. The committee that was set up, under the chairmanship of former minister Mr. Satish Faugoo, to review the constitution of the Mauritius Labour Party, has met with some serious opposition within the party. For instance, the suggestion from Dr. Arvin Boolell and some other members that a collective leadership be introduced and that the mandate of the leader of the party be limited to two years or two terms only has been brushed aside by none other than Dr. Navin Ramgoolam. This constitutes a clear indication that he wants to keep his grip on the party for obvious reasons. Most of those who were present at the Supreme Court on 12 and 13 January, in the context of the hearing of the appeal of Mr. Pravind Jugnauth against the judgment of Magistrates Miss Niroshini Ramsoondar and Mr. Azam Neerooa, sitting at the Intermediate Court, and delivered on 30 June last, say that they were not really convinced by the performance of Mrs. Clare Montgomery. That could be a good excuse for Mrs Leela Devi Dookhun-Luchoomun’s nap in court while the ace lawyer was busy pleading. On the other hand, many were surprised by the way Me. Rashid Ahmine exposed his arguments. Where will the balance of justice tilt? Will the argument of Mrs. Montgomery that the case lacked mens rea (criminal intent) have the required impact? Press reports of the body language of the leader of the MSM, Mr. Pravind Jugnauth, tend to indicate that he was “deep in thought”, with closed expressions on his face. In any case, Mr Jugnauth has no choice but wait for the decision of the Supreme Court to be in a position to plan his political future. Meanwhile, the MMM has decided that three of its MPs, namely Mr. Rajesh Bhagwan, Mr. Veda Baloomoody and Dr. Zouberr Joomaye, resign from the parliamentary committee of the Independent Commission against Corruption (ICAC). Their main argument for leaving is that the committee lacks credibility. They also oppose the nomination of Miss Shakila Jhungeer, known to be close to the MSM, on the board of ICAC. Most importantly, the MMM is dead against the nomination of Mr. Kaushik Goburdhun as Director General of ICAC, arguing that he is a cousin of Minister Bhadain. This move from the part of the MMM has been diversely commented in the press. Many insist that the three MMM MPs should have never resigned from the parliamentary committee of ICAC and that on the contrary, they should have used this platform to express themselves and try to find solutions instead of shying away. Labour MP Mr. Shakeel Mohamed proved to be bolder in these circumstances. He chose to stay as member of the committee, promising that he would summon even the Prime Minister or Minister Bhadain or both, to give explanations on the matter. Mr. Mohamed mentioned about damning information regarding the way Mr. Goburdhun was chosen as Director General of ICAC. The chairperson of the parliamentary committee of ICAC Mr. Maneesh Gobin stated in an interview to l’Express on Saturday that the resignation of the MMM MPs is unfortunate. He argued that Mauritius is probably the only country in the world where a leader of the opposition nominates members of a parliamentary committee. Although he insisted that the committee has done a remarkable job during the past year, he was quite enigmatic when replying to a question regarding the nomination of Mr. Kaushik Goburdhun as Acting Director General. Probably being a lawyer gives him another reading of the situation. The same can be said of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Etienne Sinatambou, who in an interview to Weekly on Thursday stated in no uncertain terms that “I personally was very surprised by Kaushik Goburdhun’s nomination at the head of the ICAC”. However he quickly added that “There was a lot of brouhaha about Kaushik Goburdhun being related to Roshi Bhadain. I don’t know about blood ties but I don’t think that Mr. Goburdhun is in favour of the current government”. We wonder how government will deal with this situation, now that the opposition is exerting more and more pressure. Similarly, the leader of the Opposition and of the MMM Mr. Paul Bérenger twice criticized the government, within a period of less than a week, regarding the setting of MauBank, a merger between the Mauritius Postal and Cooperative Bank (a merger between the former Cooperative Bank and the Mauritius Postal Bank) and the National Commercial Bank (formerly the Bramer Banking Corporation). According to Mr. Bérenger, the government has been injecting too much of tax payers money in this new bank. He further suspects the Minister of Finance Mr. Vishnu Lutchmeenaraidoo of having too much ambition for MauBank, which could be detrimental to other commercial banks, in particular the SBM. On Wednesday, as he addressed the press, Mr. Bérenger blasted the government, accusing it of having mishandled the BAI file. He added that this would cost some Rs 10 billion to tax payers. He also said that while the Minister of Financial Services, Good Governance and Institutional Reforms, Mr. Roshi Bhadain maintains that tax payers money will not be used to redress the situation within the former BAI group, the Minister of Finance Mr. Vishnu Lutchmeenaraidoo tends to say the contrary. It is unfortunate that Parliament is not sitting until 29 March next as so many national issues could have been discussed. Meanwhile, it is through the media that political leaders are expressing themselves. At times, petty personal matters take precedence on more important issues. Take the case of the rumour that Mr. Alan Ganoo, the current president of the Mouvement Patriotique (MP) is staging a comeback in his former party, the MMM. Mr. Ganoo has denied the rumour, adding that his party is performing well and that he intends to further consolidate the party. A statement that has become like a rhetoric, not to say cliché. Can you believe that after the debacle at the December 2014 general elections, both the Mauritius Labour Party and the MMM have set up committees within their respective parties with almost the same objectives: that of further democratizing and modernizing the structures of the party. We can bet that even before these reforms are brought before the various instances of these two parties, their respective leaders would have imposed their veto. In Mauritius, political parties are leader-centered, instead of being vision-centered. We are good at making remakes of namesakes. Is it the hedonic treadmill at its best or a lack of guts to pitch for deeper engagement within the community, in politics in particular? It could all that put together.