Why Mauritianism matters…
By Chetan Ramchurn
Like in the clichéd movies, the post-independence history of Mauritius also revolves around love and hate. Mutually exchangeable, triggered by motivations unknown, the lines between both flimsy enough to make you gasp at their level of intertwinement or the suddenness of the changes from one to another. This bipolar disorder of Mauritius has since been epitomised in the independence years by the two lines; “Malbar nou pas ouler” and “Hindou, mon frère”. Since then, Mauritians have continued in the same spirit…all colours of the rainbow nation have fallen victim to similar hate.
Not quite an ersatz of paradise
Indeed, the Hindu-peril has since given way to other undercurrents reeking of ethnic dissection. All driven with the same simplistic agenda founded on the desire to find a culprit. Thus if one such section was found culpable of a low level of ethnic identification[1], others have received their guilt token by having the limelight cast unjustly solely on their more extreme members. Pseudo attempts to unite us were riddled with dangers of further dividing us. Accordingly, in 2005, what Hollup (1996) describes as a shared “history of indentured labor, both having been recruited to work in the sugar cane plantations…and arrived in the same ships[2]” was put forward as the winning formula. De facto, were excluded from this equation the descendents of those that had the misfortune of not being at the right dock.
Managing perception
But then, there have been great movements in the past trying to break the impasse with their chutzpah and an all-inclusive approach to development…
Still, that the same debates as in the 70s are prevalent in our times says a lot about the state of unchanged things since then. In simpler terms, Mauritius went soul-searching only to return back home with the prognosis that there would not be any real change in the coming decades. The mantra was to maintain the same order of things, but to veil it through lesser force exerted on the leash. Maybe, the new goal of ‘progressive’ parties is to let the status quo prevail. To let those that wield power continue to do so and pretend that that the fight is on.
Since class struggle was too utopian, successive generations have succumbed to dreams of lower grandeur. As a result, the fascination with the allure of power through cliques and networks has grown steadily. The dream in 2011 for most young people is to become a yuppie in the lines of Brett Easton Ellis’s Patrick Bateman. Quite a difference from generations of yore, when rebels were the poster boys. The zeitgeist is definitely not one that is favourable to societal change.
Who are we?
The most acute issue is the lack of common individual fabric that would bind us collectively. What we have failed to achieve is the ingraining of traits that would unite us. What we need to work on today is how to give an identity to The Mauritian, how to create an esprit de corps that would make us emboldened to face adversity? Thinkers can work together using help from experts in economics, anthropology, history, sociology, philosophy and psychology to craft a web around The Mauritian DNA; a new education system in the lines of Montessori where freedom would be at the heart of things, a better understanding of how economic interests are related to political ones at domestic level and the greater involvement of more citizens in decision making. In short, an innovative attitude on how to cure the Mauritian despair.
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