LALIT protest against Best Loser System continues …
25.01.2017
In L’Express 19 January, 2017 in a mini-interview, Prime Minister’s Advisor on electoral matters Mr. Ally Dahoo, commented on the strange situation that would be thrown up were Minister Alain Wong, who recently resigned from the PMSD, to resign from Parliament as well. Because he is an MP as a result of a Communal Nomination after the last election, where a Mini-Amendment of the Constitutional Amendment (Declaration of Community – Temporary Provisions) holds. The advisor says, accurately, that under the law, a Sino-Mauritian would have to be nominated to replace Mr. Wong, should he resign. And this person will be nominated not by arithmetic, but by the Leader of the Lepep Alliance. And he can nominate any Sino-Mauritian, he said, from amongst candidates that stood in Parties for the election and that did not get elected.
The first lesson is that, despite Rezistans & Alternativ (RA) and often the quasi-totality of the Press following after, announcing a great victory when, having intentionally and opportunistically confused the “communal Best Loser System” with the “declaration of community”, their “victory” in fact did nothing more than create a virtual 5th community, i.e. a community of those who choose not to fill in a “community” on their Nomination Paper. The Amendment neatly absorbed the RA candidates into the status quo while the Best Loser System continues.
And now, two years later, Mr. Wong, if he resigned from the National Assembly, would be replaced by a Sino-Mauritian. If that’s a victory, what would a defeat be?
It is interesting to note that, because LALIT candidates at the last general elections, all 28 of us, filled in the Nomination Form by a drawing of lots (one out of the 5 constitutional “communities”: Hindu, Muslim, Sino-Mauritian, General Population and Not Declared), statistical chance caused us to have some candidates who drew “Sino Mauritian”. So, our candidates could theoretically be nominated, as Mr. Dahoo pointed out. This would, as he put it, be a “cocasse” (“comical”) situation, given that the community of our candidates was chosen by a drawing of lots.
The important thing is that our tactic of showing up the arbitrary nature of communal classification continues to operate, even until today’s L’Express article.
