Civic Rights

From Our Archives: A Glimpse into 1960

By Philippe Forget

The emergence of a better social order in Mauritius depends, to a considerable extent, on the participation of every man and woman in the civic, sociological, and political activities of the country. This duty of participation rests perhaps more heavily on the elite; it is among them, therefore, that voluntary abstention takes the proportion of national sin, no less reprehensible than corruption itself. Furthermore, at a time when the mobilisation of human resources in the fields of goodwill, social ideas, and political ideology is at least as vital as planned economic development, it is disturbing to find important sections of our citizenry, including a significant fraction of the elite, deterred from enjoying a full share of civic rights.

It would be extremely instructive to consider the selective factors at play in determining the present differential distribution of the elite among the Civil Service, the independent professions, and the staff of private enterprises. It would be even more instructive to follow the implications of such a differential distribution. Such a broad survey, however, would be outside the scope of this article, and only a number of aspects will be dealt with.

Young men of the Mauritian elite who face the future may be attracted towards the civil service by a variety of reasons. Family tradition of careers in government service, the requirements of a particular profession, a personality which shuns adventure and risks, the absence of any acute sense of independence, the bias of social circles, or the prejudice of well-meaning advisers may all play their part.

Less important in affecting individual decisions, but exerting a powerful and evil overall influence, is the climate of traditional favouritism which plagued certain government departments and made it imperative for whole communities, groups, and families to seek, in a retaliatory spirit, as many key positions as possible within these departments.

However, when these factors, among others, have been enumerated, it remains as an unmitigated fact that the chief attraction towards government service is financial security. Equally unmitigated is the observation that financial security exerts its strongest appeal with those young men of the elite who come from the poorer sections of the population.

If it is now considered that the important section of the elite who become civil servants are lost to the active political life of the country, the chain of argument is complete, demonstrating that the capitalist structure of society unerringly splits the Mauritian elite into groups who enjoy different degrees of civic liberty.

Thus, independent professionals, coming mostly from the richer strata of society, are free to exert themselves in the politico-social sphere, while the civil servants, coming mostly from the poor and middle-class families, are unable to contribute wholeheartedly to the politico-social struggle and influence its outcome for a healthier future.

A third group, likely to loom larger in the wake of economic expansion, consists of employees of private enterprise. Although conditions of work among them generally leave much to be desired, it seems to be the deliberate intention of capitalist managerial circles to exhibit the prospect of employment as a bait, and to make continuity of employment dependent on abstention from left-wing political affiliation.

Concurrently, a chosen few are on show, constituting an effective propaganda weapon among the expectant many. These few enjoy life insurance schemes, medical and sickness benefits, study and recreational leave, extensive facilities for the use of firm cars, and other items of “fringe-welfare” consisting strictly of non-transferable rights and amenities. The employee is consequently bound to his firm, has a severely restricted ability to change his job, and tends to conform, willy-nilly, to the political views of his employers.

Where manual workers are involved, employers are less concerned with such imaginative devices, and all the bluntness of political intolerance and economic slavery is illustrated. No election with a result favourable to socialist ideology is ever free from consequences of spiteful retaliation, of dismissals for frivolous reasons, of provocative sanctions, or petty nagging, penalising the workers on the suspicion that they “must have voted Labour!”

Universal suffrage is a mere step towards the democratization of public life. It must be consolidated by a deliberate cultivation of an alert sense of civic duty and a vigilant insistence, with adequate legal safeguards, that an open or disguised attack on the civic and political liberty of the manual or intellectual worker is intolerable. In the struggle against capitalism, extremely effective economic weapons are in the hands of the enemy. We must counter with education, full civic rights, and organisation.

8th Year – No 332
Friday 13th January, 1961

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