Noulakaz

The blog of Avinash, Christina, Anya and Kyan Meetoo.

Mauritius

Stupid 24/7

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I live in Quatre-Bornes and, this week-end, we were victims of that stupid thing called 24/7.

My daughter, Anya, was still awake at midnight last night because, brace yourself, a concert was still on (at midnight!!!) at the Municipality of Quatre-Bornes and the noise was deafening (even though we were 1-2 km away…) Don’t the organisers know that kids should sleep early on Sundays to be fresh for school the next day?

What’s the purpose of organising a concert until midnight? The only reason I can think of is that the Human Resource Development Council knows that no one gives a s*it about that 24/7 thing and the only way to attract a few people is to have such a concert. But come on guys! On Sunday?!? At midnight?!?

I only hope the millions that are being wasted are going to be recouped one day. But I have my doubts… once more.

On killing book reading

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As I suppose you all know by now, the British Council has decided to close its public library in Mauritius. This decision, which, as far as I can tell, is based on economical reasons, is very debatable as this will prevent people who like to read to have access to English books.

I have very fond memories of the British Council library. I was a subscriber when I was a kid then again when I came back to Mauritius in 1998. I remained a subscriber until two years ago when I decided to stop subscribing for two main reasons:

 

The library, which was originally a real library with real books and a very studious atmosphere, became a médiathèque with Web-enabled PCs, LCD TVs showing English movies, etc. From total silence, the place became noisy… But, more problematic, someone there decided that most books should be kept somewhere hidden and only retrieved when asked for. This made stumbling by accident on a book more or less impossible.

See, I became a Computer Scientist in large part because, at the British Council library, I stumbled by accident on one book when I was a kid. That book was the formidable Programming Pearls by Jon Bentley:

I read that book when I was 14-15 and fell in love. I discovered that very special type of literature called computer programming. From there I read books on algorithms, data structures, computer architecture, etc, all of them obtained at the British Council library. I can’t imagine what my education would have been without them…

A second reason why I stopped subscribing was that I felt that the subscription fee was becoming too high. I think it was around Rs 1000 per year which is waaaaaaay above what a normal Mauritian can pay. For the record, other libraries in Mauritius, and especially Charles Baudelaire library (which is the French alter-ego of the British Council library) charge substantially less per year.

If I were cynical, I would say that this was a deliberate decision by the British Council to have fewer and fewer subscribers until closing down would become the only viable thing to do.

But I prefer not to be cynical (once), this is just a result of very bad judgement.

Politics and the death penalty

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Yesterday, the Prime Minister of Mauritius announced that he is willing to reactivate capital punishment in the country (following its suspension a few years ago.)

Personally, I am against death penalty. Judicial errors are possible (and have happened) especially when the accused is not rich enough to afford the best barristers (watch The Green Mile.) And I am fundamentally against the idea of retribution: killing someone who has killed makes no sense to me.

The situation in other countries

According to Amnesty International, “more than two-thirds of the countries in the world have now abolished the death penalty in law or practice.”

Among the 58 countries in the world still practicing the death penalty, we have, for example, Afghanistan, China, India, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, United States Of America, Yemen and Zimbabwe.

 

Among the 139 countries which have stopped killing people, we have, for example, Australia, Canada, Cote D’Ivoire, Denmark, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Seychelles, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Togo, Turkey, United Kingdom and Mauritius.

It is important to understand that law has been amended in Mauritius to suspend the death penalty and if, and this is a big if, it it to be reactivated, then law will have to be re-amended.

My personal opinion

Mauritius has laws against the death penalty. Mauritius has also ratified agreements at the level of the United Nations to signify its intention not to practice death penalty anymore. And the Prime Minister knows this.

He also knows that the population loves blood. I strongly think that he said what he said yesterday to win some additional votes for the coming elections. I don’t think Mauritius will reintroduce the death penalty. It’s all about politics… and political agendas.