 cargo this year. As we walked toward Abrahams Landing, we could see that there weren’t as many cars parked on the streets as usual. We hit the beach, set up our blanket and poured ourselves some wine. The fireworks started, but this was the first year I can remember them being disappointing because of the hazy night sky.
But was it really just the weather that disappointed me that night? I kept thinking about all the years I tucked my little boy into his red wagon, put his light blue security blanket with the satin edge and a bottle in with him and pulled the wagon to the beach so he could watch the fireworks with us. He sat on my lap, a little afraid of the “fire”, as he called it, and it was warm and snuggley with him on my lap. I could smell him whenever I wanted to. I miss those days.
Now he’s 6 feet tall and has a beard. I still like to smell him, but try not to let him know when I’m doing it. When he’s away at school, I pass his room a lot and look in. It’s awfully neat in there; it doesn’t look like it did when he was in high school and it was his lair. I didn’t think I’d miss the messy look of it, but those socks on the floor and wet towels were signs that he’d just been there and would be back there soon. Not like now.
When I’m really missing him, I go in there and sit on his bed. Sometimes I smell his pillow, hoping there’s still some smell of him on it. Even when there is, though, it’s not much of a help. It’s just a reminder that he’s not there to hug. I know that to be a good Mom, I have to let him go, to grow up and become independent; to allow him and help him to spread his wings and make his own way in the world. After we’d helped move him into his college dorm room and it was time to say good bye and fly back East, it felt so odd. This child had been with me his entire life except for 2 weeks at sleep away camp he didn’t really like and some weekends away with friends. I’d taken care of him always, he’d been with me always, and now I’d brought him to a strange place, far away from home and I was leaving him there. I knew it was best, that he’d gotten accepted into a great program and would love it and have a great college experience, but that didn’t mean I had to like it.
Now he’s home for the summer and we play Monopoly like we always used to at the dining room table; he asks me to come sit next to him so he can show me funny videos on his phone. We talk about girls and all the things we always did. Now I’m used to him being with me again, seeing him all the time, smelling him. I’m dreading him leaving for his sophomore year at school because I know I’ll be depressed all over again and have to once again adjust to the new normal.With the general election less than a month away, ‘La Sentinelle’ (LSL) commissioned DCDM Research to conduct a political poll based on various themes prominent in the election campaign. Six hundred respondents, selected according to socioeconomic criteria such as age, socio-professional class, ethnic belonging and geographic region, participated in the poll, which was conducted through computer-aided telephone interviews in October. The results are in. So which way does public opinion lean and what lessons do these results contain for the political class?
Which parties are the most popular?
With the election slated for 10 December, leaving less than a month before Mauritian voters head for the voting booth, it looks like the Labour Party is the most popular party in the country with 28.8% of respondents claiming to support it. The Mouvement
Militant Mauricien (MMM) comes in secondwith 11.8% supporting it.That means that the two parties making up the l’alliance de l’Uunité et de la Modernité (AUM) collectively enjoy thesympathies of 40.7% of theelectorate.
On the other hand, 7.7% of respondents claimed to support the Mouvement Socialiste Mauricien (MSM) and another 3.3% supported the Mouvement Mauricien Social Démocrate (PMSD). What that means is that the two largest parties within the Alliance Lepep (AL) enjoy the support of 11.5% of the electorate.
However, 39% of respondents claimed that they were still undecided, meaning that both major blocs will be looking to sway these votes onto their sides.
Which alliance is better for the country?
The question of which alliance Mauritians thought was a good thing for the country, 54.2% said that the AUM bloc would be a good thing for the country and 55.5% opted for the AL. it would seem that Mauritians are not in favour of alliances in general and that the case is made even worse for the AUM. The fear that there might not be a strong parliamentary opposition in case of an AUM victory might be the reason behind the slight advantage the AL has over the AUM. Over 32% and 23.3% said that the AUM and the AL would be respectively a bad thing for the country.
The predicted score?
There is a great dose of pragmatism and little uncertainty in who Mauritius expects to win the 2014 election. Approximately 58% said that they expected the AUM to win the election and only 20% actually expect the AL to. When it comes to the expected score, if less than one in 10 respondents said that they expected the AUM to win an outright 60-0 victory, an overwhelming majority, however – 43% – still expect it to bag between 45 and 60 seats. Only 20.8% of MMM supporters and 29.7% of Labour supporters expect a result where they win less than 44 seats.
Will the labourmmm alliance last for five years?
Given the history of political coalitions breaking up and a short-lived Labour-MMM coalition in 1995 that lasted only till 1997, do people expect the AUM to survive this time around? Overall, more than half of all respondents – 54.7% – said that if elected, the AUM will break apart before completing its full five-year term. What is interesting to note is that when broken down by political affiliations, the expectations tend to vary. Whereas 47.9% of declared MMM supporters say that they expect the bloc to break apart before completing its term, and 37.6% of Labour supporters expect the same, the overwhelming majority of respondents – 65% – who said they didn’t support any particular party expect it to break up before completing its term. In short, more MMM than Labour supporters expect to see the coalition break apart than survive – 47.9% and 37.6% respectively. Whereas more Labour Party than MMM supporters are more optimistic about the survival of the AUM, 54.3 and 45.1% respectively. Those saying that they don’t support any particular party were overwhelmingly the most pessimistic.
How will mauritians vote?
When asked about how they plan to vote for the three candidates in each constituency, the majority of respondents, 46%, said that they didn’t plan to vote according to a bloc, whereas 38.3% said that they planned to put in a bloc vote. 13.3% of respondents said that they had not yet decided about how they planned to put in their vote.
What are the weak points of each alliance?
The AUM alliance between the Labour Party and the MMM enjoys the confidence of a significant chunk of the respondents with more than 40% stating that they have confidence in the bloc’s ability to deal with a range of issues. The Achilles heel of the AUM, however, appears to be the perception of their ability to fight fraud and corruption which is the only point at which less than 40% of respondents state that they have confidence in. The repeated promise of establishing a serious fraud office if elected by leaders of the bloc does not seem to be sufficient to improve voter confidence in this regard. On the other hand, the weakest point of the AL is the lack of confidence amongst respondents that the bloc will promote national unity, with only 26.2% of respondents saying that they are confident in the bloc’s ability to promote national unity.
The most popular politician?
According to the results of the survey, the three leaders with the highest approval ratings appear to be the foreign minister, Arvin Boolell (with a 73.8% approval rating), PMSD leader Xavier-Luc Duval (72.2%) and AL’s prime ministerial candidate Sir Anerood Jugnauth (70.5%). Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam comes in fourth (60.3%) and Paul Bérenger fifth (54.2%). But aside from their own party supporters, where else do these leaders enjoy the highest approval? Outside of Labour Party supporters for instance, 66.2% of MMM have a favourable view of the prime minister. Not surprisingly, MMM leader Paul Bérenger is currently looked on favourably by 70.5% of Labour Party supporters. In the AUM then, it seems that outside of their own parties, leaders enjoy the most favour amongst supporters of their coalition ally.
Paradoxically, among the almost 69 per cent of Mauritians who said that they wanted new leaders to take over political parties, dissatisfaction