Unchained Melody

The scene that prompts slave hunter Madame La Victoire to chase the Maroons, the fugitive slaves, is sparked by the cries of a baby unsettled while being breastfed. These heartbreaking images of a mother on the run with her baby capture the essence of the movie: there is a limit to how much agony a human being can take before spiritedly seeking refuge and reparation. All this is masterfully staged in the dark forest with striking realism. When, in a dream, slave Massamba, Mati’s father, brutally kills the slave owner, few viewers would remain unmoved. Director Simon Moutaïrou deserves praise for avoiding the easy path of depicting violence for violence’s sake. He succeeds in conveying his motivation to raise awareness without resorting to an overkill. Sobriety conveys intense and lasting emotions more effectively.

Madame La Victoire’s moral supremacism is a trap we can all fall into. When we live in a “tribe” with no bridges with the outside world, we only nurture affinities with our fellow human beings based on country of origin, ethnicity, religion, social class and gender. As a result, we tend to lose hindsight, discernment and even empathy with the Other, making our own values sacred and cursing those of others. And if the elites aren’t very enlightened, they’ll plot the status quo for as long as possible. In a plural society, social links grow defiant when the sense of entitlement trickles down. On the other hand, the “rebellious” son expresses some truth about the fact that younger generations, equipped with new bearings, are often more prone to be more open-minded.

Ni chaînes ni maîtres is not a masterpiece, but it is a laudable attempt to offer us some riveting time. Jumping off the cliff to die as the climax of the ending, rather than enduring the slow death of the soul in captivity, brings a dignified relief. A deafening silence settled over the audience as the credits rolled as if to express liberation.  A deserving ovation followed. French audiences, and many Mauritians, will clearly be more shaken by the movie’s perspective, which breaks with historical taboos. As for other viewers, the perspective may be “trivialised” by countless narratives about the ambivalent legacy of other colonisers.

Ni empathie, ni justice

La scène qui déclenche la course-poursuite de Madame La Victoire, la chasseuse d'esclaves, contre les marrons est provoquée par les pleurs d'un bébé contrarié dans sa tétée. Ces images bouleversantes de cette maman en fuite avec son bébé captent l'essence du film: il y a une limite à la douleur qu'un être humain peut supporter avant de chercher énergiquement refuge et réparation. Le tout est magistralement mis en scène dans la forêt sombre avec un réalisme saisissant. Lorsque, dans un rêve, l'esclave Massamba, le père de Mati, tue brutalement l'esclavagiste, peu de spectateurs resteraient insensibles. Le réalisateur Simon Moutaïrou mérite d'être salué pour avoir évité la facilité d'illustrer la violence pour la violence. Il parvient à transmettre son souhait d'éveiller les consciences sans recourir à la surenchère, l'énergie subtile canalisant plus intensément les émotions profondes.

 Le suprémacisme moral de Madame La Victoire est un piège dans lequel nous pouvons tous tomber. Lorsque nous vivons dans une « tribu » sans passerelles avec le monde extérieur, nous n'alimentons que des affinités avec nos semblables selon notamment le pays d'origine, l'ethnicité, la religion, la classe sociale et le genre. Ainsi, en perdant le recul, la jugeote et même notre humanité nous avons tendance à sacraliser nos valeurs et maudire celles des autres. Et si en plus les élites ne sont pas très éclairées, elles veilleront à ce que le statu quo perdure. Dans une société plurielle, les liens sociaux se tordent lorsque le sentiment d'avoir un droit supérieur se répand. Par ailleurs, le fils « rebelle » exprime une certaine vérité sur le fait que souvent les jeunes générations, dotées de nouveaux repères, sont plus aptes à élargir leurs visions et à faire preuve d'une plus grande ouverture d'esprit.

Ni chaînes ni maîtres n'est pas un chef-d'œuvre, c'est une tentative louable de nous offrir des moments lumineux. Se jeter de la falaise pour mourrir comme point culminant de la fin du film plutôt que de subir la mort lente de l'âme en captivité apporte un soulagement dans la dignité. Un silence assourdissant s'est installé dans l'assistance alors que le générique de fin défilait comme pour exprimer une libération. Un applaudissement mérité a suivi. Le public français et même une partie du public mauricien seront manifestement plus secoués par cette perspective qui brise les tabous historiques. La perspective des autres étant « banalisée »  par d'innombrables récits sur d'autres colonisateurs.

Please do not disturb…. the flow

 In football, unless you are gifted with trickeries like Ronaldinho you cannot afford to “kill the ball”, meaning when the ball comes to you it must stay alive, keep it rolling. Else, instead of freeing the space around you and trigger a forward action with grit, you end up putting immense pressure on yourself and the team.

The most creative instinct to keeping the ball alive is to set a “contrôle orienté” or a “crochet”, namely – not necessarily with the sparkle of Lionel Messi. During the Euro 2024, the England team, despite the undeniable talent within, was so gripped with individual strain that the players merely resorted to the “kill the ball” mode most of the time. They were thus unable to perform collectively and live up to expectations.

The takeaway from the analogy above is relevant for everyday life. Simply put, to keep the flow strive to stay connected to vibrant and virtuous elements. At the outset, it consists of identifying a maximum of obstacles, most visible but some not so much, and bottlenecks. Failing to do so whether at individual, local, national or international level is bound to turn counterproductive as resources are devoted to an invalid assessment of the situation.

Even some of physicist Richard Feynman’s intellectual agility to connect seemingly disparate dots across disciplines would be a blessing in the area of policymaking, and anywhere else for that matter. How we collect and process information is key to sound decision making. For instance, we would be spared much misery in commuting if the expertise to ease road traffic was not practically hooked on displacing bottlenecks and siphoning a massive share of public funds, as consistently exposed by the National Audit Office.

When this curse so short on variables and so devoid of coherence cuts across the whole system, disrupting institutions, logistics, utilities, industrialisation, ecosystem, know-how and constantly gnawing at the social ladder, reactionary forces are unleashed. In their wake, people’s brain pain fatally leads to brain drain that will haunt any nation for years to come. Urban planners and anthropologists, it’s your time, the sham has lasted too long!

Simin lalimir ?

 Que devient une ineptocratie* lorsqu’elle perd continuellement du terrain face à la monnaie du monde (le dollar américain) et à la lingua franca transnationale (la langue anglaise) tout en éduquant simultanément une part écrasante de sa population par l’apprentissage par cœur et en laissant une importante minorité sans compétences de base en lecture, écriture et en calcul ?

 * "un système de gouvernement dans lequel les moins capables de gouverner sont élus par les moins capables de produire. Les électeurs sont les autres membres de la société les moins aptes à subvenir à eux-mêmes ou à réussir. Les inaptes sont récompensés par des biens et des services qui ont été payés par la confiscation de la richesse et du travail d'un nombre de producteurs en diminution continuelle.”

Publié dans l'express du jour

A systemic knot

Now that the term “system” and its collapse resonates within the Mauritian political scene, more precisely within the extraparliamentary fringe, Mauritians who are disenchanted with this “system” in place must breathe a sigh of relief. 

Ironically, mainstream politicians would score an “own goal” should they embrace the “system” discourse as, to a large extent, this broken “system” bears their signature. Still, nothing prevents them, in a burst of elusive humility (and practical intelligence), from expressing a mea culpa and laying the foundations of a real “sanzman” with an action plan that is as comprehensive as it is coherent and convincing. Fortunately credibility loss is not always carved in stone. Otherwise, they would continue to pave their way to a not-so-glorious memory in the history books. 

By “system” we mean the national network that is connected to the international world within which we constantly interact. The healthier it is, the more our individual well-being radiates within the national and global community. The more toxic it is, the more it ignites our tribal instinct to seek refuge in a self-absorbed community. The world in which we have been living since the 1980s bears the seal of “ultra-liberalism”, which boils down to a race blinded by material quest, even if it means perverting the means to achieve it and depleting our habitat. Depending on our lifestyles and the country we live in, somehow we all suffer the consequences. 

Two groups have emerged among the few to have crafted the conditions to minimise the impact of globalised “ultra-liberalism”: the Nordics (Sweden, Denmark and Norway) and the Confucians (China, South Korea and Singapore). It is not about idealising one or the other, but about deconstructing their relative “success”. In short, these nations thrive with a mindset that generally instills confidence in the “system” and a spirit of collaboration – essential connections in the building of a nation which, for instance, succeeds in its branding exercise organically, without resorting to fatly paid consultants. Although philosophically different in their approach (individual freedom first for the Nordics, enlightened paternalism among the Confucians), the two groups demonstrate that their moves are driven by pragmatism, not ideologies. 

Baby blues 

Alas, Mauritius is one of the many countries struggling to cope with global “ultra-liberalism”. Our creativity, our bent for innovation and our entrepreneurial spirit being inhibited by narratives as divisive as they are heavily Euro-centric (Westoxicated), in effect Franco- French-centric (Frenchtoxicated) since our “républicain” status. Forces of conservatism cannot be more disconnected from grassroot realities. If global “ultra-liberalism” has lifted many citizens, especially in “developing” countries, out of absolute poverty, it has simultaneously globalised internal economic inequalities, health, humanitarian and environmental disasters. To respond to systemic challenges, the desired strategic and interdisciplinary approach is worryingly missing. ChatGPT, namely, will certainly expand the information load available, but we are fooling ourselves if we believe we shall invariably meet our objectives without being discerning and making intelligent use of it. 

Slayers of the “system” have so far not shown that they are exploring the root cause of our malaise: the disproportionate concentration of national wealth generated. Is it out of intellectual laziness, complacency or reluctance in the face of a taboo – an economic oligarchy coming from a small ethnic minority descending from our former colonisers? Sooner or later, desperation will unleash the self-determination for effective “sanzman” but it can be a painful transition. We better wise up and be proactive. What is obvious on the other hand, one does not heal a patient through stigmatisation or, even more critically, without a cutting-edge diagnosis. 

How did we practically go from the monoculture of sugarcane to that of concrete? Why are we so obsessed with export activities while in the same breath claiming that a “competitive” rupee, a junk currency in truth, not productivity gains and a welltrained and motivated human capital, would be the engine of our competitiveness and our progress? Why, in return, we deindustrialise the country; we ignore the fact that local food production can also help improving our balance of payments; we subsidise smart cities that are as smart as ineptocrats can be, dedicated to foreigners mainly seeking tax optimisation, and make housing unaffordable to locals; and finally, why do we confer a tax haven the virtues of economic democratisation or focus on taxation rather than wastage and corruption to balance our national books? 

We have built a country that operates at conflicting paces with predominantly substandard delivery of goods and services. Only another “miracle” can make such a disastrous model viable. Globalisation and the market economy can be devastating when institutions such as watchdogs against corruption and for competition do not bite continuously, fiercely and indiscriminately. At the international level, the time has come for the World Trade Organization to play a less lame, more impactful role. In order to be empowered to punish and contain abuses within the supply chains (raw materials, oil, pharmaceuticals etc.) and maritime and air carriers. 

The current surreal governance is unbearable. The leadership that can send the right signals capable of reining in enablers and producers of systemic inequalities while synergising all progressive stakeholders will end up rescuing us. Meanwhile, let us act quickly within our circles of influence and keep hoping for the vital turnaround. Above all, we must stay wary of turning “systemic” into another buzzword.