Rodrigues: when will freedom come?      

       

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Comment posted on ‘Indépendance et République : un festival mauricien précèdera les célébrations du 12 mars’.

Mauritius speaks of ''fierté' at home, speaks of human rights at the United-Nations, pledges solidarity with SADC (Southern African Development Committee) and the African Union – yet retains its own Colonial Dominion on Rodrigues. The double-edged morality is staggering. Much water and much blood have flowed into the Indian Ocean, since our brothers and sisters in Madagascar, India, Sri Lanka, Comoros, Africa, Maldives, Seychelles and Mauritius were freed (at least in theory) from the wretched web of Colonialism. But for us Rodriguans, the on-going ignominy of Mauritian Occupation still haunts our daily lives.
&nbspIn the 21st century, the island of Rodrigues, one of this region’s last remaining manifestation of Colonialism has become the ‘sick man’ of the Indian Ocean, forever bonded to an artificial welfare drip, and still begging a foreign “kleptocrat” to let us go. It is argued that because on May 30th 1814, Britain dubbed Rodrigues a dependency of the colony of Mauritius, and administered it as part of the island of Mauritius, it automatically became an integral and indivisible territory of Mauritius.
Therefore, any dismemberment of territory before independence would have been illegal under international law. If we follow this line of reasoning, then we also recognize that all colonially imposed arrangements are forever binding on all future generations. And when this thinking is extended retrospectively, then, Mussolini’s 1936 laws could still be cited today, as justification to go on bedeviling the lives of Ethiopians, forever.
During Mad-Dog-Morgan’s governorship of Jamaica, looting and rape were the arrangements of the day. As one would reasonably expect, when Morgan the pirate left, his arrangements left with him.
The British themselves snatched Rodrigues from the French at the point of a bayonet hooked-up to a gun likewise, any arrangements they made during their rule became null and void – the very minute they left. There was never any 11th Commandment, which accorded Britain divine right to bequeath our lives, our lands and our country to Mauritius, for time without end. Our people were not Mauritius’ or anyone else’s private property. We were not cattle to be handed over from one master to another.
Unitary rule was part and parcel of British colonial policy. As a result, despite underlying divisions among different geographical ethnic groups, territories were artificially forced into a unitary state. For example, New Zealand was administered as a dependency of the colony of New South Wales islands of the Caribbean were grouped together willy-nilly Seychelles was administered as part of Mauritius There were plans afoot to group all British East-African colonies under a federation. And it was only the selfless vetoes of India’s leaders that saved Burma from being administered as part of India.
Unfortunately, Rodrigues did not have a Gandhi, or a Jinnah or a Nehru we had Duval, demagoguery and double-cross a go-go. The simple truth, however unpalatable, is when colonial rule ended in 1968, the island of Rodrigues had a population, and that island belonged to that population, and was not up for grabs. The flaw in the dismemberment argument is that it is predicated on the false premise that Rodrigues was a legitimate territory of Mauritius prior to Independence. This was never the case.
Mauritius never discovered a terra nullius Rodrigues it never captured Rodrigues by conquest the British never wrested Rodrigues from the French in 1814 simply to give it to Mauritius Rodriguans never surrendered their individual sovereignty and their territorial sovereignty and their territorialintegrity to a ‘Pax Mauritiana’ – Moreover, the Rodriguan nation never consented to be part of, or governed by Mauritius. State sponsored propaganda, unremittingly repeated and embedded in school children as fact, is extremely difficult to unlearn.
The untainted truth is Rodrigues was part of the British Empire until 1968 today, it is an annexed country under Occupation. It is no more a territory of Mauritius, than Hercules is a son of Zeus. Whether Britain gifted Rodrigues to Mauritius in 1968, as it gave Eritrea to Ethiopia or whether Mauritius opportunistically annexed it, is neither here nor there. Whatever deal, whatever collusion took place between Britain and its Mauritian colonial minister, without our consent was illegal and immoral. It was akin to a departing pirate rewarding his faithful slave, with a slave of his own. It was the shameless advancement of one country’s territorial ambition at the expense of its neighbour. Mauritius added 130,000 miles of our EEZ(exclusive economic zone) to its territory, and our people lost their homeland and their dignity.
The United Kingdom, Mauritius and the International community clearly understand this, as I do, as you do, as we all do … It was wrong then – It is wrong now! In 1968, our economic or political unpreparedness should never have been used as an excuse to deny us our independence. Mauritius should have been granted its own independence separately, as Northern Rhodesia was. Rodrigues should have been placed under the guardianship of the  Trusteeship Council of the United Nations, as a non-self-governing territory. A pan-African commission or UN special committee for self-determination could then have put together a long term plan for Independence.
Under a mutually agreed-upon constitution, with suitable opt-out clauses, we could even have remained in free association with Mauritius, rather than being perpetually entrapped in the existing abomination, euphemistically known as ‘Maximum Autonomy’. If historical debts, legal or at least moral responsibilities, abrogated in 1968, are made good to some extent, past injustices can be belatedly rectified. We remain hopeful. It is not our lot in life, to be perpetually governed by other people.
We did not accept non-consensual rule from France we did not accept it from Britain – we will never accept it from Mauritius. The majority of Mauritius’ 1.3 million population are descendants of Indian indentured labourers, brought by the British to meet labour shortages on Sugar cane plantations whereas, ninety-five percent of Rodrigues’ forty thousand strong population are direct descendants of African slaves. We are as distinct, as say Mexicans and Kenyans.  This ethnic heterogeneity differentiates the one island from the other.
Rodriguans are not an indigenous group or an ethno-national minority seeking piecemeal internal self-rule we are a separate people with a ferventaspiration to self-determine our future. Our case for full sovereignty is an exceptionally strong one. More to the point, we can never give up our homeland – our forefathers paid too dear a price for it!  We are proud Rodriguans and not second class Mauritian citizens.
TORTIDEMER