Yep, Mireille Martin turned 35 on Thursday the day the voters of constituency no. 4 sent her to parliament for a second time. She got the most votes -- 16,607 votes which is 10,000 more than Cehl Meeah -- beating Joe Lesjongard by 72 votes while Kalyanee Juggoo came in third.
With Aurore Perraud getting one of the 7 best loser seats this riding will have three women representing it in Parliament. Not bad.
11 comments:
As regards to the best loser nominations, I would to comment on Mr Michael Sik Yuen nomination. This case will/should have far reaching ramifications. By declaring himself as a person from the general population, he may have set off the demise of the best loser system! I think his nomination will give more weight to the case set off by those whose candidature were not accepted for not filling in the ethnic gp.
So what if tomorrow, someone does not feel like they belong to any of these groups!
@Vikramg: I don't know how big a ripple the Sik Yuen case's gonna create. We have to remember that Lalit has in the past had its candidates randomly pick the ethnic group they inscribed on their nomination paper in protest of the system.
For sure we should do away with the best loser system and place citizenship at the centre of the our electoral system.
Rightly so. Citizenship should be the only criteria. As Regards to citizenship, one question that popped into my mind once was, can our PM/President have dual nationality?
As for the MSY case, if someone lodges a court appeal against this nomination, then maybe the court will have to set things clear.
I was just wondering, how do they compute the ethnic quota for the best loser? Is it from the data obtained from the national census?
@Vikramg: I think they can just like any other of our fellow citizens.
Not sure a case can be lodged against MSY now. That should have been done within the period after nomination day as prescribed by the law.
It is calculated using the 1972 census and via a formula. Rezistans ek Alternative have prepared a document explaining how the best losers were determined for the May 5 elections.
This is certainly the largest statistical blunder of this 21st century (I had discussed the matter with a Professor from Indian Statistical Institute who came to deliver some lectures in Paris while I was studying there). This is indeed an exercise where senior statisticians, including the Director of Statistics, sit down with officers of the Electoral Supervisory Commisssion to take a major decision concerning the future of the country for the next 5 years USING THE RSULTS OF A CENSUS THAT WAS CARRIED OUT IN 1972. Comprend qui peut !!!
@Anonymous: 'Largest statistical blunder of the century'? Let's try to keep our feet on the ground and recognise it for what it is: an anachronism.
Agree with you but blunder wrt the people who erased that particular question from the survey after 1972, you get what I mean ? One among them at that time was a certain Palma Veeramen (a PhD in Statistics now but retired !)
@Anonymous: It would be interesting to find out why they stopped asking the question (maybe if someone could ask Mr. Veeramen) or we could check the hansard or record of cabinet decisions.
The thing that we have to agree I think is that yes we should do away with the BLS but no that does not improve the lives of a majority of our citizens overnight. The latter dwarfs the former in importance by a huge factor.
Actually that happened after the 60-0 of 1982. I was a student at Sciences-Po at that time and from what I had gathered at that time (there was no Internet then !) is that a pressure group (Left and Ultra-Left) made that proposition as a first step to eliminate the BLS. After 1983, that just never occured, as you know. So the Census questions were left unaltered since then. Never really had time (or interest) to go and check all this when I got back to the country in 1989.
Mo rappel quand mo ti trouvé dans enn lagazett apré Nomination Day ki Sik Yuen ti metter comme "communauté" , mo ti faire enn ti-joke lor-la ek mo madame: Dépi enn bon lepok Lalit faire tiraz-au-sort pou rempli Section 5 Nomination Paper, Devarajen Kanaksabee ti alle faire la-cour statué ki li li pa enn Hindou, mais enn membre Population Générale, abé Sik Yuen inn prend enn "husband shortcut" ça!!
Dans cas Lalit ek Kanaksabee personne pas ti pe dire nargnié lakoz zot chance election ti bien feb. Donc c'est zordi-zour ki bann organisation / dimoun ki pé lévé couma tang sorte dépi dant zot trou pou decouvert ça? Zot bien bien hypocrite pou dire Sik Yuen rann à César saki appartenir à César. Sik Yuen gagne droit, pareil couma Kanaksabee, déclare limem Population Générale, et l'inn élu légalement. Full stop.
Enn journaliste Radio Plus inn mem pousse so analyse à l'extreme pou dire ki si aukenn grand parti pas ti aligne aukenn Sino-Mauricien, n'importe ki Sino-Mauricien indépendant (par exemple: disons Georges Ah-Yan) ti capave nominé Best Loser, mem avec ENN SEL vote! Whatever Sik Yuen has triggerred will reveal itself in the coming days: a mere ripple in a glass of water, or a landscape-changing / anachronism-killing tsunami...?
@SJ Thanks for the link.
Also for the citizenship, I just find it strange that on the one hand, someone may be the head of the state here but being a mere subject in another country.
Quite enlightening discussion about MSY! From the facts, I guess he had all the rights to put himself forward as a person from the gen pop. Actually any "smart" politician would have done that!
As regards to the ethnic classification, reminds me that in a particular country people have their race written down on their IC and all application form requires them to write down their race. Also, they have quotas set aside for buying house.
At least we arent at this stage yet!
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