For 629 Cleaners Earning a Pittance Light Finally Appears at the End of the Tunnel

They were earning Rs1,500 per month. Some for 11 years. Which coincides roughly with the Sithanen flat tax. They will now earn around Rs9,000. Most of the extra Rs55-60m they will take home as a group every year will probably be spent – and help make the economy grow faster – unlike the additional monies which the trickle-down policies have handed to those who already have everything.

Kudos to the CTSP for fighting for these ladies.

Teleplus Gets Two-And-Half Times More YouTube Views Than L'Express

After adjusting for how long they've been around. Teleplus has clocked 18.3m views on its YouTube channel since June 3 of last year which is a bit more than one third what L'Express received. Of course L'Express has been there more than seven times longer. So about 40,700 views are registered on Teleplus on a daily basis compared to 15,700 for L'Express. TOP TV gets 13,400 daily views – unlike Teleplus and L'Express it doesn't have any newspapers or magazines – while ION News grabs 9,400 views every day. Radio One too has a channel and it gets 3,300 views each day. Surprisingly one pretty good media platform doesn't have its channel yet.

It would be interesting to adjust these numbers for the types of videos hosted. Like what is the split between thrash/quality reporting. Who should do that? MRC, UoM or ICTA?

What Do You Know About the Sachs Commission?

The one about electoral reform. It's mentioned so often by politicians. But as a thinking-person what have you taken away from it? How would you explain it to a friend in a couple of minutes. Incidentally there was also a select committee on electoral reform chaired by Ivan Collendavelloo in the early 2000s. Do you know what were its recommendations and if they make any sense to you?

Blog Different is Nine

Which means we'll be double-digits in exactly twelve months. But we'll hit the 1,500th post and 5,000th comment well before that. And probably end up 2017 with at least 100 posts. Something that hasn't happened since 2012. No shortage of things to write on. Might even break the record of 10 posts in a year here.

Watch out for stuff on...

Momentum Builds for Unique Candidate of Common Sense

In the forthcoming by-election in No. 18. Something interesting is brewing. Finally.

Ki Piariv Nu Peyi?

Samem promye zafer enn kamwad finn dimann mwa zordi. De pli an pli dimunn pe truve ki kondisyons pe deteryore Moris. Revelasyons komisyon lor ladrog pe fer nu konpran lanpler fleo la. Konbin sa ek inegalite ek povrete ki flat tax Sithanen ek bann lezot politik pagla finn kree: 44 fwa plis dimunn finn tom dan la povrete ant 2007 ek 2012 ki ant 1997 ek 2002 – 22,000 kont 500. Ek lor 11 banane mank 1,000 milyar rupi dan prodiksyon nasyonal. Proliferasyon bann kazino ek lezot gambling house dernye 10 an finn anpir la sityasyon sirtu kinn etabli bann lyen ant rezo ladrog ek lindistri zugader. Azut depresyasyon rupi ek bann lezot politik dan dife pu u konpran kot nun arive ek kot nu pe ale.

Deza ki Moris nu ti setiem peyi kot litilizasyon lopium par kapita pli elve dan lemond. Nu bat Pakistan ki vwazin ek Afganistan – pli gro konsomater par kapita dan lemond – ek wityem. Devine kisana dernye. Pa tro difisil konpran kifer nu enn sanpyon dan brain drain. Bann seki sanpyon dan admir zot lonbri apel sa skills mismatch.

FMI truve ki lekonomi robis. Mo dimann mwa kot zot pran rasyon. 

Democracy Needs A Little Help From Fowdar

That is resigning from Parliament to provoke a by-election in riding No. 6 of Grand Baie/Poudre D'Or. It's necessary because our electoral system doesn't yet allow for recall elections that we could have used to immediately remove Collendavelloo from our National Assembly. And because Lepep seems to be taking a bit too long to make good on its electoral pledge of organising referendums on matters of utmost importance. The Minister must go as he wants to colonise CWA for all sorts of bogus reasons including because he didn't like its hotline. Besides he forgot how to resign. Unlike in 1989.

Mr. Fowdar would of course be most welcome to run again for the same seat. His position on this fundamental issue has been a rare breath of fresh air. All the way. Voters have definitely taken note. It would also be a great opportunity for the tiny ML to test the declaration it made at its rather lacklustre congress that it had now become a national party. Fielding a candidate and having the right poster like the one below during the campaign might help reverse the general feeling that it is a one-term party. At most.

Our Body Should Decide What We Eat

Our alimentary tract has been designed to essentially eat fruits and vegetables. Fish is good too. Chicken is not as good but better than red meat. Cooked veg food is nice but doesn't make you feel as alive as when you eat a good salad. Doesn't hurt of course to remember that old Egyptian proverb:

"One quarter of what you eat keeps you alive. The other three-quarters keep your doctor alive."

And how can we forget to exercise enough?

€222m Later Neymar Appears At PSG

From Barça. He will earn $53m a year for five years making him the best-paid footballer in the world and play alongside an in-form Dani Alves and fellow members of the Seleçao. The Catalan club want to fill the void with Coutinho. That would be a terrible blow for the Reds as the Brazilian is so crucial in enabling Liverpool to produce games that are pleasant to watch. Plus there was some hope that with recent signings like Mohamed Salah and the return of Mane the team would finally find the rhythm that is needed to mount a serious title challenge.

Even if the Spanish club doesn't land Philippe he will be chased by the PSG if their bid to get the sensational Mbappe doesn't work out. But the latest news is that Liverpool might not sell their attacking midfielder even if there's a £100m on the table. Arsenal's Wenger points out that this is a consequence of a country owning a club and reminds us of the time when the first £1m transfer was deemed unreasonable.

MK Should Ask Us To Name Five A350 XWBs

Like Qantas did a couple of months ago. But our national airline has ordered 6 of those planes I hear you say. I know. One of them has to be 12.3.68. And has to fly over the Champ de Mars at noon sharp on March 12, 2018.

Independence General Elections Turn 50

Tomorrow. The appropriately-named Independence Party won all the three seats in riding numbers 4 to 16. Which gave it 39 MPs out of the 62. The PMSD grabbed the remaining seats. The election results appear to contain some fascinating information on the mood of voters 50 years ago. Will need to play with them one of these days. Couldn't stop from reminiscing my meeting with the second member of Belle-Rose/Quatre-Bornes when I saw his name in there. That Independence thing was so big that he refused to obey the retrograde instructions of his leader of not attending the celebrations. That must have been quite easy to resist.

And a week from now partition of the Indian subcontinent will turn 70.

PM Fails To Convince We Need A Tram

Here are some of the reasons he recently put forward in favour of the controversial project:

1. You would stop using your bike. Hmm, riding a bike keeps people in shape. In Edinburgh bus corridors double up as bike lanes.  And here's what the rush hour looks like in Copenhagen where 45% travel by bike to school or work.

2. You would stop travelling by bus. Ok, so the tram will be a door-to-destination service. Interesting. To say the least.

3. Won't need to wake up early to wait for a bus God only knows when it's arriving. And not being sure you'll have a seat. How will we get to a tram station if we don't live near one? Schedules can be improved, posted at bus stops and bus routes reassigned accordingly. We can also reserve 20% of the front seats of buses for people over 60. Buses can be very comfortable too.

4. You will know when you arrive at your destination. Again these can be fixed by penalising buses that are late for no good reason. Significantly curbing the unchecked growth of private cars won't hurt either.

5. You won't be stuck in traffic anymore. There's traffic everywhere now and at hours we never had it before. A proof that our transportation policy is too primitive. Blame it to a great extent on a car pool that's growing in an uncontrolled fashion.