VAT Hike Reduced Teacher-Pupil Ratio By 16%

Yep, under Federation 2 the ratio fell from 36 to 30 at the primary level and from 19 to 16 at the secondary one. Smaller classes must have made teaching easier and the case for private tuition a little more ridiculous than it already was.

Still, there are a couple of things that should puzzle you:

1. If we built so many schools recently and given that we had already defused the demographic bomb back in 1973 there must have been a period when some ministers sat on their hands? Any idea what effect this had on the stress level of end-of-primary children?

2. And if no major public infrastructural project was carried out since July 2005 why did we have to keep VAT at 15%?

MSM Promises Second Miracle

If it finds itself in government again although we didn't see any between 2000 and 2005. Maybe we would have if we had not been stupid enough to kick Federation 2 out of office. Silly us!

Maybe not because they claim the first miracle started right in 1983. Wait a second. If Labour got hammered in June 1982 and MMM-PSM started fighting almost immediately till their break-up nine months later in March 1983 what exactly did they do for the miracle to begin as soon as Berenger was dumped?

And if miracle indeed there was, why did Obeegadoo have to build all these schools 17 years later and traffic was to become a ten-headed monster?

Why Federation 2 Lost Power in 2005

I think it's a combination of the following factors:

1. One part of Obeegadoo's educational 'reform' didn't go too well with the voters: discrimination with respect to place of residence which ended up as discrimination with respect to religious beliefs.

2. Mean-testing our senior citizens. That even stressed one of our older folks to death.

3. Strong increase in the cost of living while not buying into Berenger's explanation that only external factors were to blame. Particularly the huge increases in the price of electricity.

4. The big job losses in the export-oriented industries between 2001 and 2004: about 23,000.

5. The outrageous IPP contracts with their confidential clauses.

6. The maja-karo seen with the organisation of the SIDS conference. Absolutely insane limousines were purchased not once but twice thanks to the well-known monopoly of the MMM over competence. Some were even fitted with DVDs so that the militan koltars could reinvigorate themselves listening to soldat lalit militant while being stuck in traffic.

7. The foreign policy of Mauritius was literally transformed into a job search.

8. Illovo deal.

Maybe I should add two more so that I can transform it into a top ten list.

MMM Publishes List of Candidates in Lieu of Plan for Mauritius

A partial list to be more precise. But that was controversial enough for it to lose the PMSD and Pravind is already working at patching up with his uncle. Which means that the MMM could finally go to the polls as it said it would: alone.

That's unlikely though. What's more likely to happen is that negotiations for Federation III will soon start irrespective of whether Ashock finds his way back to the Sun Trust. Unless Ramgoolam moves rapidly with the coup de grace which is about the only way he'll get more than 35 seats in the next electoral rendez-vous.

As you would have noticed none of our three major parties really have a serious plan for Mauritius. Cry Mauritius, cry.

Protecting People

By December 2008, Rama Sithanen had produced about 6% more inflation in 1276 days than Federation II did in 1755 days. Or if you prefer, he had already clobbered the population with the same high rate of cumulative inflation of the previous government in 1051 days. Interestingly, his 1051th day as finance minister turns out to be May 20, 2008: all the poverty that was created had, as a matter of fact, little to do with the current global crisis. And in terms of average inflation the bean-counter has been protecting the poor by making their worst enemy 70% bigger.

How to Calculate Average Growth Rates

Let's do that for the previous government. It's a two-step procedure. First, you download the growth rate data from our highly esteemed Central Statistical Office (CSO) for the years they were in power and add these up. You then divide that sum by the number of years their mandate lasted. Now, given that governments are not sworn in and kicked out at exactly the beginning and at the end of calendar years we have to be a little bit careful with our computation.

The numerator. We add the growth rates for 2001-2004 together and get 17%. Then add half the growth rate for 2005 (because elections happened in middle of the year) and a quarter of the growth rate for 2000 (because recall that when the Federation II took over there was about a quarter of the year left). Half of 2005's growth rate is 1.15% and a quarter of the growth rate for 2000 is 2.43% (9.7%/4). New total: 20.575%.

And the denominator. That's easy. Four years (2001-2004) plus half (2005) plus a quarter (2000). 4.75 years. Got that?

The result: 20.575%/4.75 years = 4.33%. Which is the number I have been broadcasting for over a year now. That number is of course different from the intellectually dishonest 2% growth rate that Sithanen and Ramgoolam have been consistently ascribing to the previous government. They just cherry-picked the low growth rate for 2005 even though they were in power for half of that year!

If we were to follow their own line of reasoning then I guess that Ramgoolam's recommendation to voters is that they only remember 2009's low growth when they go to pick the next government.