Who are you going to vote for in the next elections? While the answer to that question may be “mind your own business” and, rightly so, because it is, to all intents and purposes, none of my business, I wish to share my dilemma with readers. Bottom line is, I do not know. Anybody else who wants to join my club?

I have never made use of my fundamental right to vote. Not for lack of interest but simply because I was at the wrong place at the wrong time and opportunity did not avail itself for me to do so. I remember my frustrations in 2000 because I could not vote. So I thought I would be excited and look forward to the coming elections with barely contained anticipation. It is not so.

The simple reason for this is that I do not know who to vote for. In a conversation with Harish Boodhoo the other day, we discussed this. I asked him what he thought the problem was. He said “political turncoats.” What he meant was that not one politician stood for any principles anymore. It is not about principles, it is not about the people… It is about money and power. And this is so true. I am sure not all politicians are starved for money and power but it has come to a point where getting rid of X to replace him by Y is akin to swapping a red apple for a green one. Same difference.

And now is not the time to do this. In a day and age where the country is crippled with all sorts of ill practices, where corruption is rampant, where fraud and material gain have become a way of life, we need to disinfect old Mauritius if we are to survive. But it would be too easy to blame the politicians. What about us, what about our responsibility to coming generations and ourselves? Don’t we have a say in this matter? Is it not up to us to change the course of our lives? Don’t they say anyway that we have the government that we deserve?

Harish Boodhoo was right when he said it is time for this country to wake up from its deep slumber and take an active interest in what is going on around. But the question is… will it?

If it doesn’t, then, we are all wasting our time shouting and protesting every time somebody abuses his powers and prerogatives. We should all close shop and go and laze on the beach at Blue Bay.

We have become a lazy nation, we have abdicated our responsibilities, we would rather blame everybody else than take a good look at ourselves in the mirror and face our demons. We are ugly, ugly! Shame on us.

OK. Where do we go from here? We make sure those we have elected to represent us in Parliament do their jobs properly, we make sure they listen to us. How? We make them; there are ways and means. But it is only an intelligent nation that can do this. Right now, most of us are being stupid; is it any wonder then that we have stupid political parties, all motivated by the wrong values? It is about time we stopped taking Hamlet as example. All his procrastination and abdication did was bring tragedy to Elsinore. Unless of course that’s what we want…