Mauritian teachers may not be safe from mistakes but what is the point of wasting so much money with Cambridge if there is no guarantee that there will be no errors. The MES is perfectly able to organise the job Cambridge has been doing for so many years.

For the first time, the institution has declared it could well do without Cambridge in the future. Even though the director, Lucien Finette, is reluctant about the MES marking HSC scripts alone, he seems more flexible regarding SC. He acknowledges that a “more Mauritian SC” is possible but this should not be done “in a hurry. This is a challenge the MES wants to take up. But it requires a lot of human as well as other resources”. He goes further when he states: “It could be done on a medium-term period but the people first have to trust us.”

However, Lucien Finette has more reservations for HSC, which he considers “a more sensitive issue”. “As for HSC, we can’t do otherwise than to call upon a foreign institution and I believe Cambridge is in the best position to do such a job. But Cambridge is ready for joint responsibility between itself and the MES in a number of specific fields. We are getting ready to assume more responsibility in the way the exams are conducted but there is no need to rush into anything.”