?I find politics uninteresting!? ?Politics is dirty!? Obviously most adolescents do not feel particularly concerned about politics. But this is not ? or more precisely is no longer ? the case for about thirty students from La Confiance College. For a whole month, their General Paper teacher, Linley Couronne, has been trying to instil an interest in politics in them, culminating with an enriching experience at the Parliament last Tuesday? Obviously, the experience has left its mark on their minds!

The lack of young people in general in politics may actually be due to the fact that no one has ever tried to educate them in any way on the issue. ?We are lucky at La Confiance to have a teacher like Linley who has a special awareness of these issues as the president of Amnesty International (Mauritius Section),? the school rector, Will Dorat, pointed out. ?And the way this course has been conducted is definitely a step forward,? he added.

The main objective of the teacher was actually to make pupils aware that politics concerns them all. While they thought that politics was ?something stupid and corrupted? a few weeks ago, they are now fully aware that it actually deals with their own daily problems. And Adeelen Seerungen is now even thinking of a career in politics?

But the teacher also thought, ?parliament, which is supposed to be the place where politicians speak on our behalf, is cut off from reality and ordinary citizens?. And this is why it was so important for him to take his pupils to see what happens there.

?Parliament is like a battlefield where the opposition strives to show that the government is wrong and where the government tries to defend its decisions and policies. I thought it would be much more strict,? says Adeelen. ?We are used to seeing politicians on television but the image conveyed is very different from the one we saw in Parliament,? comments François Pellegrin.

If they found the virulent interventions of Rajesh Bhagwan quite ?funny?, Shem Chenoo was impressed by the attitude of the opposition leader, Nando Bodha, who ?showed respect to all MPs from his own party as well as from other ones?. As for the Prime minister, Marcelin found he displayed a ?detached behaviour. He managed to keep calm and smile in the face of Mr. Rajesh Bhagwan?s criticisms?. As for Kenny Nunkoosingh, he found that Navin Ramgoolam was like a ?mannequin. He seemed like an observer?.

The rector, who went with the little group to Parliament, commented, ?I had the opportunity of visiting the Parliament in England but I had never been to the Parliament in my own country.? He was happy to see the ?very positive reactions of pupils. Sometimes, they were a bit surprised by what they saw but they were generally happy to see a parliamentary session with their own eyes?. And he added with a broad smile, ?I can tell you that, if some of my pupils were behaving the way some MPs behave in Parliament, I would certainly throw them out?.

The reactions of pupils, as well as the essay that they had to write after the course, show that it is up to teachers to instil new interests in the child. Such courses are not part of the curriculum but the pupils had the opportunity to have something different from purely academic knowledge thanks to the experience of their teacher in the field. ?Each teacher has a duty to look for ways of giving something extra to pupils,? explains the rector. ?It was not the first time Linley organised such a visit and it will hopefully not be the last,?he concluded .