Can you refuse to pay an end-of-year bonus to your employee? Or can you adopt a child whenever you feel like it?

You might think that you?re not expected to be up on those things ? after all, how do you keep up with all the laws that Parliament votes as well as those endless ? and not always fruitful debates by MPs who just love the sound of their own voices?

But you?re wrong, if you think this. You may or may not be familiar with the phrase, ?ignorance of the law is not an excuse? and you might be interested to know that this is not an empty rhetoric.

If you?re arrested and taken to court, you cannot tell the magistrate or the judge: ?I?m sorry, I didn?t know I couldn?t do that.? It doesn?t matter whether you knew or not ? an offence is still an offence.

This begs the question ? how are you supposed to know the law when you don?t know how and where to find it? There is no sensible answer to this question. It may be easier if you work for a big company of if you?re a civil servant, to get hold of the laws through the Internet. Usually laws that have just been voted are available on the government website and you may be able to find specific laws on the relevant ministries? website. But it?s so disorganized that finding what you are looking for might take a while.

Then enters Rama Valayden, the attorney general, with a brilliant idea ? to compile all the laws of Mauritius and print them in a loose-leaf format. The same laws will be available in an electronic version (soft copy) that will be updated annually (to cater for amendments and new laws).

Works began in June 2007 when an agreement was signed between the Government of Mauritius and LexisNexis Butterworths Limited (those of you who have studied law will be familiar with the company) for the publication, printing and supply of a new edition of the revised laws of Mauritius and for a yearly update of the revised laws.

In July 2007, Mauritius sent the data for publication to LexisNexis in South Africa and since then corrections have been made and the final draft is now ready. Attorney General Rama Valayden tells l?express that the actual printing of the Revised laws of Mauritius ?should begin in May?. Two officials of the State Law Office will leave Mauritius next week for South Africa for a final check of the page proofs and for giving the final green light for the printing of the Revised laws of Mauritius. The launching of the new edition of the Revised laws of Mauritius should be launched in June ?if everything goes well?, says AG Rama Valayden.

Time for innovation and change

What?s interesting is the fact that the Revised Laws of Mauritius exists in a compilation called Revised Laws of Mauritius 2000 regarding all laws that were in force in the country as at January 2001. But those publications were generally meant for law students. The assumption was probably that nobody else needed to be aware of the laws except law students. But as AG Valayden said in Parliament last Tuesday, ?our profession has been restricted for too long. The time for change and innovation has come. We now need to move from competition between ourselves to competition with the rest of the world.? Government believes that Mauritian laws need to be accessible to ?all sectors, which regularly have to consult our laws.?

They forgot to mention the rest of us but government did make accessible the Constitution, a first step towards making our rights accessible to the common man. Pocket versions of the Constitution have been distributed to students in an attempt to make them aware of their rights; human rights sessions are being held to raise the common people?s awareness of their rights.

In a few months? time, all the laws in force in Mauritius will be made accessible to the Mauritian public. To empower them, most probably. In case you can?t relate to the empowerment business, think of you in front of a judge?