<B>189th anniversary of rémi ollier’s birth </B>

Apart from La Sentinelle, his newspaper, the media overlooked the news of his sad demise, yet more than ten thousand mourners (out of a population of about 120,000) flocked to Port-Louis on that sad 29th January 1845 to pay him a last tribute. Time itself seemed to have stopped in the capital, almost all businesses were closed, pavements were besieged by mourners who, at that time, had the decency and courtesy to leave the benches of the Cathedral for women.

The coffin was taken by 96 young men from the Cathedral to West cemetery. They did not want to lose contact with the no less young journalist who had used his pen to help write the pages of their emancipation.

Yes, he was a great patriot, a lover of truth, a freedom fighter who loathed prejudice, racism and human stupidity. On his death bed, at the young age of 28, holding the hand of his friend and colleague Emile Vaudagne, he asked him to continue his work. Those were his last words.

What a colossal work indeed in such a short time! It all started on 21 March 1843. The first edition of La Sentinelle was published. Our young coloured righter of wrongs at last found a place to publish the letter he wrote to refute the insulting allegations made against writer Alexandre Dumas by Désiré Bernard in ‘Le Mauricien’. No other publication would do so, most probably because Dumas’ mother was a slave.

Since then, he used his pen, which he called his thousand-branched whip (fouet à mille branches) to drive his courageous plough into the then arid lands of racial, social and economic inequality. Deep furrows where, for two years, he sowed the seeds of a better and stronger Mauritius through his beloved ‘Sentinelle’.

Was it not through his writings that the secretary to the States reconsidered the once rejected request for scholarships, leading to the institution of British scholarships on 1st October 1844?

Were the scholarships not doubled in 1854 following other articles in ‘La Sentinelle’?

Was he not at the origin of the elected municipal council system, having claimed through his pen the institution of a municipality in Port-Louis to cater for better management of the capital where infrastructures were badly maintained and the police system ineffective? A dream come true in 1850 under the governorship of Sir John Anderson who was sent for this purpose to Mauritius in 1849. Mr Louis Léchelle was to be the first elected mayor of Port-Louis.

Our journalist cum reformer can also claim responsiblity for the conception of independent institutions for commerce and agriculture. His writings most probably led to the creation of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in 1846 and the Chamber of Agriculture in 1853. The same Louis Léchelle was to be the first president of the Chamber of Commerce.

He is also said to be at the origin of the decision of the granting of loans to the coloured population by “Banque commerciale” having blamed the money lenders for practising very high rates of interest, which were dispossessing the coloured population of their assets. Amongst other things, he also wrote against the death penalty and against the ill-treatment of both the coloured and the Indian population at the hospital.

This exceptional man who made of journalism a vocation for the promotion of truth, justice and brotherhood has to be remembered today because 189 years ago he was born on the 6th October; his name was Rémi Ollier…