<B>By Deepa BHOOKHUN</B>

Paul Bérenger is so very excited about the upcoming electoral reform that will apparently take place ?very soon? (he is less careful than I care to be about the Prime minister?s time management), that he can?t seem to talk about anything else. (It?s a good thing Bérenger has been blessed with selective memory and he has simply forgotten that he lamentably failed to reform the electoral system himself when he was in power despite promises that he would do so).

Anyway, so Paul Bérenger has been going on and on about the consultations for the electoral reform for at least the past two weeks, expressing his ?hope? that the exercise will be completed ?before the end of the year? and that it will be a ?good reform?.

But what exactly is a ?good reform?? Unfortunately there ends Bérenger?s loquaciousness. He wouldn?t like to say more ?before we have had a chance to have a good discussion on the matter?, he told my colleague, who enquired as to the MMM?s stand on the tricky question of the Best Loser System (BLS). That was last Saturday during the leader of the opposition?s weekly press conference.

Why so, Mr Bérenger? What is he going to say about the BLS when he discusses with Prime minister Ramgoolam, that he cannot say publicly, now?

Why should it be so hard to express one?s opinion if one is convinced of the soundness of one?s beliefs?

At least Pravind Jugnauth has had the courage of his cowardly convictions ? he thinks we should keep the BLS. For obscure reasons, of course. I?m sorry if I am sounding intolerant but why else would one want to continue with a system, one that is provided for in the Constitution for that matter, that only serves to stress the fact that we should be defined and hence represented in Parliament by people whose only similarity to us, is to have been born in a family that came from the country where ours came from or whose family practised the same religion as that practised by our forefathers?

One would have thought that patriots, that responsible citizens and political leaders like Paul Bérenger, would have jumped at the opportunity to get rid of that unfortunate system. The fact that Bérenger has been rather evasive on the matter and that he has always been quick to comment on and criticize others? stands without saying clearly what he thinks, speaks for itself.

But if only Bérenger was the only obstacle!

The Prime minister wants consensus.

Well, he is clearly not going to get it regarding the BLS, is he? What with one political leader being afraid to express himself honestly on the matter, another one so blatantly wrong in his conviction and the third one unwilling ? or unable? ? to make a decision that might not please a few people.

I wonder what is it about the BLS that politicians like so much. Could it be the word? loser?