The warm welcome received by prime minister, Navin Ramgoolam, in Rodrigues came as a surprise to observers. Ramgoolam himself admitted his surprise ? albeit a pleasant one ? to the press, the more so as Rodriguans only know about him through the media. Navin Ramgoolam, to all intents and purposes is alien to Rodriguans. And yet, the welcome he received suggests that Rodriguans may have a message for Mauritius: that they need to be heard and acknowledged.

Ramgoolam?s visit also comes about after a prolonged absence of eleven years - a long time for a dependency not to see a political leader from the mainland. Politics being what it is, acrimonious relationships betweens leaders of political parties have rendered Rodrigues more isolated than ever from mainland Mauritius. And it seems Rodriguans are suffering from this isolation and the resulting sense of being left out of central government?s priorities for a long time. This perception is not altogether unfounded and dates back to the grantingof the autonomous status to Rodrigues.

Island chief commissioner Johnson Roussety?s first comment after Ramgoolam?s arrival was: ?Rodrigues now feels more a part of the Republic.? We asked if the comment meant that the island hasn?t felt part of the Republic for a long time. The question obviously embarrassed Roussety who didn?t want to get dragged into polemics. So he asked us not to put words in his mouth. But beyond words, what was evident in Rodrigues after the arrival of the prime minister was this sense of the people wanting to belong to something bigger.

When a crowd made up mainly of people who had known Navin Ramgoolam?s father and those who don?t know either, start chanting ?Navin Ramgoolam, our beloved prime minister?, one gets the feeling that those people simply want to have a prime minister. Admittedly large parts of the crowd gathered at official functions were MR followers. But even when speaking to openly OPR followers, one gets a sense of this need to be favourably perceived by the PM. So much so that OPR leader Serge Clair?s absence from the airport to welcome Ramgoolam was met with anger from his own supporters.

Touched by the warm welcome

Having a prime minister makes Rodriguans feel important; it makes them feel that they matter enough not to just have a chief commissioner with a lot of power but limited finance. Having a prime minister means they won?t be ignored anymore.

Ramgoolam admits to having been touched by the Rodriguans? warmth towards him. More importantly, he sat in a conference hall in Port-Mathurin for nearly two hours and had a chance to listen to NGOs and representatives of civil society as well as of the private sector. They had a long list of grievances.

One came from Ram Bhawani, a rector at Maréchal College. He tried not to be aggressive in his tone but his words spoke for themselves. ?I read in the newspapers that drastic measures had to be taken in Mauritius to counter the draught and so Mauritians only have six hours of running water a day. That?s a drastic measure. In Port-Mathurin, we get water once a week. In more remote places, water runs once every three weeks and this is a fact that can be checked. Yet, we are part of the same Republic?, he told a shocked prime minister.

Constant bickering and bitterness

When Ramgoolam checked with Roussety, the latter was on the defensive and explained that Rodriguans don?t pay for water. He added that all the reservoirs had now been left in a state of abandon and it was a matter of proper water management.

The point is that the island has been left to itself for a long time. When asked at the airport if he was a friend of Rodrigues, Ramgoolam replied that he was, above all, its prime minister. Roussety has made it a point to remind the people that Ramgoolam was also minister for Rodrigues. Yet the island and what happens there are for the most part unknown to decision-makers in Mauritius.

Central government is less to be blamed for this than local politicians. The bitterness between Mouvement Rodriguais (MR) leaders and Organisation du Peuple Rodriguais (OPR) serves no purpose, least of all the interests of the Rodriguan people.

But by constantly bickering and resorting to violence ? Rodriguans of both sides complain of the same thing - they aid and abet central government?s obliviousness to the island?s plight. Will this change now that Ramgoolam has seen Rodrigues, conquered it and been conquered? It just might.