?The night is long that never sees the day.? The ferment and discontent has been brewing for years in the interstices of Dr Maurice Curé SSS. For former students as myself, outside comments such as, ?Oh Curé, lacaze hantée? would at once appear appalling. Yet, I should admit, they held nuggets of truth.

The sit-in of Tuesday the 22nd February, comes as an outburst of pent-up feelings and frustrations for unfulfilled demands. The problems articulated by students namely infrastructure and security truly necessitate immediate remedial action. It is quite surprising that the nation expects academic excellence from the students when the most basic of their needs, such as the right to a proper classroom and an updated, well equipped library are denied if not overlooked.

Broadly speaking, it is quite surprising that Dr Maurice Cure SSS is crumbling to pieces while new schools are mushrooming in every nook of the island. We understand that public funds are limited, but we also understand that education has accounted for 11% of Capital expenditure this year.

Still it would appear that we are drifting from the core of the issue and fretting over some peripheral concerns here. I believe that besides the walls of the school and their apertures, our focus should be geared towards the student force itself as weapon for change.

The sit-in is a reminder to all that student apathy cannot and will not prevail. WE should fill the cracks in our own human edifice. The fruits are now ripe for shaking? And the putative unity of students is our only chance to revamp the school system and its beliefs and its ethos!

Hampered efficiency

It goes without saying that when those holding the reigns slacken in their designated duty, the masses are compelled to overthrow the yoke and come to the forefront. This is what history teaches us. The message has been clear? The short period of sharp reversal only occurs as a solution of last resort, when public displeasure and deprivation have reached a point of saturation.

In the case of Dr Maurice Cure SSS, the spectre of alarming deterioration be it physically proximate or not, has been haunting students and staff alike for a long while. Symbols of power have feigned to acknowledge the pressing needs of students but have inevitably turned student rights into a sham by putting the onus of responsibility for change upon the Ministry. In the process, bureaucracy has become the by-word of hampered efficiency and divested student prerogatives.

As it stands today, however, a new chapter in the history of the ?Star school? underdogs has been opened. This is not the end of the struggle for justice and for equality but the beginning of the end to falsehood and hypocrisy.

Aditi B. HUNMA