Opinion - 5th of June initiative – Five stars to President Faure |05 January 2017
Five stars to President Danny Faure for declaring that 5th of June will no longer be a public holiday and to explain that his decision has been taken because “we must do even more to strengthen national unity”.
This news has been reported by the Seychelles News Agency to an international audience and has made local headlines in both Seychelles NATION (Wednesday 4th of June) and in Today in Seychelles – 4th of June.
On the whole the articles on the subject have made bold headlines but there has been little reporting as to why marking the 5th of June a normal working day is an important development once on the road to national reconciliation which is the only way forward if we are to achieve national unity and consolidate it.
However, Mr R. Meetarbhan has in his editorial in Today in Seychelles given some background information concerning what he described as “this fateful day” – “For too many citizens this ‘fateful day’ does not evoke ‘Liberation’ as our former leaders could have liked it to be seen - on the contrary the 5th of June 1977 marks the event of an era when democratic freedom was suspended. For some of us this period brings back a recollection of disappearances that have never been investigated or killings that remain shrouded in mystery”.
But surely, in deciding to do away with 5th of June as a historic day President Faure must not only be thinking about the past but also the present and the future.
The story of the 5th of June 1977 is a story of the day when the legal constitution of Seychelles was violated and which in the aftermath gave birth to the One-Party State which dictatorially ruled the country for more than 15 years by the man who had organised and who had led the coup d’état and who then took over as President of the Nation.
This man was no ordinary citizen or just a political activist of revolutionary fervour but he was at all material times the Prime Minister of the Nation who had sworn allegiance to the constitution which he had formally, officially and publicly agreed to respect. The coup d’état in fact dealt a death-blow to the coalition government which had been in power since our independence on the 29th of June 1976 – a coalition between the former SPUP and the Democratic Party.
Against this background President Faure’s decision to deal with the 5th of June as he did, projects the message that if tomorrow there would be an agreement between him representing Parti Lepep, and Mr Ramkalawan representing LDS, that agreement should be considered sacred and remain respected. It is also a message which projects the view that he does not expect Vice-President Meriton to stage a coup while he is out of the country on duty attending some international engagement.
I must say it was only after a lot of deep thoughts and reflections that I decided to entitle my last book “SEYCHELLES – the saga of a small nation navigating through the cross-currents of a big world”. The important word in this title should be underlined as the word “navigating”.
No doubt since assuming office, Danny Faure has discharged the position of President of the Republic of Seychelles which he abruptly inherited as an excellent captain and a good commander-in-chief ably navigating the cross-currents prevailing on the ocean of our actual critical political cross road.
James R. Mancham