Seychellois Living Overseas

The recent broadcasts by the Seychelles Peoples Progressive Front (SPPF) insist that they have the well-being and development of the Seychellois nation at the heart of their programme.  If they have the well-being of all Seychellois at the cornerstone of their political programme why do they ignore the wishes and aspirations of all the Seychellois overseas: The Seychellois Diaspora?

This is because the SPPF Leadership and their cohorts have no control, social or economical, over the Seychellois overseas.  They regard Seychellois overseas as only informal investors – people who invest in their country but have no say in how their country is run.  Why?

They cannot scare these voters through beating their mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters or sack them from their jobs. They cannot have anyone to carry out instructions that are wrong against them.  They refuse to believe that with these Seychellois from overseas, we can still be the happy, peaceful and beautiful country it once was, and that they should work for good not for evil. The people mandated by the SPPF to instill fear in the rest of us - all they have to do is put down their batons and their weapons and refuse to help a regime that does not have the interest of the people at heart.

One argument they put forward with tongue in cheek is that only people living in Seychelles comprehend the socio-economic conditions and are therefore best placed to choose their leaders.  Ignored in this argument are a number of factors: (1) it should be the fundamental right of every Seychellois citizen to vote; geographical location is a weak excuse to disqualify a person’s right to vote.  (2) The knowledge of socio-economic conditions in the Seychelles is shrouded in mystery.  There is no freedom of access to information and hence the truth.  In most instances Seychellois living overseas are better informed of the true situation in Seychelles.  (3) Lastly, people from Seychelles have been forced to move overseas because of the stifling and degrading policies that the SPPF have been imposing on them for the last thirty years.  This refusal to recognize the Seychellois citizens’ right to vote because of residence in another country is just another failure to recognize the rights of all its citizens. (4) This issue also presents another case for an Electoral Commission composed of independent, impartial and informed members who will work for a country’s future wellbeing and also seek to improve the aspirations of the nation’s citizenry, and not be subservient to the whims of a kleptocracy.

August 10, 2007
Copyright 2007: Seychelles Weekly, Victoria, Mahe, Seychelles