President Michel Finally Discovers Poverty in Paradise

PRESIDENT MICHEL FINALLY DISCOVERS POVERTY IN PARADISE

According to the State controlled television, SBC, when president James Michel went walkabouts in the hills of Plaisance last weekend to see for himself the state of the physical amenities such as motor able roads and water tanks he also discovered poverty among the population of this very urban community. It hit him in the face for the first time, it appears, even though he never left the narrow roads while being surrounded by a retinue of armed security personnel and highly paid civil servants in their newly minted SUVs.

Poverty in Paradise? Throughout his election campaign Mr Michel and SPPF propaganda would never admit that after 30 years of socialism, there are still poor people in our country and many have become poorer over the last few years. The self-serving but false propaganda was extended even to the pages of the in-flight magazine of Air Seychelles. The standard argument to measure poverty, according to the ruling party’s propaganda, is the fact that we do not have beggars in the streets as you find in the streets of African and Asian cities.

Abject poverty in Seychelles has been highlighted by institutions such as the World Bank as far back as 1994. In a document called Poverty in Paradise published in June 24, 1994, the World Bank citing 1992 Seychelles Government statistics estimated that 20% of the Seychellois population was living in poverty and almost 7% in absolute poverty.

According to the World Bank study, this level of poverty existed despite a generous welfare system which, in 1993 transferred, 5.5% of the gross domestic product (GDP) to those of our population who were on low or zero income. It led the World Bank to conclude then that the very generous welfare system put into place since 1979 when the Social Security Act came into force “do not appear to have been effective in eliminating poverty.” And, the World Bank study observed, the distribution of income (when measured by actual reported expenditures of households), was “highly unequal.”

According to the World Bank study “the poverty line has been set at SR 900 per household per month in 1992 prices”. In other words a home in Seychelles that could not spend SR 900 per month, based on the prices of food and shelter equivalent to those of 1992 would be considered a poor family, one living on the breadline.

But the 1994 study, dismal as it was, covered the period before GST was imposed and the black market in currency exchange became prevalent. Another study of income and expenditure according to the number of people in each household, this time by our own statistical agency – the National Statistical Bureau (NSB) - was conducted between 1999 and 2000, again before GST.

This study found that “to meet the barest minimum for living, a 2 person household would need at least SR 1682 per month”. And the study also found that the average household did not have 2 persons. Instead it had 4 individuals. As a result, the statisticians said, the average household needed to spend SR 3364 per month “to meet the barest minimum for living.”

But just how many households there are in Seychelles that did not have SR 3364 to spend per month? According to the same study 12% of households were living on less than SR3000 per month. In other words, by the definition of our own statisticians 12% of the families in Seychelles were living below the poverty line, not even enough “to meet the barest minimum for living.”

The situation is even worse according to the NSB study. It found that there was an additional 16% of household containing an average of 4 people which had less than SR 4000 to spend per month. Add together, the number of households that are existing on incomes that do not exceed much above the amount needed “to meet the barest minimum for living” numbered 28%. The study also found, quite interestingly and paradoxically, that the larger the household the more likely each individual would be surviving on incomes below “the barest minimum for living.”

President Michel’s solution to the growing social catastrophe is to have the community meet and talk about it, in effect, trying to deal with the symptom rather than the cause of the disease. Meanwhile, during 2005, in order to beef up its spending to win votes the government, led by Mr Michel, raided the Social Security Fund (SSF) and took out SR375 million from the SR400 million it collected. Officials at the SSF were told to ration welfare payments, such that many destitute families were and are still being offered SR 500 per month financial assistance for a two month period only, as if a miracle would take care of the other 10 months. Many have expressed the view that living on welfare in our society today is a degrading existence.

The World Bank warned, as far back as 1994 that this was a social time bomb waiting to explode. Today the situation has become critical risking a social upheaval that runs the risk of damaging our precarious tourism industry for years to come, just as it happened in Jamaica after a decade of socialism under Marxist Michael Manley. President Michel must appoint a qualified taskforce.