Wednesday, March 19, 2008

A victim goes to Radio 1.

Well one of the victims of yesterday's thefts went to 'Casernes' to file a case and the stupid, unprofessional policeman (as are some of them!) told her that it would take a week before the case filed in Port-Louis to reach Moka, and it would be better if she filed the case in Moka.

Either the policeman forgot his brain (if he has one) at home, , or he has no people skills, or we are still in the dark days. This is typically Mauritius, we talk about Cyber Island, Digital economy and stuff, and it takes a week for a case to move from the police head-quarters to Moka. Anyways its probably because the Comissioner of Police is on holidays!

Or is it that the 'motards' are busy escorting , ministers... whatever be the case, it is inadmissible.

By the way, its frustrating when you have your car stopped by a 'motard' and then you see a Mercedes or BMW whizz by followed by another 'motard'. So you take the necessary precautions by leaving home early to get through the traffic, and you have a minister who wakes up late as he has probably been to a 'tax-payer financed' diner on the eve and still want to move from Vacoas to Port-Louis in 20 mins at 07 30 on a weekday.

Simple calculation.
Fuel for 2 BMW or MERCEDES
Fuel for 2 motor bikes
Wages for 2 drivers and 2 policemen 'the motards'
Wages for the 2-3 bodyguards

The bare minimum these would cost is Rs 1000 per hour, though we all agree it does costs more.

Assuming we have 15 ministers needing these facilities for 5 hours a day, and 5 days a week we have;

15*5*5*1000= Rs 375 000 per week

FOR 1 MONTH : 375 000*5 = Rs 1.5 million

And thats the bare minimum, do not even be surprised if it is twice the amount.
and you 'peuple admirable, Serrer meme ceinture'.

I have been to England and seen Tony Blair several times when left Downing Street to attend functions, he had 1 car, 2 motards, and 1 driver and 1 bodyguard. Yes we have to learn!

So rather naturally, the girl who seemed to me as being 'de nature tres calme' actually lost it and went to complain in a private radio station, namely Radio1.

Well i bet loads of people heard it. Futhermore, it also happened that the student in question also informed the student's Union about it. She told me that their response was that 'this is not the first time, and thatthey had informed management about it and nothing has been done'.

Well Student Union people, i think that it is your right and duty to follow up on a request you made to management, as you are customers to this university and you have rights as students ad well as obligations to the fellow students who elected you as their representatives. So simply telling that this has happened before and that your request has not been attended to is a lame excuse.

Well lets forget that, I had my 3rd Teaching and Learning session today, and its was quite good, though i did not enjoy it as i enjoyed the previous 2 sessions. May be because, it covered stuff i already knew, about 'Benjamin's Bloom Taxonomy of Learning outcomes...'

So anyways lets hope tomorrow's session is better!!!!

Well i got back home and while i was watching the news (well you know, that is that 30 minutes programme, out of which 15 or 20 minutes are allocated for our PM) on MBC, there was this news report about the lunch organised at the State House for our laureates, and in his speech the PM said that he was proud to be considered as a role model and that he askes the folks to come back to Mauritius when they finish.....

Hey where are we heading?

I would urge his advisers, especially those who are paid Rs 150 000 monthly- Please wake him up and tell him: ' Navin, Arrete Rever Camarade!'

I know all the RCC laureates of 2001, and 7 years later, none of them has come back. Yet all of those interviewed, just like those interviewed today said they will come back after their studies.

By the way, now even the President is talking about world-class education, and the minister of education was talking about increasing access to tertiary education by 45 %....

Well when we talk about world-class, we focus on quality and not on quantity - i am ready to advise you people, for only Rs 50 000.... lol :-)

Anyways i have talked enough got a homework to attempt for teaching and learning.

As usual, comments are welcome! And do not forget to vote, i have added a polling facility on the blog now!

p.s dusing the Unitec coverage on the news, the MBC made a mistake, When 'presenting' certain Mr Patrice Despax, instead of writing 'Orange Telecom', they wrote 'Orrange Telecom'.... Well just say erreur de frappe - ok?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

nou students union ene joke sa.. zotte ti bizin ene bureau.. zotte gaggnE... aster nu pas bizin derange zotte!! ;)

Anonymous said...

1. Concerning the theft, this is one of the many examples why the police force is less trusted. Why would someone want to go to file a case when he/she has to wait a week? Man, in one week not only the thief would have already spent the money stolen but he can get time to do more thefts. Mauritius = Cyber Island? That’s a joke isn’t it? Guess that the ministers who tell this “slogan” don’t really know what it means to be a cyber island…

2. Ministers are often (not to say always) complaining about the tight economical situation of our island and as you mentioned “le pep bizin sere ceinture”. It’s said that example should come from above, maybe one day we will see that in Mru, where ministers try to save as money and avoid stupid expenditures(well its good to dream)

3. I am sure that 90% of the laureates are on a one way ticket to other countries. And frankly I don’t blame them. They got their chance to have a better future so why not move forward. Now concerning world class education that’s a real joke I can tell. Have you compare Mauritian standards with Scandinavian countries? Ok you might say, they are bigger than Mauritius with a greater population that mru with resources and so on and a much better economy, so lets drop this example. Lets take Singapore as example, which is rather close to us and not only that its smaller than mru. So does anyone see the huge difference there is in their education policy/level and ours? That’s what I can call WORLD CLASS EDUCATION, not what there is here

darklide

G@V!N said...

Hi Darklide...
Being known for being sarcastic, i will try to explain what could be the most appropriate excuse for our country being called Cyber Island.
Let's one of our ministers were asked what makes Mauritius a Cyber Island, I would not be surprised that the minsister answers: 'Because we have Cyber Towers!'

He will be selectively forget that there are mainly call centres in there!

We still have a transport infrastructure comparable to a thirds world country, and the culture of several people is still that of prehistoric times!

If they were so keen about improving the economic situation of the country, many more could have followed the example of a certain minister who decided not to change his car as he rightly estimated that his current car was still in a pretty good shape!

As i have mentioned, the laureates have the right to stay abroad, but tome more honesty would be appreciated if they could accept to 1. pay back the bond.
2. be sincere when they give interviews!!!
When it comes to world class education, it is very disappointing, they you see the quality of the education decreasing. WE have good students, and we need competition to bring out the best in everyone.
I heard the Minister of Education say that there would be not automatic promotion in Primary school, so if you fail standard one, you will not be allowed to go to standard two. So you will have to repeat. Finally he has woken up!!!! Better late than never.

Unless we have a competitive education system, the level of our students will not be very good!

As one of my friends pointed out yesterday, nothing prevents us from taking 1000 students in out department during the first year, and then just do a 'Concours de promotion' as in France, the outcome of which will determine whether of not you are good enough to continue.

Alternately, we could have high entry requirements for some programmes.

However darklide, you have to remember one thing... its a 'political sin' to compare Mauritius to European Countries, or countries like Singapore... to the eyes of our politicians, we are still developing country!!! Let the others in their ocean of illusion, thinking that Mauritius is one of the best in the region.... notice that the region is in Africa...It is not that Mauritius is so good, its is only that they are comparing us against countries whereby there is economic instability, riots, civil war, droughts...

You and me seem to know that we should compare like with like...but do i leaders!!!

This reminds me of a turkish proverb, a guy from a Kebab shop in London, once told me. I managed to find it again as well as the translation on: http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=19971

"Koyunun olmadigi yerde kec(ch)iye Abdurrahman c(ch)elebi derler."

The exact translation is "Where there are no sheep, goats are called his excellency.".

So lets consider ourselves as goats, coz there are roughly any sheep in the countries we are getting compared to.

Anonymous said...

[..]Being known for being sarcastic, i will try to explain what could be the most appropriate excuse for our country being called Cyber Island.
Let's one of our ministers were asked what makes Mauritius a Cyber Island, I would not be surprised that the minsister answers: 'Because we have Cyber Towers!'

[...]We still have a transport infrastructure comparable to a thirds world country

It's not just the roads that's 3rd world. The whole system is 3rd world. The people's mentality is around 19th world or something. Nothing is evolved around here.

And I still fail to understand how world-class education comes in play when you cram 999 students in a class that's meant to accomodate 200. We lack infrastructures, so instead of ministers and our "leaders" spending our tax money on staying in Hilton hotels, they could invest in our university. They do 100+ millions of reports that are used as combustion fuel afterwards.

Wouldn't those 100+ millions be better invested in UoM and stop the leaky ceilings.

If you want world-class education, you need to provide world-class funding. Here, I guess, it's a one-way road. Ask, but don't give.

Talk about cyber island all you want, but it's just 2 towers full of call-centres and BPOs.. I fail to understand why we call ourselves "cyber" anything when we don't even have development companies, huge data centres and similar big-shot firms.. :/