A Labor surplus budget after so many years

It was a promise they made after the spending spree of the past 5 years i.e since labour came back to office in 2007. From a surplus budget left by Peter Costello, it went down last year to negative $44b.

Labour had to deliver on its promises by hook or by crook to get the budget back in surplus although by a minimal 1.5 b. It also had to give away some goodies as the general elections looms and this is exactly what Treasurer Wayne Swan did.

Labour presented a budget which is tailored for the lower and middle class, for the battlers. A budget with cutting income tax is rare. The tax free threshold tripled going for $6,000 to $18,200. This means that people earning less that $18,200 will pay zero tax and if it has been deducted at source, they will get the refund. This represents some 1.5 million taxpayers paying no tax al all.
It also means that all those earning beyond $18,200 will not pay tax on the first $18,500 which was at the rate of 22%. It represents a saving of close to $2,000.
Pensioners will get an increase of $338 and families with school children will get $410 for primary and $820 for secondary students among other benefits.

The budget forecasts a surplus of $1.5 billion coming from a deficit of $44 billion. It means that new revenues and savings will amount to $45.5 billions. While cost cuttings have been a hard thing for labour who always favour big spending and deficit budgets, they have now done it. It affects many government departments and some public servants will face redundancies.
This surplus, according to wayne Swan, will continue to increase over the years. But remember this is only a forecast and will only come to reality or not at May of next year.

Most of the government revenues will come from the Mineral Resources Rental Tax and the new Carbon Tax. They are both taxes on big business. The MRRT is fair when we know that billionaires are getting everyday richer exploiting our land. It takes great courage to tax these powerful people like Clive Palmer, Gina Reinhart and Mr Forrest who are favoured by the Liberals.
The Carbon Tax will be imposed on some 200 businesses who are consistently and continuously polluting our atmosphere. It aims at reducing emission by 5% by 2020. The CT will be changed into an Emission Trading Scheme after some time.

In the budget speech there was hardly any mention of the Carbon Tax. These words are toxic to the government as this is the Black Caviar ( the winning horse) of the opposition. Campaigning against the carbon tax has caused damage to the government. It has become a slogan which hammered by Tony Abbott so much so that the majority of Australians now believe that it is a bad tax, that will affect us all. It comes into effect on 1st July and it is only after a few months, or a year later that we will feel the real effect of this tax, if it will really drag prices up and our standard of living down. It remains to be seen and proved. If it doesn't it will surely backfire on the opposition as this is their only weapon. A weapon that Tony Abbott used extensively in his budget speech reply.

The budget of Wayne Swan was definitely a leftist and an electoralist one. It shows that Labor wants to connect back to its base i.e the lower and middle classes. Will this pay off in the months to come ?
The answer will be in the polls three months before August 2013. But for now, labor is still in deep shit. Their battle is definitely uphill.
GDL

Quand un Premier Ministre ment.

If you have followed the events of the 1st of May in Mauritius, you would have noticed that all speeches were dominated by 2 topics: Medpoint and RochesNoireGate.
While much is known about Medpoint(Gate) little was known about the RochesNoiresGate.
The event related to Roches Noires happened in the night of the 2-3 July 2011.
It all started about a Rolex watch belonging to the Prime Minister of Mauritius Navin Ramgoolam, that was allegedly stolen in a bungalow at Roches Noires.
The bungalow is said to belong to the PM which he bought for 40 millions rupees. Only God knows if that is true...!! as no one dares to contradict him.
The strange thing is that the PM initially said that he was not in the bungalow that night and if so how comes that his watch was there ? But he said that is not true and he still have his Rolex ? Is this the same Rolex asked SAJ ou bien Rolez faire piti ?
Then the PM said he actually went to the bungalow that night and later said he only stayed for a little while. However  he did not say who were in the bungalow that night . Some said there was a woman, others say that there were a at least six people there partying,  a second version of the Macarena party !!  You surely remember the Macarena party 15 years ago at Albion!!!   15  years later we have another of these secret party at Roches Noires !!!??.
In a meeting in Port Louis, first Paul Beranger, then Sir Aneeropod Jughnuth revived the events of the 2-3 July 2011 at Roches Noires implicating the Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam.
SAJ talked about a macarena party at Roches Noires where the PM was present and he even talked about " couteau emba la gorge " !!
What really happened that night in the bungalow is a real mystery although there has been many versions by the people of Mauritius. Personne  pa kone mais nou tou kone ki ti pase sa swar la !!!

Anyway following the macarena party at Albion, many has been written and said about les frasques du PM et ses sorties nocturnes. A journalist even called these night adventures  " les demons de minuits" from the tube of Mario Ramsamy and le Groupe Images.

The other question raised by SAJ, Is the death of a person in police cell linked to the Roches Noires party ? Did that person know too much and had to be silenced ?
The answers my friend are blowing in the wind as Bob Dylan sang.
This is the RochesNoireGate. Only an independent enquiry can shed light on whether the PM lied and why.
Meanwhile enjoy a sega made in Mauritius.

.

Distasteful politics in Australia

The Labor Party in disgrace over the Craig Thomson saga.
By GDL.

The Craig Thomson saga and the incompetence that the Labor party manifested since 2007, are surely the obvious reasons why they are at the lowest point in the polls.
This week surfaced again(sic!) Craig Thomson's affair, with the report from Fair Work Australia. It took four years for Fair Work Australia to investigate whether Craig Thomson, the Labor MP for Dobell, and other members of the Health Services Union, had acted improperly and whether they should be prosecuted for criminal offences.
As reported in the press months ago, Craig Thomson had allegedly used the union credit card for his own enjoyment, i.e to pay for prostitutes, dinner, travel and cash outs which amount to more than $100,000. These expenses  appeared on the bank statements and signatures affixed to the payments. Mr Thomson continues to deny all wrongdoings.
After four years of enquiry, Fair Work Australia submitted its report into allegations of unfair use of HSU's finance by its former Federal Secretary, to the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecution. 
The report was not made public but it is understood, that, it  named three members of the HSU. There  are apparently 118 cases of wrongdoings and 71 cases of breach which are liable to prosecution.
In a bizarre twist, the DPP declared, after receiving the report, that it will not act on this document to engage in prosecutions. It is up to the HSU or Fair Work Australia to lay formal charges to the DPP to consider prosecution. This was not the case with the enquiry report.
It is no strange, under these circumstances that, in the general public's  mind,  there is an attempt of cover up somewhere. The Opposition leader was quick to highlight the failure of Fair Work to provide prosecutors with the brief of evidence required and qualified this as a deliberate act of " obstruction of justice."

Mr, Abbott told radio 2GB, "I think the public are concluding that basically a protection racket has been at work here inside officialdom to look after Craig Thomson and the Gillard government.”
For her part the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, brushed off any suggestions that Fair Work Australia was trying to protect the government by concealing any wrongdoing by Mr Thomson, whose departure from parliament would threaten Labor slim's parliamentary majority.She said the workplace watchdog was wholly independent. 

While I understand that legal procedures can be quite complex at times, I am surprised that despite all that has been written and said in the media, it has taken four years for Fair Work Australia to "properly" investigate whether Craig Thomson had misused the union's money. I found this unacceptable that after four years of enquiry, there is still no signs of whether Craig has committed a criminal offence.   Is this Australia or another Australia ?

I find it hard, not to believe or suspect that everything is done to delay that the case goes to Court, in view of the Gillard's  minority government. If Craig Thomson is found guilty, he brings down the Gillard's government with him. The longer it takes the better it is for the government to rely on Craig Thomson's vote. It might take up to the general elections.

I have the impression that I am living in a third world country in Asia or Africa, where the separation of powers is not embedded in the constitution and where corrupt politicians do everything to pervert the course of justice. 

For my part, I am really disgusted by the way this saga is turning. This Gillard's Labour Government is just  a disgrace.

Politics and democarcy in island paradise Mauritius.

It is always said that democracy is the worst system but unfortunately there is no better one.
Democracy was invented in ancient Greece with a view of giving a government by the people, for the people.  En passant, it is sad to see how the once great civilisation which was Greece, has turned out today in a bankrupt country. This denotes that the government was not for the people but rather against the interest of the people. Now the people are suffering and no doubt not supporting the government.!!

In the island paradise Mauritius, it seems that democracy has got a particular or different meaning, taking from the past two general elections when the same party, namely the Labour Party came back to power. What is particular in Mauritius is that there is no clear demarcation between the party and the government.
It is true however that it in a democracy, it is the winning party which forms government. However  the notion or role of a government is not the same as the party. They are and should be different in operations, in objectives and practice.
A party, is a group of people call politicians, which competes against another party or parties in the quest for power.
A government on the other hand, is composed of minsters who are sworn in to work for the good of all the citizens, their social, cultural and economic well being. The main aim of a government is to work in the best interest of the nation and the country.

In Mauritius it is different. Once the general elections over, the incoming government favours only its supporters, i.e members of the party, their friends and families. Everything is done to favour those who have worked for the party in helping them win power. In this case it is not a government for all the citizens but a government for some citizens.
This state of affairs is not good omen as it amounts to corruption. But you know what ? Corruption has been a way of life in Mauritius since  Seewoosagur Ramgoolam took power in 1953. Since then corruption perpetuates and became worse after Mauritius became independent when the  same S. Ramgoolam became Prime Minister.
Today, corruption is endemic in Mauritius. You ask any member of the public in Mauritius and he or she will tell you that there is corruption at all levels of government and there is nothing they can do about it. They will tell you that we also get into it if we want to "move forward".
Navin Ramgoolam, the son of the late Sir Seewosagur Ramgoolam, was educated in England, in a western society and country which has a long tradition of democracy and transparency.
With such a background one would have expected Navin to modernise his third world country and make it a model of governance for other third world countries to follow.
But contrary to all expectations, Navin became more embedded in politics just as his old father. He uses the same tactics of appealing only to the Hindu majority to support him and keep him as PM.
In return,  he gives them all the favours and privileges and in so  doing let corruptions continues to flourish. The government ministers nominate their friends or relatives at the head of government corporations and parastatal  bodies even though they have no qualifications and skills.And guess what ? The results are catastrophic. But this is no problem for the government as they use public money to cover up and get the money back from taxing the citizens.
Most of the time,  the money that the government spends, flows back  in the hands and pockets of those  friends of the Labour government, The same money is afterwards use to finance the electoral campaign of the Labour Party which gets back in power again and so goes in circle.
This is how Mauritius is governed and this is how democracy functions is the island paradise.

Firehawks Band in Sydney for Independence day on 17th March

For the first time in Sydney, the Mauritian community  celebrated the anniversary of the Independence of Mauritius. Une celebration pas comme les autres fois!!!

For the occasion the ball will was held at the Redgum Centre, on Saturday 17th March, at Wentworthville featuring the Firehawks Band from Mauritius. It was a special night and very different from the balls we used to have in Sydney.
Some 300 patrons were crowded in the function centre dancing all night long to a band which  played a variety of music  pleasing everyone from 17 to 77. They were kept on their toes till 2 a.m the next day.
The band is composed of  9 young musicians, among whom 2 female singers and children of great musicians like Gerard Cimiotti and Karl Brasse.
Mr Ben Nursoo, President of the Mauritian Community Welfare Association, made a speech on the night appealing to the Mauritian community to support the projects of the MCWAA and to make our voice heard within the wider Australian Community.
Mr Alain Laxale, a major sponsor of MCWAA, urged the attendance to support the community radio broadcasting live every Sunday on 89.3 fm at 10 a.m (Sydney time).
Due to the size of the hall some 100 people who called one or two days before the ball, missed out.
Those who had the chance of securing a ticket and a seat were not disappointed at all,  most of them said they had a memorable night.
Mr Stellio Rivet, a great musician from the greatest band of Mauritius in the 70s, The Blue Stars said,
 " Man, what a band and what a ball!!. Du jamais vue a Sydney!!"
Dr Gerard Adolphe wrote," I have been in Sydney for more than 45 years and have never seen such a ball. Congratulations to the organisers."
The organising committee take this opportunity to thank for all those who contributed to make the night a successful and enjoyable one.
The next function will be in October. Watch this space.
See you there.

Jimmy Harmon's interview by GDL

Listen to Jimmy Harmon talking about Institut Cardinal Margeot

The Rodriguan Social Club of Victoria

OPINION of GDL

 

The Rodriguan Social Club of Victoria, a model of solidarity and success.

I was very impressed when I walked into the clubhouse of the RSCV for the first time on 19 February 2012. While the interior decoration of the club is very original, the atmosphere is so welcoming.

It is immediately felt that all the members are very connected to the club as a building but more so as a group who share the same commitment, the same values and the same passion. There is a great feeling of belonging and solidarity among the members.

What is more impressive is the cordial, friendly, community and family atmosphere that prevail where anyone and everyone is put at ease straightaway.

The Rodriguan Social Club of Victoria can be classified as a model of democracy.

While the club is under the leadership of a Central Committee, it operates with full disclosure and transparency. Power is decentralised, all the members are involved in one way or another in the running of the club. In politics we call this participative democracy a new and modern paradigm which is gaining momentum and more consideration.

This model is working perfectly for the club. It is a strategy which allows the RSCV to reach its aims, goals and objectives. It keeps the bond among members while focussing on the bigger picture.

The members, and rightly so, have a sense of pride of what they have achieved. It is a dream comes true, as was put to me by the President Cyril Appadoo.

But it is also a dream that they are living in the reality. A baby that is being taken care of with much attention and which is growing and developping.

The other intangible, but how big, achievement of the RSCV is they way they are keeping the Rodriguan legacy and culture alive in a western city which is also very multicultural. They have consistently value their food, music and dances.

The Rodriguan Community of Victoria has made their culture, and their country of origin, known to the wider Australian Community through their frequent participations in festivals and other cultural events.

There is no doubt that this community has positioned itself strongly and conspicuously on the social and cultural landscape of Victoria .

 Bravo a Fidou, Cyril, Mikel. Leo et les autres.