University Of Mauritius

Name: Fokeerbux Mehrey Nigarr

Title: Critically examine the nature of the debate over independence in Mauritius from
1959 to 1967

Mauritius towards independence was regarded as a political movement which had an

intense political significance in history as well as for other British colonial territories. The economic
structure appeared to have a lesser substantial impact. In the late 19th century, most African and
Asian countries start to manifest in order to achieve a self-government system. The movement for
self-government gain more incentive when the British colonies faced consecutive economic crises
and when the British rule was regarded with discontent. This movement was speed up especially
after the Second World War as the British was not able to maintain power within the vast empire.
In the late 1940s, 1950s and 1960s most British colonies became independent. In Mauritius, people
were more determined to go for the political movement as the economic conditions were
degenerating and this push the leaders to focus on the economic and social reforms. The leaders
vision of the country became in conflict with the actual pace of reform undertaken by the British
government. The economic and working conditions gave rise to the formation of political parties to
express their frustrations and to manifest their standpoint. Thus they clamour for self-government
so as to be independent in the economic and social life of the country. They wanted to decide and
execute their own economic and social reforms.

The British were completely opposed to the idea of self-government and independence.
They considered Mauritius as a small territory similar to Ellis Island, Sierra Leone, and the
Falklands. Therefore they believe that being small Mauritius will not be able to fulfil its full
responsibility of self-governance. It can be said that Britain was reluctant to part away from the
star and Key Island of the Indian Ocean and to set it free from his control. Hence Mauritius had to
struggle relentlessly to obtain that freedom. In 1951 the British officials, according to Chan Low,
regarded Mauritius to be in the category of class III territory because of its two major obstacles
towards independence: its small size and the complexity of its population1. Mauritius consists of a
multi-racial population and thus this could give a rise in serious discrimination. So to establish a
centre government was not so unproblematic.

The British then came up with a new idea that is they decided to promote decolonization. In
fact they were somewhat obliged to take this step since they were themselves encountering
economic crises since their defeat in India in 1947. In 1965, upon visiting the island, Anthony
Greenwood bluntly said that Mauritius could no longer receive any financial aid from Britain.
Therefore the British took up the decision of liberating the colonies. Indeed, the Secretary of State
for colonies, Oliver Lyttelton, in his New Year message in 1951, clearly reflected the intention of
London when he stated that Britain will be helping colonial territories to attain self-government

1
J. Chan Low, ‘Democratizing Politics in a Smaller Plural Territory: British Policy towards the Constitutional
Evolution of Mauritius’, Conference on Decolonization’, MGI.
within the British Commonwealth. Many colonies immediately started to gather at the Colonial
office in London to fix dates for independence. The Colonial Office (CO) suggested the formation of a
new group to bring forward the idea of self-government yet it will be the British who will control
the defence and foreign policy. But in 1955, the CO advocated a case by case approach: Mauritius
and its islands were also required for strategic purposes and independence could not be approved
without some assurance of British military power in those islands. Sir Robert Scott, Governor,
however felt that even self-government should not be granted because it would lead to a flight of
capital and Mauritius would become tropical slum .

Writing in the Spectator of January 1964, Macleod2 agreed that there was a deliberate
speeding-up of the movement towards independence. He wrote: Were the countries fully ready
for independence? Of course not. Nevertheless, arguing that India too was not prepared for
independence, he wrote on a philosophical note that the march of men towards their freedom can
be guided but not halted.3 In Mauritius, some people were totally opposed to the idea of
decolonisation and clamour that the island should not severe bond with Britain. However the
period of decolonization was quite peaceful compared to that in India where they suffered from
partition and from the resulting bloodshed and riots. The leaders have abandoned the All party
coalition government and started their electoral campaigns. According to Chan Low, in 1955, Dr.
Ramgoolam did not have any intention to fight for independence and Scott also wrote that even in
the late 1958, none of the leaders were thinking of independence.

It cannot be denied that the struggle for independence of Mauritius bears the indelible
imprint of Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam. Adequately supported by Guy Rozemont, Renganaden
Seeneevassen, Guy Forget, Veerasamy Ringadoo, Raymond Rault, Satcam Boolell and Abdool Razack
Mohamed, Ramgoolam and the Labour Party pressed for adult universal suffrage, that is One man,
One woman, One vote, along with a Ministerial System and Responsible Government. The sugar
magnates, who since the early days of colonialism - French and English - had monopolised political
power, were opposed to any progressive changes in the Constitution. Their party, the Parti
Mauricien led by an eminent lawyer Jules Koenig, was against one man one vote, contending that
the masses were not mature enough to be able to use their vote with discernment. Further the
party was averse to any form of Self Government, through a Ministerial System, claiming that with
one man one vote the Hindus being the most numerous community, would obtain a majority of
seats in the Council. The Ministerial System, it was argued, would further compound the problem by
ensuring a majority of ministers for that community. The minority communities would, according
to the Parti Mauricien, be in grave peril as they would not have enough representatives to ensure
the respect of their rights.

In the early 1960s, the British minister for the Colonies conceded a large measure of
autonomy to Mauritius. The country obtained adult universal suffrage, self government and the
leader of the majority in the Assembly was styled first, Chief Minister, then, Premier of the island.
Adult universal suffrage was first implemented at the 1959 election. The electorate rose from
93,000 in 1953 to 208,000 in 1959. With the huge rise in the number of new electors, the Labour
Party supported the registration campaign as many of the new voters were illiterate labourers
working on sugar estates, and potentially would be voting for their candidates. It had to ask the

2
Iain Macleod was appointed as Secretary of State of the British colonies.
A a d Moheeputh, British colo ial polic a d the i depe de ce of Mauritius , l’e press. u
3
Governor to extend the registration because only some 60% had registered. There were 159
candidates standing in 39 constituencies. There were 208,726 electors but only 191,676 voted.
17,050 people thus abstained. The difference with earlier elections was that constituencies were
smaller; people knew each other and the candidates better. The Labour Party, in alliance with the
Muslim Action Committee, led by Abdool Razack Mohamed, and the Syndicaliste Travailliste won 31
out of the 40 elected seats in the Council. The Independent Forward Block, led by Sookdeo
Bissoondoyal won six seats, all in the rural areas. The Parti Mauricien, for its part, won only three
seats. There was an added factor in the elections: caste. According to Simmons, Bissoondoyal
exploited caste divisions and this led to the reduced majority by Labour Party candidates in areas of
low-caste dominance. The Trustram Eve recommendations of 1958 seemed to have worked in
ensuring representation of each section of opinion , but not necessarily in ensuring party
representation. The Labour Party which had got 41.4 % of votes got 57% of seats; the Parti
Mauricien won 15% of the votes and 7.5% of seats; the IFB, 18% of votes and 15% of seats and
CAM, 8.55%of votes and 12.5% of seats. Spurred on by its huge electoral victory, the Labour Party
led by Dr. Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, the Chief Minister of the Colony, pressed for complete internal
self government. A partial transfer of power from the British authorities to the elected
representatives of the people started in 1958 with the introduction of a Ministerial System.
Following the 1959 election, a coalition government was formed with the Parti Mauricien, the
Independent Forward Block and Muslim Action Committee.

The new Governor, Colville Deverell who arrived in 1959 did not believe in giving
independence too hastily. He felt economic and social problems needed to be dealt with first. These
problems were to be accentuated by the destruction caused by 2 cyclones, Alix and Carol in 1960.
Forty-eight people died, thousands of buildings were blown away and sugar plantations destroyed.
The damage was estimated at £33 million. The development plan was abandoned in favour of
another one which included reconstruction. Meanwhile existing problems remained, in particular,
the massive annual 3% rise in population, caused by a much reduced mortality rate and this led to
fears of deterioration in the standard of living. Moreover the late 1950s and early 60s were not easy
times for the Mauritian population, many of whom were oblivious to the political storms raging
within and among political parties.

The secretary of the State, Ian Macleod, who visited the country in 1960, promised a London
Constitutional conference to discuss future reforms likely to be introduced. The 1961 Constitutional
Conference was thus a conference at which all the Mauritian political parties were represented.
The British proposed ongoing development toward internal self-government, the introduction of
ministerial government with the leader of the majority party as Chief Minister and after elections,
as Premier. The Colonial Secretary would become Chief Secretary. After elections, the Executive
Council would become the Council of Ministers to include all parties who agreed to share collective
responsibility for government. The Legislative Council would be renamed Legislative Assembly.
Foreign relations, control of army and internal security would remain in the hands of the British
Government. The Labour Party and CAM accepted the proposals with some reservations while the
Parti-Mauricien and the IFB rejected them. The IFB supported the right-wing Hindu interests while
the Franco-Mauritian oligarchy was supported by the Parti Mauricien. The Parti-Mauricien as well
pleaded vehemently in favour of their demands, depicting the Hindu majority as the Hindu peril,
Hindu hegemony, which made living difficult for the minority groups. They demanded separate
electoral list as a safeguard of their jeopardized interests. The Parti Mauricien considered their duty
to struggle for the welfare of the non-Hindi speaking minority groups belonging to the Hindi
Community because they believed that the M.L.P did not represent the whole Mauritian nation. The
PMSD also did not want independence and favoured some form of integration with Britain. The
PMSD, as the party representing Creoles and the Franco-Mauritian minority, was afraid of
independence and of the political dominance of Indo-Mauritians which they believed would follow.
The PMSD claimed that most Mauritians were not yet ready to assume the responsibility of running
their own affairs. The PMSD was outnumbered, however, by the Labour Party and its allies who
favoured self-government and independence. The PMSD representatives withdrew from the
conference before any decisions were reached.

The election of 1963 saw once again the victory of the Labour Party and Muslim Action
Committee (M.C.A) but with a reduced minority. The 1963 October elections were won by joint
effort of the Labour Party and M.C.A. This success of the pro-independence group reflected public
opinion which was in favour of autonomy. In the elections, the Labour Party won 42.3% of the
votes, CAM 7%, IFB 19% and the Parti Mauricien 19%. Although the Labour Party remained easily
the largest party, it had lost some popularity, which can be directly ascribed to the communal and
caste undertones in the political campaigns. The Labour Party won only nineteen seats out of forty
and the PMSD made some recovery with eight seats and made some important gains in the urban
area. There were several differences between this election and preceding elections in terms of
election tactics and methods and campaign issues. The Labour Party, under Ramgoolam, gave in to
caste considerations while the Parti Mauricien conducted a completely communal campaign. The
IFB campaigned against corruption and wastage of public funds. While both IFB and the PM
appealed openly to communal audiences, the Labour Party could not do so as it represented Indians
and about 50% of the Afro-Mauritian and Coloured population. Part of the Franco-Mauritian elite
also supported it as the Labour Party had openly stated it would not nationalize the sugar industry.
Some of the agents used by Walter, Duval and Mohamed used criminals who went about
intimidating voters.i While the financing of the Parti Mauricien came from the oligarchy alone, the
Labour Party s funds came from wealthy Indo-Mauritians as well as some from Franco-Mauritians.
Because the Labour Party knew that the Parti Mauricien would be popular in the towns where there
were fewer Hindu voters, it attempted to extend the boundaries of the towns to include more Hindu
voters. This had led to 34 members in urban councils belonging to the Parti Mauricien to resign. It
also lost the Labour Party many votes.ii The Parti Mauricien did not try to win in the rural areas,
because its anti-Hindu rhetoric was not likely to fall on receptive ears. According to the Parti
Mauricien, independence meant the domination and supremacy of the Hindu majority over the
minority groups and to face such situations, the PM leader suggested a confederation of the
minority groups against those who were in favour of independence especially the Mauritius
Labour Party and their allies, the Muslim Committee of Action. After the election, in consultation
with the Colonial Office, Ramgoolam formed an all-party coalition government created with the
collaboration of Mauritius Labour Party, Muslim Committee of Action and Independent Forward
Bloc. The Governor managed to convince all major parties to take part in the government but on
the day the new government was going to be installed, the coalition broke. Negotiations continued
and a second government was finally formed, composed of:

Minister of Labour H. Jomadar Labour Party

Minister of Education V. Ringadoo Labour Party

Minister of Works H. Walter Labour Party

Minister of Health G. Forget Labour Party
Minister of Agriculture S. Boolell Labour Party

Minister of Local Government S. Bissoondoyal Independent Forward Bloc

Minister of Housing G. Duval Parti Mauricien

Attorney General J. Koenig Parti Mauricien

In March 1964 Dr Ramgoolam became Premier and the Executive Council became a council of
ministers responsible to the Legislature.

The 1960s were dominated by the Independence versus Association/ Integration with UK
debate. The Mauritius Labour Party, allied itself with the Muslim Action Committee and the
Independent Forward Block, demanded the Independence of Mauritius. The main opposition party,
the Parti Mauricien, later Parti Mauricien Social Democrate (PMSD), led successively by Jules
Koenig and Gaëtan Duval insisted for a closer association, better still, an integration of Mauritius
with Britain. It was rightly argued by the PMSD that the then monocrop economy, based solely on
the production and sale of sugar on the
British Market at a preferential price, was too vulnerable. Further, Mauritius is cyclone prone. It
was, therefore, contended that Mauritius could not stand on its own feet and consequently could
not be Independent. Mindful of the fragility of the economy, the Labour Party under the leadership
of Dr. Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, was already involved in massive diplomatic negotiations with
France and with Britain - our two greatest European allies - in order that
Mauritius could continue to obtain, after independence, a preferential tariff for its sugar from the
European Economic Community.

In 1965, Anthony Greenwood, the Secretary of State for colonies, came to Mauritius to
demand the opinions of the population. Politics became intensely communal from this period
onwards. In April, 50,000 Parti Mauricien supporters, dressed in blue shirts and waving the Union
Jack , lined the streets of Curepipe to welcome Greenwood and show support for the principle of
association . The Chinese and Franco-Mauritian community joined in this show of support. This led
some Hindu youths to attack Chinese shops in late April. Before the Labour Day demonstration, all
the gangs of various political parties had been organising and fighting broke out after the
demonstration between Labour Party and Parti Mauricien thugs. A young Hindu boy was killed
when he was hit by a stone thrown from a Parti Mauricien bus, and Ramgoolam s and Boolell s
houses believed to have been stoned. By then, the political leaders in Congress and Parti Mauricien
had lost all control of the thugs under them. In the village of Trois Boutiques, on 10th May, a Franco-
Mauritian was beaten to death. Armed gangs of Creoles and Hindus fought in the cane fields.
Because of the danger of the violence spreading, and of the inability of the police to control it,
despite 98 arrests in less than 48 hours, a State of Emergency was declared.

Despite the riots of 1965 and the rise of communalist politics, the Colonial Office continued
to press for constitutional progress. The decisive Constitutional Conference on the future status of
Mauritius was held in Lancaster House, London, in September 1965. All the leaders of political
parties represented in the House were invited to attend the Conference. The Labour Party and its
allies pressed for early independence while the PMSD demanded an Association/Integration
formula with Great Britain. The PMSD put forward a scheme for associated status with Britain
under which certain matters, including defence, foreign affairs and some constitutional decisions
would have been kept under British control. They also asked that no final decision should be taken
on the future of Mauritius before a referendum was held because it felt that party loyalties would
blur that issue 4. Greenwood in his summing speech was against a referendum, feeling that it
would prolong the current uncertainty and political controversy in a way which would only harden
and deepen communal divisions 5. At the Constitutional Conference in London the British
negotiators seemed reluctant to agree to an early move towards independence and rather they
wanted the MLP to agree on the transfer of the Chagos Islands to Britain which would be as a price
of a British grant of independence. The MLP agreed not to raise objectives to the transfer of the
Chagos group to Britain as part of the British Indian Ocean Territories and to the evacuation of their
inhabitants to Mauritius.

The British Electoral Commissioner, Mr. Harold Banwell, proposed a system of constant and
variables correctives. There were to be eight best losers to ensure a fair representation of the
different communities in Mauritius. Over and above, Banwell proposed that any party which
obtained at least 25% of the vote in the election should get 25% of the seats. This was to be
achieved by a system of variable collectives which would give sufficient additional seats to a party
which had obtained 25% of the vote to ensure that the party obtained 25% of the seats. It was an
attempt by the Electoral Commissioner to satisfy the demand of the PMSD and also to, ostensibly,
ensure that the minorities would have adequate representation and the power to block any
constitutional amendment designed to violate their
constitutional rights. The PMSD represented the minorities. Sir Gaëtan Duval was hailed as King
Creole. Although today the best loser system is criticized and quite rightly so, for
institutionalization of communalism and entrenching communal cleavages, at that time, there was
a concern to establish a system that would not keep any group out and because of this, the leaders
of each of those groups accepted it. Whether this was believed to be a makeshift solution or a
permanent one is not known.

The 1947 election was the most crucial one ever to be held in Mauritius. Three parties, the
Labour Party, the MCA and the IFB, fought the election as the Independence Party . The PMSD
continued to press for an Association/Integration formula with Great Britain and to oppose
Independence. The election main issue was over independence or association. The Labour Party,
the IFB and the CAM renamed the Independence Party won 56% of the votes i.e., 39 out of 62 seats.
The PMSD began to resemble a national party as Duval realized he could not win with only his
supporters. He set out to win the rural votes with the slogan Hindou, mon frère . The PMSD
succeeded in getting votes that would have gone to Labour Party, CAM and IFB. The Commonwealth
observers reported that, with few reservations, they were satisfied that the elections had been
conducted fairly and with a minimum violence.

The Legislative Assembly of 1967 found the following motion tabled by the leader of the
House, Dr.S. Ramgoolam, to the effect that the population was in favour of independence:

4
Simmons, Modern Mauritius, 167.
5
Simmons, Modern Mauritius, 169.
 That this Assembly request her Majesty s Government in the United Kingdom to take necessary
steps to give effect, as soon as practicable this year according to the desire of the people of
Mauritius to accede to independence within the Commonwealth on the attainment of
Independence.

The resolution was passed and the British Government fixed 12 March 1968 as
Independence Day. During the debate Sir Seewoosagur spoke hopefully of the country s future:

We are meeting today on an historic and solemn occasion. By our decision today, Sir, we shall put
Mauritius on the path of her destiny. It is a day of joy for all patriotic men and women, for on this
day we are taking the formal step which will confer on our people freedom and bring them into
their heritage…

With independence there will come among the people of this country a sense of regeneration and
there will arise in the hearts of our fellow countrymen a fervour and a determination to go forward
and build for themselves and for future generations a strong and a happy Mauritius…

Let us resolve that in our determination to build a better future for ourselves and our children we
shall inspired by the loftiest principles of patriotism and love for our island home.

We have striven for many years now to create a new sense of unity out of our rich diversity and in
the words of poet let it be said for the glory of those who are fortunate to live at this hour: Bliss was
it in that dawn to be alive .

Sources :

 Vijaya Teelock; “Mauritian History”

 Adison J & Hazareesingh, A, Short History of Mauritius, Longman, Green & Co, 1949
 Dayachand Napal, ‘Mauritius: Growth of a Nation’
 L’express articles