Vincent Pellegrin interviews Dr Mu

1. Tell me about your experience, from early beginnings up to now, in an Environmental Non-Governmental Organization (ENGO).

The NGO I work for is actually a charity that a friend and I founded at the end of 2008. Its goals include promoting human rights as well as protecting the environment, expressed as environmental stewardship and social justice. The two are fundamentally linked since the poor destroy the environment out of need and the rich destroy it out of greed. Moreover, the UN Human Rights Council has long been seeking to establish the human right to enjoy a healthy environment. My experience to date has been an exploration of what this actually means in the Mauritian context.

MID – Maurice Ile Dépendante

The Empires Strike Back

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away…

A tiger-class merchant ship was making its way with the rest of the fleet towards the Golden Dawn of the New Age. Without the added weight of weaponry, it was one of the fastest craft around, it’s path illuminated by a state-of-the-art 4-sight navigation system which resembled a balanced tripod supporting a bright spark. All would have been perfect, except that three officers coveted the captain’s chair and the fickle crew regularly mutinied in favour of one or the other.

The first was an old Jedi Knight, who had turned completely to the Dark Side. The second was a short-sighted son of a former captain, who had lied about his lineage, assassinated his rivals and betrayed the most vulnerable members of the crew to get the post. The third was a rejected member of a race of condescending albinos, who had deceived the crew into believing that the ship could not operate without them, even though they did little work themselves. They had been the first to board the ship and, though few in number, still controlled most of the trade. Somehow they had managed to convince everyone that they had a divine right to occupy the best quarters and live in luxury while others lived in squalor.

Shortly after an unusually traumatic upheaval, the Dark Knight was reinstated as Captain. Once in control, he ripped the tripod apart, giving each leg as a prize to his key supporters and jettisoned the bright spark. The merchant ship meandered aimlessly. Half-hearted attempts were made to copy the trading strategies of others and unprofitable sectors were subsidised, mostly in the interests of the albinos and their fratres, whom many suspected of secretly manipulating the ship’s controls. Caring less about the lack of progress, the wannabe captains continued their feud for the captain’s chair.