I cannot believe that after what we’ve gone through on Saturday, after eleven people have lost their lives in the killer floods, after countless persons have had near death experiences, after even more of our compatriots have lost their every belonging in Saturday’s backwater flooding, that minister Anil Bachoo is still desperately hanging on to his ministerial office.

No, he’s been shamelessly saying since Saturday, it’s not my fault. Of course it’s not his fault. Anil Bachoo didn’t personally go and murder those people, he didn’t conspire to damage thousands of cars, wreck hundreds of homes and traumatize countless people. But somebody needs to take responsibility. We have tolerated this shameless attitude of power without responsibility for way too long but enough is enough; Bachoo will not this time get away with enjoying the privileges that come with occupying a ministerial offi ce while rejecting its trappings.

We cannot have someone who is ever so eager to blow his own trumpets about how much of our money he is spending to upgrade our infrastructure, without having him shoulder the responsibilities when things go wrong.

Somebody must accept responsibility for the consequences of building the Ring Road, for deviating and blocking water’s natural course off the mountain and somebody needs to take responsibility for the obstruction of the Pouce stream caused by the works for the third lane of the M1 motorway and somebody needs to take responsibility for the builders’ criminal recklessness in blocking the Pouce stream.

Now who’s overseeing those building works? The RDA. Under whose purview does the RDA fall? Anil Bachoo. Whose responsibility was it to draw the attention of the Prime minister to the drainage problem? Bachoo. Who, instead, oversaw works that obstructed or covered those same drains it was his duty to protect? Anil Bachoo.

Bachoo’s recklessness goes even further. Last year Ledikasyon pu Travayer (LPT) and their neighbours at Grand-Rivière, a stone throw away from Canal Dayot, protested against two 4 metre walls in reinforced concrete built by the ministry of gender, supposedly to “protect” battered women. The walls obstructed a natural drainage system, blocking the water’s way to the sea. Works were delayed after the forceful protests of Lalit and a report by an engineer was even produced.

That report predicted that in cases of heavy rainfall, the walls would exacerbate the flooding that generally occurs at Canal Dayot and Grande-Rivière. That report went straight into a bin and Bachoo’s ministry gave the green light for the building of the wall. LPT even went to the police in October in a vain attempt to stop the building of the wall.

Need I go on? Bachoo needs to resign. He needs to stop this pathetic attempt to hang on to his ministerial post and stop cheapening the tragedies that people have lived by trying to shrug off blame. People have died and he acts as though his office is more important. Unless of course, it is more important to him.