At last you’ve landed a ministerial portfolio but now you must be wondering what to do with it. Ministers easily slip into administrative drift, overtaken by crises or beguiled into doing little by functionaries happy to float effortlessly alongside. Few of you try to sort out deep-rooted problems that could one day suck the country into a whirlpool.

“The isles of Greece!…Eternal summer gilds them yet, but all, except their sun, is set.” Apart from exceptional Rodrigues, the same could be said of these fair islands. And you’re not helped by ministerial overlap. Diego is out of your hands, Agalega is up in the air and the inner islands have fallen off the radar – although some of Serpent Island’s inhabitants seem to have slithered into the Assembly or joined the media. Rodrigues is being mentored elsewhere, no one talks about Tromelin anymore, despite its enormous EEZ, and it’s doubtful any minister knows anything concerning St Brandon apart from the weather forecast.

Greece, xenophobic since ancient times, managed to dispose of its Turkish and Italian colonists but is now faced with Syrian and Afghan infiltrators. You’ve still got perfidious Americans in Diego and Frogs on Tromelin, but now have longlost ancestors descending on Agalega. All you need is for the Chinese to take an interest in St Brandon – although given its massive fish stocks perhaps the Japs will get there first.

It would help Agalegans to defend themselves if there were an MP for the Outer Islands. By the way, what did they say to you about Mother India’s charity? However, the islands are used, there’re going to have to be some foreign naval officers stationed there, who’ll need to treat the locals with respect – not as Mauritian officials used to treat Rodrigues, like a colonial outpost. Still, there’s an opportunity to provide better facilities, paid for by the invaders, with structures like a cottage hospital rather than a dispensaire. And how about some small-scale tourism so other citizens can glimpse what life’s like there? It might bring regressive souls to realise they shouldn’t call the country île Maurice.

Meanwhile, is there any thinking about St Brandon? It has an interesting past yet how many know that pirates used it as a hideaway – or that it’s an archipelago with several islands? Most people live on île Raphael but there are small settlements on Avocaré, Cocos, and Île du Sud, although Albatross was abandoned nearly thirty years ago. Today, there are sailing cruises to St Brandon for rich foreigners but couldn’t a few hovels be made available to mainlanders, to learn more about this neglected outpost of empire?

Meanwhile, it’s time for more geopolitics. Why haven’t you, like Greece, presented the government’s begging bowl to Jean-Claude Juncker, who will delight in seeing Brexiters kicked in their Diegos? Surely it’s worth at least a billion euros – with a little consideration in Luxembourg bank accounts for politicos who don’t yet have one. Incidentally, do keep an eye on Sir Olivier if the UN route leads nowhere. If the Brits managed to buy the Father of the Nation…

Awake, ye son of Floreal! Advance! As there’s no sign of local government reform, why not use your spare time and your pharmaceutical skills to manufacture a new formula for all the islands instead of dishing out placebos. Be inspired by that MBC advert claiming it’s clinically proven that Epi helps ministers grow wiser, stronger and more thoughtful.

Yours sincerely,

Epi PHRON