It is written so we all have to pretend it is real. Even if we know we will never actually see it. The by-election in No. 7 Piton-Rivière du Rempart, to fill the seat left behind by Vishnu Lutchmeenaraidoo, has been scheduled for 13 November and so in August, everybody will go through the motions: parties will nominate candidates, the Electoral Commission will process the paperwork and speeches will flow but everybody will know that the by-election will, likely as not, never really take place. Why would voters in No.7 rush out to elect somebody who will sit in a parliament that will be dissolved a mere two weeks after the by-election? And who would want to spend money and effort to win a parliamentary seat to sit on it for two weeks before giving it up, or having to fight for it all over again soon?

The looming question is that given the importance that the constituency has for the Jugnauths and the MSM, why on earth would the government risk losing there on the cusp of a general election? No.7 has long been the bastion of the MSM patriarch Anerood Jugnauth, who has been elected from there at every election since 1976 except in the years 1995 (when SAJ lost in a 60-0 wipeout) and in 2010 (when SAJ did not stand there because he was made president as part of an electoral arrangement with the Labour Party). So important is the seat that in 2003, when SAJ resigned (as part of the deal with the MMM), he chose his right-hand man, Prakash Maunthrooa, to contest the by-election in his old seat. Maunthrooa lost and the Labour Party’s Rajesh Jeetah was elected instead: Paul Bérenger, whose MMM was backing Maunthrooa at the time reacted by saying, “An election halfway into the mandate of the government leads to a defeat for the government”. A drubbing in SAJ’s home constituency would be a terrible augury for the MSM ahead of an election where they are keen to keep a vengeful Navin Ramgoolam out of power. 

Bérenger’s observation in 2003 contains a harsh truth: governments lose popularity midway through their terms. And the odds are even more stacked against this government since the by-election is even further down the line, at the end of its term. All governments fear by-elections: in 1972, the Labour Party even took the drastic step of abolishing them altogether following the resignations of Dev Virahsawmy and Gaëtan de Chazal. Until that is, they were guaranteed by law in 1982. So, if the current government exudes confidence about this by-election, it is exceedingly deceptive. 

Just because it is written does not make it so: there were supposed to be two by-elections in 1987, one to fill a seat vacated by Harish Boodhoo and another by Serge Thomas (one of the ‘Amsterdam Boys’). When Lutcheemeeparsad Ramsahok (one of the ‘Bombay Pilgrims’) also threw in the towel, the two previous writs for by-elections were swiftly forgotten and the then-MSM government, fearing its majority frittering away and risking embarrassment in a series of by-elections, called a general election instead in 1987. Writs, particularly so close to a general election, count for little. 

In the meantime, the government’s bluff continues and everybody has to pretend to play along.