One Seychelles’ reaction to SONA 2021 ‘SONA well received by leaves a lot of unanswered questions’ |25 January 2021

One Seychelles has sent its reaction to the State-of-the-nation address (SONA) 2021 delivered by President Wavel Ramkalawan on Friday January 22.

The following are highlights of One Seychelles’ remarks: 

• Peter Sinon, the interim president and secretary general of One Seychelles political party, would like to firstly congratulate the President of the Republic for his first State-of-the-nation address since assuming office. The SONA hails a new era of openness and freedom of expression with an incessant, strong call for unity and harmony in our beloved nation, despite our diversity. This is most welcomed. “We are nevertheless a bit apprehensive about the stern warning from the President for his stated intolerance for what he termed as “incitement”. In our view, the latter is bound to occur when and if the socio-economic context boils to a point where all that is required is to light the match due to unacceptable hardships. Such situations can and should be avoided,” said Mr Sinon on behalf of the national executive committee of One Seychelles. 

• One Seychelles appreciates the present declining economic situation of the country that remains tight and challenging, but nevertheless we feel that the health and welfare of our people of our islands must remain at the centre of any decision that directly impacts the livelihood of our population.

The handling of Air Seychelles and the termination of the FA4JR announced by the President as from April 1, 2021 are two potentially explosive situations. As deliberations on the future of the former unfold and the deadline approaches for FA4JR, both issues could turn out to be very hot potatoes to be handled with utmost care. Both the above will have direct implications on existing jobs and businesses that may be terminal in affecting a relatively large number of jobs, entrepreneurs and SMEs. It is hoped that contingencies for as soft a landing as possible is built into the final decisions for our people.  To ensure smooth continuity the former government did not hesitate to announce FA4JR and SETS to cushion the anticipated shocks of the measures to initially combat the first signs of Covid-19. This time around we have not heard a word on any such mitigating initiatives at a time of a mutating and much more deadly Covid-19 that has started to take the lives of Seychellois. This is a very worrying development.

• Congratulations are nevertheless in order for the mobilisation of voluntary donations (R35.3 million so far) to assist with the national vaccination programme so as to achieve herd immunity by March 2021 and for the construction of the ‘Isolation Centre’ by the end of the year. Those are commendable achievements and ambition thus far.

• However, more clarity, measures and reassurances were expected in dealing with what the President rightly identifies as the biggest challenge for the global and for our small remote economy. Apart from the unlikely goal to achieve herd immunity by March 2021 and be ready to further open up our airport to the whole world to revive our tourism industry, the President was silent on possible complementary and even alternative ways of survival for our vulnerable economy. The way forward desperately seems to hang on to the revival of the deeply affected tourism sector.

We heard nothing concrete on alternative efforts to revive, re-structure and re-adjust to even attempt to diversify of our economy. Initiatives such as to realise the ‘blue economy objectives’ in which the Republic has invested in and successfully promoted globally. Efforts to improve food security through possible import substitutions policies, as well as, incentivise and promote investments in lucrative high-value export oriented industries, have unfortunately not been part of our President’s SONA. There was actually nothing of substance that gave new and alternative directions to even begin to set our economy on a renewed path to lessen its overwhelming dependence on the travel and tourism industry of yester-year.

• We waited patiently, but were disappointed to hear no support for our struggling industries (small, medium or sizeable). Instead they were all just informed of the cessation of the FA4JR programme by April 1, 2021. Thus we can only anticipate a lot of redundancies and closures of businesses. It is a bleak future.

• The President commended the Electoral Commission for a job well done upon receiving their report. One Seychelles looks forward to having the opportunity to peruse the submitted report. All stakeholders that partook in the 2020 elections should have the opportunity to study and comment on such a document to ensure that the glaring mistakes of the last election do not recur in the future.  The EC seems to have produced an internal document without consultation with or validation of the key stakeholders that participated in the elections. This is very unfortunate.

• The President’s pledge to cut red-tape and bureaucracy and to promote a leaner, more cost conscious, efficient and effective public service is a popular line that has been the subject of many SONAs. The devil however, always lies in the details of this promise. Too often, the latter is the perfect excuse that is used to usher in changes with completely different agenda than what is given to the populace. Let us hope that this time around this is not the case and the objective of a more cost effective and efficient public service is actually realised for the benefit of all.

• The directive to reallocate resources of the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) for tangible results delivery by the end of 2021 is welcomed.  One Seychelles however cannot help but wonder if the investigators to be employed in place of the Commission’s Board will actually deliver? Or is this another avenue to hail the beginning of the end of the ACC by the end of this year? This thought is rendered more credible after we all heard the President publicly respond to CNN’s Richard Quest on the issue of past corrupt allegations, his response was that his interest is not in the past, but rather resolutely focused on the future. We wait with anticipation as to witness the ending of this episode.

• The President is nevertheless on point in his assessment and pronouncements of our labour market situation. The party welcomes wholeheartedly his ‘Seychellois First’ policy for jobs in Seychelles. This was the cornerstone of our political campaign. Too often Seychellois professionals are overlooked and it is indeed unfortunate that preference for expatriate workers is oftentimes facilitated and promoted by our very own Seychellois for personal gains. It is a situation that should most definitely be addressed since it is also a cause for considerable brain-drain. Qualified and able Seychellois have too often felt and continue to feel more valued abroad than at home.  

• The expectations on the effort to address the serious issue of the present Seychellois workforce mindsets and work ethics stopped short of a comprehensive strategy to address this deep-rooted malaise. Yet, it is one that we all agree with the President, that it is in urgent need of attention. We are very much aware that the changes we desire to turn our workforce into the main ‘engine of growth’ for our economy will not happen overnight, nor will it happen with just speeches and pronouncements. A series of policies and strategies will be required to address this cross-sectoral issue with the input of multi-stakeholders of our economy from both the public and private sectors.

• The effort should be well planned and begin from our homes with enhanced parental responsibilities that are taken seriously, as stated by the President, as well as the need to relook and equip our schools that should be well resourced and enabled to produce relevant, disciplined, qualified and skilled labour force for our workplaces. It should be ingrained in our youth that in today’s open market-oriented world, their jobs are currently the dream jobs of multiple educated and skilled expatriates who are very willing to replace the Seychellois and commit to higher and more efficient delivery for the company, institution or agency. Those traits are what are being highly sought after by the CEOs and managers. Therefore the challenge remains to deliver to the best of our abilities so as to keep our respective companies afloat and profitable. This is the only assured way to keep our jobs.

• We have heard the different warnings that the President has issued to drug dealers in previous speeches. We are all aware today that hard drugs are the biggest adversity to the progress of many Seychellois youth, their focus and eventually their productivity. However, thus far, we have seen no concrete action to follow through the multiple warnings. Is what we are hearing just more talk or will we see some action soon? It is the hope that a comprehensive strategy to deal with this scourge be seriously rolled out because it is also one factor that is at the heart of the demise of our socio-economic and cultural fabric as a proud Seychellois nation.

The national flags that we received as gifts from China and for which we are thankful, will not mean much in front of our homesteads if we are not in a position to stop the ruining of our young generation with the poison of hard and very addictive drugs.

Conclusion

The SONA was well received and delivered with much gusto. However, the SONA leaves a lot of unanswered questions and does not allay but rather compounds some compelling uncertainties. Given this situation, it is hoped that going forward, the spirit of consultation and compromise will prevail as we confront one of the darkest periods of our nation’s present generation. 

The need to diversify our economy, manage the repercussions of economic structural adjustments and changing the mindsets of our workforce, cannot be underestimated. We should start somewhere and we should start now.

Press release from One Seychelles