National Assembly concludes debate on TRNUC report |05 August 2023
The nine remaining members of the National Assembly who were yet to give their views on the report of the Truth, Reconciliation and National Unity Commission, addressed the house yesterday.
The six members of the Linyon Demokratik Seselwa (LDS) who intervened maintained their party’s position that the perpetrators should apologise and bear responsibility for payment of compensation to the victims’ families for the injustices and oppressive actions that took place following the coup d’Etat of June 5, 1977.
Similar to their colleagues who addressed the house during the two previous days, the members cited several oppressive actions that took place during the one-party era which they said terrorised a part of the population.
Hon. Sandy Arissol cited examples such as security clearance which he claimed deprived many families of the right to employment, abuse by the army, the National Youth Service which was imposed on teenagers, among others.
He said the members of the former ruling party have a short memory of all the oppressions and now want to distance themselves from all those actions which destroyed the country.
He added that the members should have been humble and apologise, just like they are being asked to do.
The three remaining members of the United Seychelles (US) party, the successor to the SPUP/SPPF/Parti Lepep party that orchestrated the coup, accused the majority party of going against what the Truth, Reconciliation and National Unity Commission (TRNUC) law had been enacted to do, which was to have a restorative approach, which would bring about unity instead.
The members said there could never be unity with a punitive approach.
They also questioned the proposal for a successor body, stating it was not in the law and the LDS members were now coming up with new proposals, which should have been taken care of back in 2018 when the law was being drafted.
One member, Hon. Johan Loze, claimed that the Head of State had the authority to execute all the 47 recommendations in the report instead of bringing it to the National Assembly.
He also questioned the fate of those who were aggrieved after 1993, and who had come before the commission to bear their souls, stating the commission was appointed to investigate incidents that took place from 1977 to 1993 under the one-party state.
TRNUC was established under the administration of former President Danny Faure in 2018 to work on settling past political divisions and grievances that were a result of the coup d'Etat in Seychelles on June 5, 1977.
During three-and-a-half years, the commission registered 371 case reports and completed 124 reports. Each report is from 10 to 120 pages. There were 272 hearings in which saw the appearance of 1,164 witnesses/suspects. A third of the cases were about land issues.
Patsy Canaya