Seychelles Satire - State House Anytime Now

Cascade HELL hath no fury...and all things in between

Life seems to be a cruel hell! With the much publicised district meetings back on track, every stop is like a rotten egg on the face as the populace are asking pertinent questions that Mr. President has to shadow box his way out of. Even the heavy editing by SBC could not put him in a good light. To make matters worse he had to endure a monologue of sarcastic praise from ‘Deco’ the comedian MNA. JenPA could not come to his rescue as he was mingling in the crowd trying to get the proper pulse of these bad vibes, along with the State House madams with writing pads in hand taking notes.  Hmmm, we need to push for a major youth activity to turn things around and at least bring some cheer to good old JAM - only five years and already contemplating throwing in the towel…

JenPa: Bonjour Monsieur le President! The eastern river of hope cascaded on our heads last week. I was always under the impression that Deco had everything in control there. I never realised that they would bombard us with questions and insinuations of incompetency. You surely do not deserve this Sir! After five years of toiling to end up in the same spot does not auger well. You see, Orderly has been fooling you all this time.

Mr. President: Indeed JP. I have always been fooled and I do not have the wisdom to see through all this. I am led by the nose like the bulls on La Digue. This is why I surround myself with all these bodyguards and I go to these districts with my team of ministers and high ranking officials. It is to project the image that we work as a team and I am in charge. But it is for me to deflect the nasty questions and to take the praise & glory for the few good things I have done so far. I need to be present everywhere JP so that my people can see I am a man of action! Remember that I told them when I came to power that they need to judge me by my actions. Well, I have been the Clint Eastwood and Rambo of Seychelles for the last five years…

JenPa: Sir, we need to work on getting you as much sympathy as possible from the people. They know that you cannot be everywhere but they do see you on TV every night. You seem to be a one man show! You cannot handle all the ministerial portfolios all at once. Guys like Pillay is enjoying his role as host on the cocktail circuit while he builds his palace at Port Launay and you take on his role as Foreign Minister…

Mr. President: Yeah, I also had to take on the function of Minister of Defence when I got back from Japan as little Jo seems to have cherished this role – despite shitting in his pants when he sees an AK 47! Big Jo the static VP had gone into hibernation during this whole debacle. He is still recouping from the prison mutiny dilemma. I am starting to get fed up with all these complaints we are getting from the districts. It shows total inefficiency of my government and puts me in a terrible light.

JenPa: Sir we have to attend to some of the comments made at Cascade speedily. It is totally unacceptable that we are still having public transport problems despite the importation of new buses and modernisation of SPTC.

Mr. President: I am equally dumb-assed JP! No one seems to be finding solutions to these petty issues such as lights for ladies to be safe at night. We have new buses from China and now it seems that no one wants to take them on the routes. I will probably make a call to Greg and ask him to break the monopoly on ox-carts on La Digue and send some over to Mahé to handle the secondary routes.

JenPa: Very well Sir! We should also perhaps fire some more workers to keep the IMF happy and reduce the load on the buses. If the workers of Cascade do not have a job, then they cannot go to work and hence don’t need the bus.

Mr. President: Good thinking my man! We probably need to decentralise the whole thing like Auntie Mitzy did on Praslin. But we have to try and protect the girlies by giving them some Cuores and Picantos! They refuse to ride the bus, but at least they are fresh and smell like roses when they arrive… I like these young women that smell soooo good JP.

JenPa: Ok Sir, enough of this wheels business. We have to watch the budget. Liz was the last one to get a jeep. In fact, we need to start raising some money from now on. We should go along with the Irish recommendation of selling all the AK 47s and remove them from civil policing.  

Mr. President: Good idea! We should do a “Malo” arms deal and get some precious forex. Or better still, we can do barter with the Somali pirates and give them the arms as a ransom in exchange for the hostages. Yeah, let’s get Glenny in on this. He can wrap it up in cases of ‘fouke sale’, birds’ eggs and ‘torti sale’ like he did in ‘94!

JenPa: That should do the trick Sir! If it is well concealed like that even Tonton Albert will never notice. By the way, there has been an outpouring of compliments on my new appointment as SOS. A lot of this has been via ‘Facebook’. I can vouch that I am the most popular guy on this social networking site. It is a great gauge for my future presidential bid, judging from the tough time you had at Cascade – and more to come!

Mr. President: Hey not so fast! What is this book that you are writing? I have seen a lot of faces during my five year tenure and perhaps you should also include me – with the Pope, with the Japanese Emperor, Sarkozy! Hey, I am popular as well!

JenPa: Indeed Sir. Especially with the girls as the social agenda is getting more and more delicate to handle. We had to placate the one on Praslin who got a toaster from you as a gift with a trip to Singapore (paid via the Jj Spirit Foundation) as she was complaining badly. We will maintain the trips overseas – despite the criticism – so that you can continue to explore the more exotic varieties.

Mr. President: Good work JP! With the new car hire I have given to Natti and the nice Raffles Hotel contract coming up, she’ll be kept busy and stay quiet for a while. This is the best repositioning. Give them what they want and we have peace of mind on that front. Liz is on the State House team so we can monitor closely. Doreen is a docile secretary who knows all my whims…

JenPa: Enough of the name dropping Sir! And from now on, I will create a buffer zone so that the fresh ones do not become cling-ons! In this economic downturn, they all want to get a piece of you and we did not foresee such casualties.

Mr. President: Very well. I need to meet up with the journalist to work on this special edition of my 5 years as President. I am already thinking about the answers for the ten questions for your State House newsletter. Man, the number 10 seems to be heavy on me. I feel like Moses carrying those tablets of the 10 commandments, even if I don’t believe in God! And we have not even gone past ten districts yet… OK, plug in Praslin for next week as I am popular there!

JenPa makes way for the team of Irish advisers who have called in to brief the President on the progress on the war on drugs and other security details. There has been a lot of mumblings as a result of the latest round of firing of key members in the force. Could it be that they have finally caught one of the Escobars?? JAM (the Irish wolfhound) stands to attention, sniffs the air and licks his master’s hand as he snatches a cookie… setting the tone for this high level security debrief. Ah, the Irish have settled in Seychelles, the President mumbles to himself… They are now sub-servient to us….much better than the Brits we kicked out many decades ago…