The Commonwealth countries from Africa

· Botswana, Cameroon, The Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Zimbabwe

· In the 1960s and 1970s, many other countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean and the Pacific became independent. Some had fought wars for their freedom. Yet almost all joined the Commonwealth.

· history: After a brief Dutch settlement, French immigrants who came in 1715 named the island Île de France and established the first road and harbor infrastructure, as well as the sugar industry, under the leadership of Gov. Mahe de Labourdonnais. Blacks from Africa and Madagascar came as slaves to work in the sugarcane fields. In 1810, the British captured the island and in 1814, by the Treaty of Paris, it was ceded to Great Britain along with its dependencies. Indian immigration, which followed the abolition of slavery in 1835, rapidly changed the fabric of Mauritian society, and the country flourished with the increased cultivation of sugarcane. The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 heralded the decline of Mauritius as a port of call for ships rounding the southern tip of Africa, bound for South and East Asia. The economic instability of the price of sugar, the main crop, in the first half of the 20th century brought civil unrest, then economic, administrative, and political reforms. Mauritius became independent on March 12, 1968 [republic within the Commonwealth on 12 March 1992.].

· geography: Mauritius is a mountainous island in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar.

· capital: Port Louis

· population: Mauritius is a secular country and freedom of religion is a constitutional right. Statistics on ethnicity are not available because such questions were removed from the population census. The people of Indian descent (Indo-Mauritian) follow mostly Hinduism and Islam. The Franco-Mauritians, Creoles and Sino-Mauritian's follow Christianity. A minority of Sino-Mauritians also follow Buddhism and other Chinese-related religions.

· language: The Mauritian constitution makes no mention of an official language. It is only in the Parliament that the official language is English; any member of the National Assembly can also address the chair in French

· places of interest: Jardin Botanique de Pamplemousses, Coloured Earths of Chamarel [coloured sands, big turtles – can touch !], The Bird Garden of Casela [home to over 140 species of bird], Ile aux Cerfs [several water sports activities], Le Val Nature Park [ponds where fish and shrimp are raised.

· Flowers are grown in greenhouses. The park is populated by monkeys, deer, and giant tortoises.]

· politics: Politics of Mauritius takes place in a framework of a parliamentary democracy. The separation of powers is among the three branches of the Government of Mauritius, namely the legislative, the executive and the Judiciary, is embedded in the Constitution of Mauritius. The President is the Head of State while the Prime Minister has full executive power and is the Head of Government who is assisted by a council of Ministers. Mauritius has a multi-party system

· Today Mauritius is a republic within the Commonwealth with a population of 1.2 million. Being a multi-cultural society, the Mauritian population enjoy a rich ethnic background, consisting of Hindus, Muslims, Tamils, Blacks of African and Madagascan descents, Whites of French descents, Mulattos and Chinese. The main religions are Hinduism, Christianity and Islam. However other religious denominations also flourish. This is a small country where religious festivals, rituals, customs and traditions abound in all their splendours. With such a diversity in the cultural fabric of a society, Mauritius is often described as a miniature representation of the world itself, where 'East meets West'.

Date: 2015-01-29; view: 809