La Plaine St Andre : A piece of Seychelles Cultural Heritage askew ?

Lest we forget:
The object of what was presented in the “Nation” of 09.02.2010 as part of our national heritage should not only be the buildings and vestiges of what was once the property of Grand Blanc Jean-François Marie Jorre de Saint Jorre.
It must also be a recall of what we now know to have been the sufferings and indignities visited upon the flesh and souls of those who were deemed simpler and humbler, torn from their ancestral lands and forced to serve the needs of their Grand Blanc master in the person of Mr Jorre de St Jorre. True, there were then, others like him lording it in our land: Sauveur Thomas Audibert, Guichard, Fournier, Antoine Barthélémy Hodoul, Jean François Hodoul, (père et fils) Julien Antoine Hodoul, Antoine Maurel, Pierre Hangard, Jean Marie Le Beuze, Charles Blaise Savy, Pierre Fournier Louis d’Offay de Rieux, Andre Nageon de l’Estang, Landrous, Maximilien Morel, Pierre Gontier, and Jean Pierre Langlois, and others, bourgeois, vulnerable nobles, demobilised military or adventurers, the whole bag of them, who had all left their troubled country (from St Malo, Antibes, Morbihan, Yonne, La Ciotat and Ile de France or Ile Bourbon,) and fortunes in search of better prospects, and in the process, bestowed upon themselves the merit of being more cultured and civilised.
That the nation must preserve whatever vestige that has survived through the ages as an enduring silent testimony of the past, is a good thing. However, in order for us not to be a modern and accommodating accomplice in perpetuating the ignominy of our humbler ancestors being cast aside, unworthy of homage and remembrance, we must guard against modern economic projects that divert focus to only the visible signs that allow immediate recall of the prestige and vibrant fortunes and glory of a certain era, the stuff that commercial promoters – and perhaps influence from the circle of contemporary descendants of the Grand Blanc – would be more comfortable with as an income generating tourist trap.
We must not dismiss further into the mists of time and our collective conscience, the memories of what our enslaved forebears had to endure to shore up the prestige and glory of the Grand Blanc. Should we but dig into the foundations of the La Plaine St Andre Estate, we would perhaps discover that these lay upon the silent bones of those whom history never bothered to give a name: The Mingas, Bristols, Moumous, Lajoies, Octobres, Samedis, Kissombees, Acikciris, Poonelewas, Amices, Lesperances, and so many others whose memories need to be stirred from our national archives where they lie silent and dusty.

Ironical it is indeed, that in the name of Cultural Heritage, we have since the 1980s been focussing so much national attention to restoring the glory of an edifice that reeks of Grand Blanc arrogance and oppression, the same stuff that some prominent local politician with a gift of the gab used to bludgeon us with as the embodiment of evil and the supreme obstacle along the path to national freedom.
The modern Savys now have beyond life-time lease of Ste Anne, the same land that in early 19th century, their Grand Blanc ancestor Charles Dorothé Savy worked his 100 or so slaves before the abolition of slavery.
The Hodouls have their La Ciotat. The Nageon de l’Estang, d’Offay de Rieux, Gonthier, Maurel, etc, all have had their fair share of prominence in the contemporary social, economic and political life of the nation. Will La Plaine St Andre be yet another reminder that history can afford to frolic only around the memories and vestiges of the rich, powerful and influential?