ABSTRACT
René's campaign against the exiles escalated with the murder of Gérard Hoarau in London on 29 November 1985. René denied any responsibility, but the killing hangs over Seychelles’ politics to this day. The murder overshadowed even the lengthy list of other opposition deaths and disappearances. Hoarau was the founder and leader of the MPR, which was transitioning at the time of his death into a more broadly conceived organisation called the Seychelles National Movement. Hoarau as a youth had trained in Rome for five years ahead of an intention to enter the priesthood. The pre-murder bugging of Hoarau was elaborate and ambitious. Hoarau's supporters contended that the Withers organisation had bribed at least two former British Telecom engineers or technicians to install listening devices, including at a telephone junction box near to Hoarau's home. Immediately prior to the killing of Hoarau, arrangements changed around his surveillance.
