The man who started it all: Sitiveni Rabuka (photo:Coup 4.5)

The 26^th anniversary of the first 1987 Coup has revived some traumatic memories for many of us who lived through it – the shock, the air of menace, the violence, the feeling that Fiji would never be the same again. Tens of thousands of our best and smartest people simply decided there and then that there was no future for themselves and their families and packed up and left. The exodus was so dramatic that it soon altered the entire racial balance in Fiji. The Indo-Fijians – or Indians as they were then called – were once in the majority. But so many of them fled to New Zealand, Australia, Canada and the US that the “Fijians” – as the i’Taukei were then known – gained the ascendancy and remain the dominant racial grouping.  

You really have to be in your mid thirties, at least, to recall the events of that life-changing day, which means that to the overwhelming majority of contemporary Fijians, May 14^th 1987, is a date in the history books, not something they experienced. Yet more than ever, it’s important for every Fijian to appreciate the magnitude of the schism that ripped apart the social and political fabric of the nation. Racial supremacy in favour of the i’Taukei was imposed at the point of a gun even though they had no cause whatsoever – as the dominant landowners – to feel in the least bit threatened by the other communities. It produced a crude form of minority rule in Fiji in which the members of other races became second-class citizens. And worse, it led to hideous excesses, as far too many i’Taukei turned on their fellow citizens, snubbing them, beating them and robbing them in a disgraceful display of greed and stupidity. That sense of arrogant superiority – of surly self-entitlement – lingered on and was again a feature of the second coup in 1987, triggered the events of 2000 – the disastrous Speight coup – and persisted through the Qarase years until 2006, when one indigenous leader in the form of Voreqe Bainimarama declared that enough was enough.

It’s no exaggeration to say that the events of May 14^th 1987 triggered the most disastrous era in Fijian history – three decades of instability that deprived the country of three decades of progress. Grubsheet, for one, is continually bemused by the way in which the man ostensibly responsible – Sitiveni Rabuka – is lionised simply because he was eventually able to gain a degree of respectability by morphing into an elected leader. Rabuka is continually being invited to international conferences – most recently in Australia and before that New Zealand – as a kind of eminence grise or eminent person to comment on political events in Fiji. Indeed, he’s again taking centre stage on Wednesday night at a panel discussion at the University of the South Pacific on the processes leading up to next year’s election. Now, Rabuka is a pleasant enough character to meet, still retains a semblance of the good looks and bearing that made him a 1980s heart-throb and carries a definite aura of celebrity as a living, breathing relic of one of the most tumultuous periods of our history. Yet is Grubsheet alone in being astonished that those who scream the most loudly for an immediate return to democracy nowadays seem to be the first to scramble to share a platform with him? Surely this is the man who started it all, who triggered the earthquake, who carries more blame than anyone else for Fiji’s lost decades? Yes, he’s begun to say a tentative “sorry”, to tell the world that it was a mistake. Yet there’s a decided absence of overt shame on Rabuka’s part that so many lives were destroyed, so many families uprooted, so many opportunities lost. There was a particular element of cruelty in the choice of the date of the coup – the anniversary of the arrival of the Girmit, the first Indian indentured labourers brought to Fiji by the British. For many Indo-Fijians, the events of May 14^th have left an indelible scar.

Grubsheet met Sitiveni Rabuka for the first time during the events of 1987 when we covered the coup for Australia’s Nine Network. He was the picture of civility yet it all belied the menace he’d displayed to get his own way. Fiji’s current ambassador to the United Nations, Peter Thomson, was then Permanent Secretary for Information. He tells of how Rabuka came into his office wielding a pistol and forced Thomson to write the public announcement of the coup. In those days, there was no television, only Radio Fiji. And the words that Rabuka uttered in his radio broadcast are etched in Grubsheet’s memory to this day: “At 10 o’clock this morning, troops of the Royal Fiji Military Forces took over the Government of Fiji and neutralised parliament…” He’d also taken the Bavadra Government hostage and, in doing so, changed the course of Fijian history forever.

In my own mind’s eye, there are so many memories of the following days, all of them extremely confronting for someone who’d grown up in Fiji believing in the multiracial ideal. I was at Channel Nine in Sydney working when the coup was announced and immediately went on Ray Martin’s talk show to provide some of the background before racing to the airport via my flat to pack a small suitcase and pick up my Fiji passport. The plan was for me to go into Suva without a film crew and avoid the hotels just in case the overseas media couldn’t get in or happened to be thrown out. I stayed with a friend – a prominent lawyer – who remains a friend to this day, not least because he came to my aid when I wasn’t as smart as I thought I was and got arrested anyway when I was stupid enough to be caught in a taxi with a couple of other journalists.

I was taken by armed troops to the Central Police Station, where my Fiji passport became an immediate problem. “Who are you? What are you doing with this? Where are you staying?” It occurred to me that my interrogators thought I was a foreign spy. But what really agitated them were some stamps in my passport in Arabic. It was at the time of the big 1980s Libyan scare in the Pacific that arose from Colonel Gaddafi’s flirtation with Vanuatu. “You been in Libya? Are you working for Libya?” “No I was born in Fiji and I work for Channel Nine”. To his eternal credit, my Indo-Fijian lawyer host suddenly arrived at Police HQ and eventually secured my release. So my own detention of several hours was far less traumatic than those of others, who in some cases were held for days and severely beaten. Never before or since has been tagged as a Methodist luve ni talatala (child of a clergyman ) come in quite so handy in Fiji. Yet never before had I been so ashamed of the actions of the Methodist Church. The coup was not only supported by some of the Church hierarchy, it was accompanied by Sunday bans – instigated at the urging of certain Methodist talatalas – that saw Christians and those of other faiths harassed at road blocks and even driven from beaches at gunpoint for “breaching the Sabbath”.

All around Suva were stories of the less fortunate – those either targeted because of their political activities, especially in the case of Bavadra Government staffers, or merely because of the colour of their skin. To me, this was the most heartbreaking aspect of all; when “The Way the World Should be” – as the visiting Pope John Paul had described Fiji just months before – became a racist hellhole. I can still feel the anger to this day – the utter disgust of watching helplessly while well-dressed Indo-Fijian passersby were beaten by a rampaging i’Taukei mob in the car park of the Holiday Inn, then the Suva Travelodge. Those pictures are still the most obscene ever recorded in Fiji. But they were only the most visible manifestation of the widespread violence that was visited on Indo-Fijians in a series of sporadic attacks – some organised, some random and opportunistic.

To their eternal shame, the RFMF and Police often turned a blind eye even to events that unfolded virtually in front of them. Marauding youths threatened to cook coup dissenters like Richard Naidu – the lawyer and then Press Secretary to the deposed Prime Minister – in a lovo they’d dug in front of Ratu Sukuna’s statue at Government Buildings. It was a time of terror and of hatred. Even if you escaped a beating or a home invasion, you could still be elbowed off the footpath into the street, as an i’Taukei thug did to me And it was repeated all over again later in the year in Coup 2 – as it became known – and on an even bigger and more sinister scale in the Speight coup of 2000.

Only now – more than a quarter of a century later – has the cycle been broken. And, ironically, it’s thanks to a revolution – also at the point of a gun – in which racial equality and genuine democracy is being imposed and a new order created. The Bainimarama Revolution is easily the most important point in Fiji’s history since 1987, with its promise of finally breaking the nation’s coup culture by dissolving race as the defining factor in national life. Yes, many people still think Voreqe Bainimarama is on a quixotic mission that cannot possibly succeed. One of his principal political opponents, Ro Teimumu Kepa, has said that race is a fact of life in Fiji and warned last year of the prospect of “racial calamity”. Yet by even attempting to forge a common national identity by declaring everyone “Fijian”, Commodore Bainimarama has established himself – in Grubsheet’s view – as the boldest and bravest of our leaders since independence.  If he fails, the overwhelming odds are that Fiji will regress and the notion of forging a successful multiracial nation will be lost. But if he succeeds, nothing can stop Fiji from cementing its place as the pre-eminent Pacific nation and reaching greater heights.  

How did we come to this view of Bainimarama as social revolutionary rather than self-interested coup maker, a depiction that invariably has Bainimarama’s critics seething? Because someone had to break the never-ending destructive cycle of racial politics in Fiji and he alone has had the foresight and fortitude to do so. Bainimarama may not be the first Fijian leader to try to break through the communal barrier. Timoci Bavadra tried to do so in 1987 but lasted only a month. But there’s no doubt that every other political leader – from Ratu Mara through to Laisenia Qarase – owed their fortunes and allegiances to one racial grouping, however successful they might have been at forging occasional multiracial coalitions. What singles Bainimarama out from the pack is that he will go to the nation next year asking every Fijian to support his quest for a new Fiji, a non-racial Fiji in which all Fijians – irrespective of race and religion – will be invited to share his vision. 

I sat around a couple of days ago over coffee reminiscing about the bad old days with a couple of friends, including the lawyer who rescued me from military/police custody 26 years ago this week. We don’t agree on everything but there’s one thing we did agree on; that life in the new Fiji is so much better for everyone than the old. The fear and trepidation has gone, replaced by optimism and hope.

The porkies politicians tell (Photo:Disney)

The Government’s cyber critics have been blindsided by the announcement that all three former major political parties – Labour, the National Federation Party and SODELPA, the former SDL – have been cleared to contest the 2014 election. The declaration by the Registrar of Elections, Mohammed Saneem, that all three entities had cleared the hurdle came last Thursday. Yet as of the time of writing, the main anti-government website, Coup 4.5, still can’t bring itself to fully report the news, confining itself to a posting that the NFP alone has been given the nod to compete, with a one line addition about the other two, much more important registrations. Yes, almost a week later and any Coup 4.5 reader is none the wiser about undoubtedly one of the most important developments of the year.

It confirms once and for all – quite aside from its routine censorship of readers’ comments – that when this miserable cyber rag doesn’t like a particular story, it simply buries it. For the credibility of the increasingly hysterical Coup 4.5, this is yet another nail in the coffin. It continually portrays itself as a crusader for democracy while railing against the alleged propaganda of anyone who writes positively about Fijian Government policy, Grubsheet included. Yet when the chips are down, it willfully ignores the fact that genuine democracy is precisely what is taking shape in Fiji – the Bainimarama Government’s opponents free to contest what the Prime Minister has described as the “battle of ideas” that will determine the result of next year’s election.

All this is what a colourful British politician named Alan Clark once famously called being “economical with the actualite”. The late junior minister in Margaret Thatcher’s government was caught out giving a less than full and frank account about a British arms deal with Iraq. Rather than admit to being a liar – which he patently was – he merely conceded not exactly telling the whole truth, of being economical about the details of what actually happened. Regrettably, this is a failing that is chronically common not just to Coup 4.5 but someone in Fijian public life who should know better – Mahendra Chaudhry, the Labour Party leader and former Prime Minister deposed in the 2000 coup.

Most people in Fiji are familiar with Chaudhry’s history, someone who supported Voreqe Bainimarama’s takeover in 2006, accepted the job of finance minister in his administration, then fell out spectacularly with the PM and did an about-face. He turned from very public supporter to implacable critic and has waged war on the Bainimarama Government ever since. Most people will also be aware that Mahendra Chaudhry is also on trial for alleged foreign currency offences related to substantial sums lodged in Australian bank accounts. He has also fought a prolonged series of skirmishes to retain control of the Labour Party, of which he was once undisputed leader. The most public of these has been with the prominent trade union official, Felix Anthony, who stormed out of Labour accusing Chaudhry of continually employing undemocratic means to get his own way. The relationship between the two remains poisonous and Anthony is widely expected to form a breakaway party with others to oppose Labour in next year’s election.

For all the political mayhem within Labour ranks and signs that Chaudhry is losing his grip, history tells us that he is arguably the wiliest of the country’s political operators. He is a master of backroom politics and especially the tactic of divide and rule that has kept him at the top of the union movement and then mainstream politics for much of the past quarter century. However great the falling outs between Chaudhry and the Bainimarama Government and Chaudhry and his former colleagues, he is not to be underestimated. He’s especially adept at manipulating opinion in the sugar cane belt of the West, convincing ordinary Indo-Fijian farmers of their tenuous grasp on their leases and their tenuous livelihoods in an industry that has been buffeted by huge winds of change. Whether or not the outcome of his current court proceedings eventually allows him to stand in next year’s election, the fact remains that he poses a formidable force at the ballot box. All of which makes him someone to take very seriously. Regrettably, there are clear signs that our first Indo-Fijian Prime Minister has taken a leaf out of Alan Clark’s book and become a master of being “economical with the actualite”.

Grubsheet was startled to hear an interview Chaudhry gave to Radio Australia last week – after Labour had been registered to contest the elections – in which he peddled two blatant falsehoods. First, he claimed that the Fiji media continued to be saddled with restrictions that prevented any party that opposed the Bainimarama Government from getting proper coverage. This is simply untrue. There are no restrictions on media coverage of Chaudhry’s comments or, indeed, the comments of any other political leader. On the contrary, Grubsheet has been repeatedly informed by individual journalists in Fiji that Chaudhry refuses to talk to them nor to anyone else from the outlets that employ them. It’s a clear case of hollering that one has been gagged by the media while refusing to answer the knock at the door or pick up the phone and speak. Now, that tactic might wear with an ignorant Australian audience and a broadcaster – in the ABC – that is ever willing to give events in Fiji a negative slant. But to a domestic audience, it simply won’t wash.

In the same interview, Chaudhry claimed that restrictions continued to be placed on political gatherings of parties opposed to the Bainimarama Government. This too is untrue. Labour, or anyone else for that matter, is entitled to meet whenever they choose to do so. Previous curbs on political meetings have been lifted. Indeed a brace of opposition political figures – including Mahendra Chaudhry, Laisenia Qarase, the deposed SDL Prime Minister, and Ro Teimumu Kepa, the new President of SODELPA, the former SDL – attended precisely such a gathering in Cuvu, Nadroga late last month. Were they stopped from doing so? Not at all. They may have attracted no more than 40 people when they had reportedly catered for 600 and had spread the word that those attending would be fed. They may have been scorned by the Prime Minister, who said it was “funny” to see those who had “brought Fiji to its knees sitting on the same mat and smiling at each other”. But there was nothing to prevent them from doing so, nor to stop ordinary people from joining them if they chose to do so. The truth is that the meeting was not only allowed to go ahead, it went ahead and received widespread national media coverage. So why on earth did Mahendra Chaudhry tell Radio Australia what he did? 

Then came yet another case of the former PM being economical with the actualite in an interview he gave last Sunday to Radio New Zealand International. In it, he condemned as “cruel and grossly insensitive”, the Government’s decision to cut off most of the 19,000 recipients of its Family Assistance Program. Chaudhry said the decision would, in effect, sentence these people to extreme hardship and indignity and add to crime, child prostitution, human trafficking, domestic violence, child abuse and suicide. The average RNZI listener throughout the Pacific would have been appalled. What a terrible place Fiji has become, they would have imagined. There was only one problem. The story was a concoction. Chaudhry had again been economical with the actualite. The truth is that more people, not fewer people, are set to benefit from a major reform of the social welfare system currently being implemented by Government. What happened is that a government spokesman said the 19,000 people were currently being re-evaluated to make sure that the most needy Fijians would receive assistance. He said this would lead to a portion of these people being taken off the Program because they were deemed to be in less need than others who previously received no assistance. Chaudhry twisted that statement into his extraordinary claim that most of the 19,000 FAP recipients were being cut off. The truth again, is that the program is being strengthen – in consultation with the World Bank – to provide an even greater safety net for Fijians. Whereas only three per cent of Fiji’s poor received some form of assistance under the old system, the new system will assist 10 per cent. Those are the facts and Chaudhry chose to ignore them.

What’s the common thread here? That Chaudhry goes to the foreign media to peddle this misinformation, knowing that they are more gullible, less likely to know the precise facts and also likely to give his statements prominence. The local media in Fiji, of course, knows better – that this is blatant politicking (which is fine) but that some of these claims have only a passing acquaintance with the truth (which is not fine at all). As one journalist put it to Grubsheet: “Why should we report what these guys are saying when we know it to be false?”  The answer is “you shouldn’t.” As the Fijian opposition evidently sees it, the local media is there to report their utterances without question. No. They are there to report without fear or favour but are under no compunction to report comments that are either untrue or are not newsworthy judged by conventional media standards. In other words, tell us something new or something that our readers, viewers and listeners need to know. But don’t treat us like idiots and especially the people we are meant to serve – ordinary Fijians who will be making a decision next year on which political party is best suited to govern.

Mahendra Chaudhry surely has a duty to the Fijian people not to be economical with the truth, something that, of course, applies to every candidate in 2014. His recent behavior also highlights the need for ordinary Fijians to be more aware than usual of false prophets in the election countdown. Australians talk about the need to have a “good bullsh*t detector” when it comes to dealing with their own politicians and the same applies in Fiji. More than a quarter of a century of  bullsh*t – of the old racial politics and the rhetoric of class warfare – means that many ordinary Fijians can detect it when they see it. And in the past week, they’ve been clearly able to detect it emanating from Mahendra Chaudhry.

 Ho hum. This is the illustration that goes with the latest attack on Grubsheet by “Mad Marc” Edge, the Canadian academic who left the University of the South Pacific in disgrace after formal complaints about his bizarre behaviour from a string of his students and fellow academics. Equally bizarrely, Edge blames Grubsheet for his termination and devotes an entire blog to attacking us and the other targets of his ire – Crosbie Walsh, the New Zealand academic and blogger, and Professor David Robie of the Auckland University of Technology. In the tortured mind of this sad figure, all three of us are guilty of having deprived Pacific journalism of his brilliance. Whereas the truth is that all three of us – quite independently – came to the conclusion long before the USP itself that Edge was delusional and a total menace – a strange melange of Walter Mitty and Forrest Gump. Nothing wrong with that, of course, except that he turned malevolent and began to trash the furniture at USP – sowing dissent, belittling his fellow academics and even threatening some of his students on Facebook.

Everyone eventually decided enough was enough and Edge was forced to resign or be sacked. The official term was “relieved” of his post, though it also describes the collective sigh that accompanied Edge’s sudden late-night departure from these isles. He now resides at 23,000 Dyke Road, Richmond, British Columbia (what a long street it must be), spewing venom and without a dollop of the self awareness necessary to grasp that he alone was the architect of his demise. The good news is that peace broke out at USP the minute Mad Marc left. The bad news is that he refuses to go gracefully. We know his address because he’s posted his entire “Curriculum Vita” on the Internet. It’s preceded – on a Google search – by such headings as “The lies of Marc Edge” -an excoriating piece penned by Professor Robie – all of which makes the following extract from Edge’s latest offering laughable in the extreme: ” Journalism, it has been long said, is merely the first draft of history. Often the truth only comes out in the fullness of time, to be told by historians such as myself.”

See what we mean by delusional? This is a man branded as a liar by the only Professor of Journalism in New Zealand and the South Pacific. Mad Marc’s CV ends at USP so he is evidently yet to secure another academic position. But with David Robie’s reference, it’s hardly likely that the global academic community is making a Gadarene rush on 23,000 Dyke Road. Ho hum again.

Preparing for democratic battle: (Photo: Graham Davis)

The Prime Minister, Voreqe Bainimarama, has spoken of waging a “battle of ideas” to win next year’s election in Fiji after all three major established parties – Labour, the National Federation Party, and SODELPA, the former SDL – were cleared to register as political entities to contest the poll. Commodore Bainimarama restated his intention to form his own party to seek a democratic mandate to continue as Prime Minister. In comments that clearly indicate that his campaign for the September 2014 poll has already begun, the PM appeared to welcome the formal registration of his opponents, saying that it was up to the Fijian people to choose who was best capable of taking Fiji forward. He said that he intended to run on his Government’s record of creating a level playing field for all Fijians and of providing ordinary people with essential services that previous Governments had neglected.

Speaking to the Auckland Indo-Fijian radio station, Radio Tarana, Commodore Bainimarama was scathing about his opponents, saying they had “brought Fiji to its knees” with their racial policies and “wanted to mess the country up again”. Here’s an audio link to the full interview, recorded on Friday morning May 3rd.

An outstanding success: Voreqe Bainimarama arrives in Port Moresby (Photo:ABC)

There’s elation in Fijian Government circles over the highly successful outcome of this week’s visit to Papua New Guinea by the Prime Minister, Voreqe Bainimarama, at the head of the biggest Fijian trade and investment mission ever to visit another country. The original aims of the visit were ambitious enough – to lay more of the foundation for the creation of a single, integrated market for the countries of the Melanesian Spearhead Group. Yet the results exceeded even the most ambitious expectations of the PM, his Foreign Minister, Ratu Inoke Kubuabola, and the trade delegation of 65 Fijian business leaders from 47 companies.

Commodore Bainimarama described himself as being “on a high”. And the normally ultra-calm and measured Permanent Secretary for Trade and Industry, Shaheen Ali, said he was “overwhelmed” by the “marvelous” outcome of the visit. Within hours, some of the Fijian companies were already receiving orders and entering into agreements with PNG suppliers and distributors. And by day two of the mission, two more Fijian businesses had registered as foreign investors in PNG. This is in addition to the F$180-million investment by Fiji’s national superannuation fund, the FNPF, in Bemobile – a major telecommunications provider in PNG and Solomon Islands – and the management takeover of its operations by Vodafone Fiji.

The Fijian Government sees itself as equal partners with PNG in ultimately leading the other MSG countries into an economic union to improve the lives of every Melanesian. There’s a notable absence of rivalry of the sort we’ve witnessed over the years in Europe, where Germany, France and Britain have consistently maneuvered for advantage in the European Union. As Fiji sees it, Papua New Guinea has the biggest market – seven million people compared to around 900,000 here – plus the massive wealth that flows from its minerals and energy sectors. And Fiji has an established manufacturing base, a skilled and educated workforce and is positioned at the crossroads of the Pacific. In other words, their assets are complimentary. Each country has its particular challenges – Papua New Guinea with corruption and lawlessness and Fiji still grappling with finally putting to rest the divisions that have hampered its development since Independence. Yet there’s a strong feeling on both sides that working in tandem in a joint leadership role is the best way to improve the lives of their own citizens and their Melanesian brothers and sisters in the smaller MSG states.

There’s no doubt that Melanesian solidarity generally was a big beneficiary of this visit. As Commodore Bainimarama put it, PNG -Fiji ties go way beyond the mutual respect and cooperation that is the traditional benchmark of diplomacy. The peoples of both countries genuinely like each other, enjoy each other’s company and share a vision of a stronger Melanesia building a common economic and political future for all its citizens. And of course, both Governments bear significant grudges against the most dominant power in the region, Australia, which they regard as generally arrogant, overbearing and indifferent to Melanesian sensibilities. The same applies to New Zealand, albeit to a lesser extent.

As Grubsheet has written before, Australia’s mishandling of its Pacific neighbours – and especially Fiji – is a mistake of historical proportions. Its failure to fully engage with them, let alone comprehend their challenges, and its propensity to prescribe and even hector, has driven influential Pacific countries like Fiji and PNG further into each other’s arms and the arms of others outside the region. The Australian trade union heavies and their stooge of a Prime Minister who currently determine Pacific policy – and the foreign affairs establishment which implements it – seem to have little concept of Melanesian sensitivities and protocols. It’s well known in Suva than even the mention of Australia can trigger a surge of anger in Prime Minister Bainimarama, who feels sorely aggrieved that Canberra chose not to even  sit down with him, let alone try and comprehend his reforms. During this visit, the PM kept his counsel, adhering to the diplomatic convention of not criticising another country on someone else’s soil. In fact, it was the Papua New Guineans who made unflattering public comments about Australia. PNG’s Trade Minister, Richard Maru, accused Canberra of using his country as a “dumping ground” for its goods and said it wasn’t in Australia’s interests for the Melanesian countries to become self sufficient in anything. If that was what was being said publicly, then we can be sure that the language behind the scenes would have been a lot more colourful. The shared grievances of both governments about Australia would have been fully aired.

Certainly, there was general astonishment about the way in which this visit appeared to have been downplayed by Australia’s national broadcaster, the ABC, which also has a significant presence in PNG. Aside from one story that correctly cited a series of “historic” agreements, the rest of the visit was generally ignored. Indeed on the first day, Radio Australia’s current affairs program, Pacific Beat, chose to lead with an item criticising Fiji’s constitutional process rather than give weight to the region’s two biggest and most influential island countries forging closer ties. It merely reinforced the notion in Fijian minds of the ABC’s chronic bias against the Bainimarama Government and Radio Australia as a lapdog of Canberra’s foreign policy. By any normal journalistic standard, this was a big Pacific story of significant interest to the populations of PNG and Fiji and, to a lesser extent, those of Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and the Kanaks of New Caledonia, who make up the rest of the MSG. It was buried.

Is Australia sensitive about the fact that its so-called smart sanctions against Fiji haven’t turned out to be smart at all? You bet. American diplomats report that far from modifying their policies in the face of defeat, the Australians have stepped up their efforts internationally to isolate Fiji. Was Commodore Bainimarama’s visit a collective two-finger salute to Australia? Well, maybe just a little. Yet the overriding sentiment in official circles in Suva nowadays is that Australian attitudes are irrelevant. In any event, Blind Freddy can see that Julia Gillard’s Government is toast -with a 29 per cent primary vote in the most recent opinion poll – and that Australian policy towards Fiji is bound to be more realistic, if not more favourable, when the Coalition’s Tony Abbott storms into power in the Australian election in September. A full year out from the promised Fijian poll, Abbott and his likely foreign minister, Julie Bishop, will have ample time to end Labor’s vendetta and rebuild the relationship.

There were many highpoints of this visit, not least the Bemobile signing -Fiji’s biggest foreign investment on behalf of all Fijians through the FNPF in one of the most dynamic sectors of the global economy- telecommunications. The Government’s critics continually harp on about the FNPF putting the retirement savings of ordinary Fijians at risk. Yet with Vodafone Fiji running Bemobile, the potential to grow that investment seems rock solid. In Fiji, there are more mobile phones than people – a penetration rate of 105 per cent. In Papua New Guinea, the penetration rate is 35 per cent. That’s a lot of potential customers and a lot of mobile phones.

Among other highlights of the visit:
·      The announcement that citizens of both countries will no longer require visas to visit each other. This is on top of existing plans to achieve a seamless flow of labour between the MSG countries.
·      The provision for retired Fijian civil servants – who are obliged to vacate their jobs at 55 – to work in Papua New Guinea to boost the local skills base.
·      The plan for a permanent Fiji Trade Mission in Port Moresby and the continuation of the joint effort to break down the remaining impediments to trade and investment, with a view to developing a common market.

Most important of all – at least in the shorter term – is the financial support Papua New Guinea has offered Fiji to conduct its election in September 2014 and introduce the first genuine parliamentary democracy in the country’s history of one-person, one vote, one value. According to officials travelling with Commodore Bainimarama, the PM couldn’t believe his ears when the amount of the PNG contribution was announced out of the blue by his opposite number, Peter O’Neill. “What did he say?”, he asked. At first, the Ministry of Information flashed a media release that the amount was 15-million Kina. But it soon became clear that the fifteen was actually FIFTY. A sense of astonishment, delight and gratitude swept the Fijian delegation and text messages lit up in the corridors of power in Suva. More than 40-million Fijian dollars!  By any standards and especially in the Pacific, it is an astonishingly generous amount.

This contribution has sealed the Fiji-PNG relationship and laid to rest the concerns of some that PNG was more intent on cementing its own interests during this visit than pursuing a genuinely equal partnership. It means that Fiji no longer requires other outside assistance to finance the poll, and especially from those countries or groups of countries like the European Union, which appear more interested in using the money as political leverage than in assisting Fijians to determine their own future. Instead of having election observers from the EU – as happened controversially in 2006 – the Prime Minister wants election observers from PNG and the other MSG countries. He accused the EU observers of endorsing a “flawed” election in 2006 and said Fiji wanted an observer group with “integrity”. This will not be music to the ears of Fiji’s voluble EU Ambassador, Andrew Jacobs, who before the PNG announcement, was telling people that Fiji would need to  approach the EU for assistance and accept certain conditions that are now decidedly moot.

With Commodore Bainimarama having now travelled across the world to New York to chair a meeting of the G77 Plus China and the rest of the Fijian delegation making its way home, it’s clear that this visit has been an outstanding success. History may also judge it as the week that Fiji and PNG cemented their common future and came to realise more fully the potential they have – working together – to establish the MSG as the pre-eminent regional grouping and its integration as the best way to improve the lives of all Melanesians. One thing is certain. The axis of power in the Pacific is gradually shifting, whether Australia, NZ and their Polynesian client states such as Samoa like it or not.

This article has subsequently appeared on Pacific Scoop NZ.

A “traversty” alright

There are increasing signs of desperation among the anti-government forces in Fiji as the country moves closer to the introduction of a brand of democracy that they are desperately trying to prevent – a non-racial model of one person, one vote, one value. That sense of desperation has reached fever pitch with the publication of the new Draft Constitution – that specifically stipulates an election in Fiji before the end of September 2014 – and the declaration by Voreqe Bainimarama that he intends to contest the poll. With precious little in the Draft to criticise, the old order in Fiji is in a state of collective meltdown and actively seeking out small targets to kick. How else to explain the accompanying cyber pamphlet currently being circulated on several anti-government blogs that specifically attacks Grubsheet and our connection with the American company, Qorvis Communications?

Qorvis has a contract with the Fijian Government to assist it with the communications component of its program of institutional, electoral and constitutional reform in the lead-up to 2014. Qorvis approached Grubsheet in September 2012 and asked – given our links with Fiji and long-expressed support for the Bainimarama Government’s reform agenda – whether we would be interested in a part-time role in Fiji promoting that agenda. Er, you mean you want to pay us a modest fee to come to Suva and do what we’ve already been doing on Grubsheet for nothing? Sure, why not?

There appears – from this pamphlet – to be a fundamental misunderstanding about Qorvis’s role in Fiji. The company has no influence on policy. Our advice is not given or sought. In the main, we write speeches and news releases at the direction of the leadership team and assist the Ministry of Information in its public information efforts. It is “nuts and bolts” communications work of the kind that any government or company performs as a matter of routine. There is certainly nothing sinister about it, as the accompanying leaflet implies. Grubsheet does not take “the lead role” in Fiji, as this leaflet alleges. The account is run from Washington with input from several members of a Qorvis offshoot – GeoPolitical Solutions – that assists several sovereign clients. Grubsheet is not even on the Qorvis staff so the notion of us taking “a lead role” is fanciful in the extreme. We are just not that important. Our main value to Qorvis is our local knowledge as a Fijian citizen.

The evidence shows that we have not “airbrushed human rights abuses”. Indeed, any instances have been strongly condemned in these columns, though that is not a Qorvis matter either. One of the conditions of accepting our role in Fiji was that Grubsheet, the blog, would continue and that there would be no instruction or direction from either Qorvis or the Fijian Government about either the choices of subjects or the views expressed. Indeed, those views have been remarkably consistent and predate not only our association with Qorvis but Voreqe Bainimarama’s 2006 takeover. We have always said there are three preconditions for our support for the Government. 1/ Its multiracial agenda and a common and equal citizenry in Fiji. 2/ Zero tolerance for corruption. 3/ An election in 2014 on the basis on one person, one vote, one value. This is hardly an agenda to “propagate and legitimise Fiji’s junta”, as this pamphlet alleges, but arguably a blueprint for the first genuine multiracial, “clean” democracy in Fiji’s history. To paraphrase the owner of the Gillette Razor company – “I wouldn’t be doing this commercial if it wasn’t”.

Despite a stream of explanations in the past, this pamphlet continues the deliberate misrepresentation of Grubsheet’s description of ourselves as an “independent journalist”. By independent, we mean that we don’t have a single employer. In other words, we freelance and have multiple income sources. This is the accepted description of any practitioner of the trade not firmly attached to one teat. Indeed, a simple search on LinkedIn – the professional cyber network – will uncover thousands of similar individuals in Grubsheet’s position. It implies no claim of independence of opinion but of professional status.

As mentioned previously, one suspects that this highly personalised attack is part of a final and desperate attempt to cast aspersions on a process leading up to next year’s poll that is clearly working to the disadvantage of the Government’s critics. There is hysteria at almost every turn and not only on traditionally hysterical outlets such as Coup 4.5. The fevered cyber rantings of the likes of Victor Lal and Rajendra Chaudhry point to a fundamental collapse of confidence on the part of the critics that they will eventually prevail. They are not only losing skirmishes and whole battles but are losing the war. The reform process in Fiji is being seen to be in the country’s wider interests and not the interests of certain self-serving individuals.  And so we see – in this crude attack on Grubsheet – the cyber equivalent of kicking the cat in rage and frustration.

One of the most self serving individuals of all is the Canadian academic, Dr Marc Edge, who has belatedly embraced the mantle of anti-government campaigner to mask his forced resignation from the University of the South Pacific for misconduct. Dr Edge posted this pamphlet on his widely unread blog site a full day before it was circulated on other anti-government blogs. We actually suspect that he may have been the author, given his uncorrected use of the word “traversty”. This guy is meant to be a journalist educator, or a journalist “scholar” as he so grandly describes himself. Yet clearly spelling is not his strong suit. No, let’s call this attack on Grubsheet what it is – a genuine travesty – much like the antics of the lamentable cast of manipulators and misfits for whom the fiction of gaining the upper hand in Fiji is far better than the truth of abject failure and irrelevance.

Island of Taveuni bursts from the skies over Nadi after its flypast over the country. March 19 2013 (photo:Graham Davis)

The aircraft had made an 18,000 kilometres journey from the Airbus factory in Toulouse via Hong Kong (photo:Graham Davis)

A flock of birds envelopes the plane as it taxis off the main runway (photo:Graham Davis)

The striking new masi livery designed by local artisan Makareta Matamosi (Photo:Graham Davis)

The A330 with the old Air Pacific “rainbow” livery in the background (photo:Graham Davis)

Part of the large and patriotic crowd that greeted the aircraft’s arrival (photo:Graham Davis)

The traditional water salute greets the new arrival (photo:Graham Davis)

A day of colour and wild enthusiasm (photo:Graham Davis)

Welcomed with a blast of the davui (conch shell) (Photo:Graham Davis)

Pristine white in the morning sun and so authentically Fijian (photo:Graham Davis)

A wild tarmac greeting from hundreds of well wishers ( photo:Graham Davis)

The Fiji Police band and singers add to the patriotic fervour (photo:Graham Davis)

Island of Taveuni with an old Air Pacific 747-400 in the background. The two 747s will be retired later in the year (photo:Graham Davis)

The Fiji Airways name restored after 40 years (Photo: Graham Davis)

Overwhelming approval for the new look (Photo:Graham Davis)

Tourism Minister Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama, and Air Pacific Chairman Nalin Patel (Photo:Graham Davis)

EU, British and French diplomatic envoys. Proud to have supplied the Airbus (Photo:Graham Davis)

Aircraft stairs in place and excitement builds (Photo:Graham Davis)

The striking tail with Makareta Matamosi “Teteva” design ( Photo:Graham Davis)

The tattooed engine cowl reminiscent of a warrior’s upper arm (Photo:Graham Davis)

A day of intense national pride (Photo:Graham Davis)

Makareta Matamosi, proud creator of the new look (Photo:Graham Davis)

Inside the giant Air Pacific hanger looking out (Photo:Graham Davis)

Air Pacific CEO Dave Pflieger emerges with his delivery crew (Photo:Graham Davis)

Greeted like heroes from the waiting crowd (Photo:Graham Davis)

HE the President of the Republic of Fiji, Ratu Epeli Naitalikau, and first lady Adi Koila Nailatikau led from the aircraft by a traditional warrior (Photo:Graham Davis)

The President receives a tabua (whale’s tooth) during the traditional welcoming ceremony (photo:Graham Davis)

Design details on the engine cowling and tail (Photo:Graham Davis)

A warrior guards the aircraft door. A totally authentic design (Photo:Graham Davis)

As Fijian as a serrated policeman’s sulu (photo:Graham Davis)

Already acknowledged by the design world as a triumph (Photo:Graham Davis)

A great day to be Fijian (Photo:Graham Davis)

A better future for the North (Photo:Graham Davis)

The Fijian Government’s Look North policy in global affairs is well known – the change of axis forced on it by the uncompromising stance of its neighbours, Australia and New Zealand, in the wake of Voreqe Bainimarama’s 2006 takeover. What’s not widely appreciated is that the Government is also pursuing a Look North policy of a different kind – a domestic one. It’s engaged in a concerted effort to develop the Northern Division of the country in a broad arc from the western tip of Vanua Levu across the second biggest island to the third, Taveuni, and some of the islands in between. It’s one of the Government’s most ambitious projects but one that largely passes under the radar amid the day-to-day obsession with political events – the difficult birth of the new constitution and who will or won’t be allowed to contest next year’s election. This Look North policy could have far reaching consequences, demographic and economic. It certainly has the potential to alter the traditional dynamic of Fiji’s population flow, to arrest the urban drift to Suva and keep many Northerners happy where they are, with jobs and sustainable futures. It may even encourage more Fijians to move to the North, a prospect that undoubtedly pleases the burghers of Labasa – Vanua Levu’s biggest town.

Chinese Bauxite Mining (Photo:Graham Davis)

Scores of millions are being spent on new infrastructure projects to end the traditional isolation of the North and its provinces of Bua, Macuata and Cakaudrove.  Roads, schools, jetties, health centres, nursing stations, housing projects, Government Service Centres– all manner of initiatives are either completed, underway or planned. There’s not exactly a boom taking place or a mass migration to the North, more that a region that has always been chronically neglected is now getting some of the infrastructure it so badly needs. Suddenly, the sleepy North – where change can often be imperceptible over generations – isn’t quite so sleepy anymore.

Savusavu (Photo:Graham Davis)

Grubsheet grew up in Savusavu – the island’s other main town – in the 1950s and still finds it pretty much a facsimile of our childhood memory. In those days, there was no road to Labasa – the sugar town across the mountains  – nor any way to get to Bua except on horseback or by boat. The Hibiscus Highway to Buca Bay had only just been built and was regarded at the time as a wondrous feat. Now an excellent road links Savusavu with Labasa and turn left on that over the mountains and the road is sealed all the way to Dreketi. But after that comes one of the worst stretches Grubsheet has ever had the misfortune to traverse – the muddy, stone-strewn track from Dreketi to Nabouwalu  and the ferry terminus that links Vanua Levu to its big brother island, Viti Levu, to the south.

The PM arrives in Nabouwalu(Photo:Graham Davis)

This week, Grubsheet met the Prime Minister off the ferry at Nabouwalu and accompanied his party for a portion of his tour of the North. He sets a cracking pace on these visits, three or four major events a day punctuated by travelling time and a total of ten formal speeches this particular week. It might leave his entourage exhausted but the PM seems to relish what used to be called treks in colonial times and especially his contact with ordinary people. Politics is all about authenticity and these exchanges can’t be faked. Of course, the PM keeps saying he isn’t a politician. But when that day comes – as most believe it will – he needs no training in how to engage with the public. The encounters are overwhelmingly spontaneous and warm, the jokes flow freely, the rapport instantaneous.

PM poses with tea ladies in Nabouwalu (Photo:Graham Davis)

Those around him know that the PM can sometimes be testy, even fearsome, when he rebels against the sense of being trapped in the hothouse of government in Suva. But out here, he exhibits an air of genial informality. He thrives on his contact with ordinary people, who he says matter more to him than anything else. He seems to genuinely like them and they bring out the best in him, including a propensity for spontaneous acts of kindness.

Appalling roads (Photo: Graham Davis)

Heading out of Nabouwalu towards Dreketi, our twelve-vehicle convoy bounced over canyons rather than potholes and sloshy mud rather than stony gravel. At one stage, the Prime Minister insisted on a detour to a side road that someone had told him was even worse. Sure enough, it was, and even one of the military vehicles became bogged. Suddenly the PM noticed some of the local children returning from school along the side of the road. They were all immaculately dressed in spotless white shirts and blouses but the rain-soaked mud was up to their ankles as they gingerly picked their way through it, cheerfully waving as the PM’s motorcade passed. Something seems to be triggered in Bainimarama in situations like this – his training as a soldier to act decisively merging with a decidedly sentimental aspect to his personality.

An easy affability (Photo:Graham Davis)

As they made their way home, little did these kids know that the Prime Minister wasn’t just feeling sorry for them – as the rest of us were – but was already on the phone organising assistance. 120 pairs of gum boots are now on their way to the local school for 120 pairs of feet. “I don’t want those kids coming to class and having to sit there with dirty wet feet”,  he explains with the tone of a concerned parent. Those around him say there are dozens of such instances in Bainimarama’s working life. Some are publicised, some are not. But they all speak to a person far removed from the caricature of the brutal dictator peddled by the PM’s critics and the anti-government blogs.

Stopping to listen and then acting (Photo:Graham Davis)

By now, of course, those critics are gagging as they read these words. “Grubby” is an apologist for the dictator, an enemy of democracy, an agent for the destruction of the Fijian people. No. We’re calling it as we see it and what we see isn’t what the anti-government blogs claim. Nor, for that matter, what we’ve seen from Fijian leaders before. There’s a clear preference on the Prime Minister’s part to deliver better outcomes for ordinary people rather than get tangled up in the political intrigues that arguably prevented former leaders from doing the same. On this trip, as on others, the overwhelming refrain from the grass roots is warm appreciation that after years of feeling neglected, ordinary people are finally being listened to and receiving the basic services to which they’re entitled. And from the Prime Minister comes the constant refrain that it’s not enough to make promises. His Government is determined to deliver.

New homes for hurricane victims (Photo:Graham Davis)

By this stage, one imagines, the critics are gagging even more. It’s the usual Davis apologia for the regime. These people, they claim, are forced to make these speeches because they know what will happen if they don’t. Well, the difference is that Grubsheet was there and they were not. The point is that authenticity and spontaneity are virtually impossible to fake.  No one forces these people to do or say anything. They’re making speeches of support for the Bainimarama Government because it is demonstrably delivering better services for ordinary people, and especially in remoter parts of Fiji. The new schools and health centres aren’t cardboard cutouts wheeled in by the dictator – the kind of facades you see on movie sets – and then wheeled out when the media caravanserai moves on. They’re permanent reminders in the everyday lives of many that their interests matter for once. Government is listening, and delivering better access to electricity, clean water, roads, telecommunications, education, affordable housing, legal aid, skills training and government services.

Used to doing without (Photo:Graham Davis)

Beyond mere distance, this is the real chasm between some of the attitudes of the educated middle class in Fiji’s town and cities and the rural poor. They simply don’t have the luxury to sit around debating whether our parliament should be bicameral or unicameral. Daily life is a constant struggle, sometimes heartbreakingly so. They would hardly be impressed if the PM merely came and sat with them in a makeshift vakatunaloa – as he did repeatedly on this trip – made promises and then left. What they’re seeing for the first time is a well-oiled government machine – Bainimarama and a clutch of ministers and permanent secretaries – swinging in behind their pleas for assistance and delivering tangible results. Those results underpin Bainimarama’s popularity and will be the springboard of his political career, presuming he takes up the challenge.

Seamless racial integration (Photo:Graham Davis)

There’s another crucial element that is also overlooked – the distinct sense of unity and purpose that has taken hold in the country and replaced the racial and political divisions of the past. His critics allege that Bainimarama only embraced the multiracial ideal to give a veneer of respectability to a craven lunge for power. Yet he delights in the outward expressions of racial unity his rule has produced, clearly proud of having bestowed the title of Fijian on every citizen. In Labasa, he reveled in the sight of schoolchildren singing the national anthem in the three languages, so much so that when they asked him for a new building, the deal was virtually sealed on the spot. A case of sentimentality getting in the way of due process? Who cares. Genuine needs are being addressed.

New Nursing Station and fluent Fijian from Mrs Singh (Photo:Graham Davis)

The wonderful thing about the North is the seamless nature of race relations, the number of Kai Idia who speak perfect Fijian, the number of i’Taukei who speak Fiji Hindi. It’s not unusual to see Indo-Fijians sitting crossed legged among their i’Taukei neighbours at formal indigenous welcoming ceremonies, something Grubsheet has rarely seen elsewhere in Fiji. At the opening of the new Bua Nursing Station, there was an extra element, a generous gift from a local Indo-Fijian family – the Singhs – of an acre of freehold land on which to build the facility plus a $5000 cash donation. As the Prime Minister thanked the family, there was an audible chorus of vinakas. But what struck Grubsheet most was the sight of Mrs Singh giving media interviews afterwards in perfect Fijian, saying that her family wanted to put something back into the community as a gesture of thanks to their i’Taukei neighbours. How strange that such a supposedly backward part of the country be setting a national standard for racial integration. It certainly bodes well for the long-term future of the North – truly the way Fiji should be.

Impediment to trade: the Dreketi-Nabouwalu road (photo:Graham Davis)

On his journey this week, the Prime Minister opened or launched all manner of facilities on Vanua Levu, Taveuni and Rabi – jetties, ice works, coconut processing plants, revamped health centres, rebuilt housing for hurricane victims and more. Yet easily the most significant event occurred on Friday at the ground-breaking ceremony outside Dreketi for the $228-million project to upgrade the road to Nabouwalu. It will take four years for the China Railways One company to rebuild and seal the remaining 70 kilometres of highway and finally provide a smooth, seamless route between Nabouwalu and Labasa. It’s easily the Government’s single biggest infrastructure project – 700 local jobs – and the cornerstone of its plan to accelerate development in the North. As the Prime Minister said in front of an audience that included the Chinese ambassador, it’s impossible to overstate the importance of this project. It will transform the economic prospects of the North and the lives of its people.

A road paved with opportunity. When it’s fixed (Photo:Graham Davis)

As things stand, Bua is the least developed of the country’s fourteen provinces. Yet it already hosts some major industrial ventures – a Chinese bauxite mine and Tropik Wood’s pine chip installation. Upgrading the road will not only be a major boost for them and the sugar and tourism industries but seems certain to attract more investment from companies that have baulked at setting up in the North because of a lack of infrastructure. But above all, it will be ordinary people who benefit – less stress, less dust, shorter travelling times, easier access for children to school, easier access to markets for small business people, easier access to health services for the sick. And for the first time, the prospect of further development and the prosperity that invariably accompanies it. As the Prime Minister put it, truly the road ahead is paved with opportunity. For the North and Fiji as a whole.

This article has subsequently appeared on Pacific Scoop NZ

Unacceptable but a symptom of a wider problem?(Photo:Coup4.5)

Few people with access to the Internet can have failed to be shocked and distressed at the extraordinary video that emerged this week of two recaptured Fijian prison escapees being ill-treated by their captors. The clip that has appeared on local television is a sanitised version of the original, which at the time of writing has been viewed almost 60,000 times on YouTube. It isn’t just the violence unleashed on the escapees and the degrading treatment to which they were subjected. Many people have been equally disturbed that their captors were taunting them, laughing at them and recording their ordeal on their mobile phones.

Yes, these individuals are violent, hardened criminals who had escaped from lawful custody and can hardly have expected to be garlanded when they were eventually tracked down. Some comments left on Facebook and certain blog sites express the sentiment that they were simply getting what they deserve. Doubtless many ordinary Fijians are fed up with the kind of lawlessness that saw much of Suva terrorised during the Naboro Prison mass breakout last September. They want a tough response against law-breakers and especially home invaders. Yet, equally, nothing can justify the abuse these recaptured prisoners suffered – something that the police themselves have acknowledged by expressing their own disquiet and announcing an investigation. It may not have been as bad as some human rights abuses in other parts of the world but that’s not the point. This is Fiji and we generally don’t see ourselves in this way. That’s why there has been such shock and revulsion across the community – people saying that it made them cry and they couldn’t sleep – which is an encouraging sign of the moral state of the nation in itself.

Yet the fact is that police brutality occurs the world over. Bad things happen in good countries. This week, the Sydney police have been under fire for using excessive force as they made drug-related arrests during the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. In South Africa in recent days, there’s been an outcry after a man was killed when police allegedly dragged him behind a car. The shock of these incidents is understandably heightened when they are recorded, especially in this age of instant postings on Facebook or YouTube. Yet even before this, there was global outrage when vision was released in 1991 of Los Angeles police beating the black American Rodney King. That incident is still etched in many memories 22 years later. Will it be the same in Fiji with this video?

Only those with their heads in the sand can ignore the damage done to the reputation of our law enforcement agencies and Fiji’s general reputation abroad. Tourism Fiji is current running a social media campaign built around its new slogan “Fiji – where happiness finds you”. What happens to that now that the prisoner abuse clip has gone viral on the same platforms? How does it affect general perceptions of Fiji?  Will it affect tourism numbers? The point is that perception is a fragile thing and international perceptions about any place and its people can shift in an instant. Talk to anyone in PR and they’ll tell you that reputations can take years to build and seconds to destroy. Even one human rights violation can destroy years of hard work. That said, has Australia’s image been unduly damaged by recent images of police brutality there, the deaths of aborigines in custody or the murder of foreign students by racist gangs? Countries are generally judged on their response to these incidents, not on the unfortunate fact that they took place.

Yet it’s also time for a wider debate about the general culture of violence that has always existed in Fiji and how to break it. Because one thing links both the victims and the perpetrators in the video in question. And that is that they’ve grown up in a country in which summary violence is often the norm rather than the exception. And, as we all know, violence invariably begets violence.

It’s a fair bet that everyone in that clip was raised as a child to expect a “hiding” – the traditional form of discipline in most Fijian homes for even relatively minor infractions. We’ve all copped it pretty much irrespective of background. Did we harbor resentment against our parents for getting a belting or a cuffing? Usually not. And at school, corporal punishment was routine until relatively recently – the strap or the cane on the hand or the backside the traditional means of enforcing discipline. It was all designed to instill fear and deter us from repeating the particular offence. Did it work? Only sometimes. But it’s inarguable that it instilled in many of us the notion that violence is an acceptable way of keeping social order. And it also made us – to a lesser or greater extent – inured to violence and more likely to resort to it ourselves. Children were beaten, wives were beaten, fists used whenever disputes arose. Indeed violence has been distressingly routine in some families and unfortunately it still occurs in far too many Fijian homes. The Prime Minister, Voreqe Bainimarama, has acknowledged as much by waging a personal campaign against the mistreatment of women by the men in their lives.

In the Vanua – in traditional i’Taukei society – it can be even more prevalent than in our towns and cities. The buturaki – the premeditated beating – has always been the traditional method of enforcing order at village level. Never mind the use of violence in family settings. These were targeted punishments – sanctioned by the village hierarchy – of wayward youths who would quite literally be bashed in the cause of the common good. It was all designed to be the ultimate deterrent, to teach them a lesson they would never forget.

The point is that it’s no stretch of the imagination to see echoes of this – albeit in extreme form – in the video that has surfaced this week. Because there’s little doubt that this concept of summary justice – of terrifying violence, of making an example of someone in the interests of deterrence – will have taken hold at other levels in Fiji, including the agencies that are charged with keeping order at a national level. There’s little doubt that the police motive is to send the strongest possible message to the prison community that hardened criminals can expect the direst of consequences should they be tempted to escape. The spectre of escapees returning to their cells broken in limb as well as spirit must have a big impact on any prisoner.

Let’s face it. Maintaining law and order in Fiji has been a big challenge in the context of the coup culture of the past 25 years. Violence has often been just below the surface, erupting at times with terrible consequences on both sides. In the mutiny of 2000, innocent troops were murdered by traitors and some of the mutineers were subsequently beaten to death. It left an indelible impact on the psyche of the entire establishment and especially the Prime Minister, the ultimate target of the mutineers, who barely escaped with his life. So it’s to be expected that official attitudes to law breakers generally are harsh and unforgiving.

In truth, many law abiding Fijians actually like being ruled with an iron fist if it means being able to sleep soundly in their beds at night. It doubtless explains why some correspondents to the newspapers this week have wanted more emphasis placed on their human rights in this debate than on the rights of those who violated theirs by committing robbery and rape. A few weeks back, Grubsheet was at Baulevu chatting to a young Indo-Fijian farmer about how much better he felt his life has been under the Bainimarama Government. “I feel safe for the first time in my life”, he exclaimed. He went on to recount a tale of abject horror during the 2000 coup. Marauding gangs of i’Taukei extremists terrorised his community, bashing residents at will and helping themselves to his cattle and meager personal effects. “It was so bad, we slept for weeks in the bush because we were too scared to stay in our homes at night. They would look for us but because we had grown up here, we knew the best hiding places”, he said. By this man’s account, it was only when the coup was put down that life returned to normal.

This is not an apologia for excessive use of force on the part of the police, as doubtless some of Grubsheet’s critics will argue. Yet there seems little doubt that certain elements of the criminal class in Fiji have a sense of entitlement that poses a very real threat – even in relatively peaceful times – to the rights of all citizens to not only feel, but be, secure and unmolested. This demands a particular resolve on the part of the authorities and some excesses are doubtless inevitable. They can’t be condoned but they can at least be understood, set against a social background in which violence has been an accepted feature for so long.

There are some encouraging signs of change, not least in the official attitudes to punishment in our schools. Corporal punishment has now been banned, the cane and the strap put away. As they are subjected to less and less violence, will current and future generations, in turn, be less prone to tacitly accept violence themselves? We can only hope so. As a nation, we need to do a lot more to prevent violence – to instill the notion in our children that it is unacceptable – just as we need to tackle the associated scourges of rape and child abuse, which have reached frightening levels in Fiji. Because it’s an uncomfortable fact that when we were watching that video of those prisoners being degraded and were appalled, we were also watching something of ourselves.

This article has subsequently appeared on Pacific Scoop NZ.

Bring back the good old sounds (Photo:Castaway Resort)

The aural island idyll of gentle breezes wafting through swaying palms and waves softly breaking onto pristine shores is taking a real battering in Fiji. You can’t go anywhere without being assailed by rock music played at the highest decibels and Grubsheet, for one, has had enough. We want paradise restored – to not only be able to smell the Frangipani but to hear the birds, the other sounds of nature and the occasional strumming of an island combo. And, most important of all, to have a civilised conversation with another human being without having to shout into their ear or look blankly as they shout back, not being able to comprehend a word they say. We keep running into people who say “Remember, I told you that story when I saw you at such-and-such a function”. It’s usually accompanied by a look of mild pity at what they clearly regard as our early onset dementia. Yes, you might well have told us that story. But all we saw was your mouth moving energetically while we feigned interest, unable to admit that we couldn’t hear a word you said because of the din consuming the entire proceedings. Doof, doof. Blast, blast. Blare, blare.

Now this is not an attack on anyone in particular and especially the country’s better musicians, who struggle enough to make a decent living without old fogies like Gubsheet making it any harder. Never mind their great musical skills. People like Ken Jansen Ho and Knox Kalounisiga happen to be smart, interesting people and we don’t fancy our usual friendly discourse being replaced next time we meet with a guitar planted on our head. The point is that there’s a time and a place for everything. If you want to hear loud music, you should be able to find it in our bars, clubs and concert venues. It shouldn’t be coming to you, especially at public events when the whole idea is for people to meet and have civilised conversations.

What is the point of getting every mover and shaker in Fiji into a room and then turning up the volume so all they can do is look at each other? And yet that’s precisely what happened at three of the biggest and most prestigious events of the last few months – the launch of the new Fiji Airways, the opening of Tappoo City and the extravagant function that heralded the arrival of Bred Bank. Once the music started, the conversation died. And when that happened, is it any wonder that alcohol consumption went up? Wrapping your lips around a glass is – after all -the customary fallback position if forming words is rendered completely useless.

How on earth public figures like the President and Prime Minister cope is beyond us. All that smiling and nodding and pretending to hear what’s being said. Grubsheet has seen the inside of the ears of some of Fiji’s most distinguished citizens on such occasions. We’re resolved, as a result, to at least try to control the tufts of hair that inhabit our own aural crevices. But it’s not only undignified for those involved. These are also missed opportunities for the exchange of ideas. The pounding beat means that only the smallest of small talk is possible. This, of course, may suit some people with much to be modest about in an intellectual sense. But Grubsheet is continually leaving functions in Fiji wishing there’d been more opportunities for conversation before the band struck up and rendered everyone speechless. Doof, doof. Blast, blast. Blare, blare.

Call me old fashioned. Call me Qase. But seriously. We live in one of the most peaceful backwaters on God’s planet. So why on earth do we insist on having the void filled so mercilessly? Get into a cab and the radio is up full blare. Walk into a café or restaurant and the music is up full blare. We were even on the Bula Bus at Denarau last weekend with a speaker right above our heads subjecting us to a full aural assault. Is this what visitors to Fiji come for? To be assailed by the same inane rock music that assails them at home from the time the clock radio bursts into life to drag them into their sorry lives? Haven’t they come here to get away from it all? Has anyone asked them if they’d prefer to have the sound turned down or better still, turned off? Has anyone thought that they might prefer an unamplified Fijian string band to the tortured cries of yet another banshee from the world of rock? Not on your nelly. They’ll get what they get whether they like it or not. Doof, doof. Blast, blast. Blare, blare.

Not so long ago, Grubsheet almost lost it altogether at the Sofitel Fiji – in our experience, a chronic offender when it comes to aural rape. We were at the beachfront restaurant engaged in conversation with one of Fiji’s most senior diplomats. Suddenly, the music came on at a volume clearly designed for the edification of the restaurant staff, not the guests. Why? Because we could no longer hear ourselves talk. Grubsheet went over and politely requested that the music be turned down. Down it went for a few minutes before rising again. This time the request wasn’t so polite and what should have been a pleasant evening was marred by unpleasantness. Yes, we’re cantankerous at the best of times but this kind of thing really sets us off. Of all the Denarau resorts, the Sofitel is easily the worst. At the AON Excellence in Tourism Awards last weekend, the thick doors into the ballroom couldn’t muffle the sound of the band playing in the adjacent lounge. And in that lounge, normal conversation was impossible, any conversation nigh on impossible. For Grubsheet, the Sofitel has become synonymous not for “smooth jazz” French sophistication in an island setting – as one might imagine – but our notion of aural hell. Doof, doof. Blast, blast. Blare,blare.

And why western music at all in these places – the memory of the tragic Whitney Houston violated by yet another tortured cover version of I Wanna Dance with Somebody? No I don’t. I wanna sit here having a quiet drink and a quiet chat with my companions. And if I wanna hear any music at all, I wanna hear Fijian music. In the old days in such places, there’d be half a dozen guys with ukuleles and guitars and an upturned tea chest for a double bass singing a clutch of local songs – Tagimoucia, Lomoloma, Oi lei Susi  – and breaking at decent intervals for a couple of bilo or more before picking up the rhythm again. As they got more and more relaxed, so did the patrons. Now, we’re all reduced to sitting there looking at each other while some reject from Samoa’s Got Talent strangles the nearest cat.

How is this helping to promote Fijian music? Yes, it may be helping to promote the careers of some Fijian musicians. But what our international visitors are getting is invariably what they get at home, only not nearly as good. Let’s get these global wannabes replaced with ordinary local people who can play and sing at conversational level during the conversational hours. And let’s get the banshees banished from our hotel lounges and bars and pushed back into the late hours when conversation has either petered out or is no longer physically possible. Confine them to their gloomy, smoke filled venues where they can scream as loud as they like. And at least give the rest of us a fighting chance to get to know each other properly and better still, to rediscover the joys of the sounds of silence.

Suspended jail sentence: Fiji Times Publisher and Editor Fred Wesley ( Photo:Cafe Pacific)

Scandalising the judicial system has come at a heavy price for the venerable Fiji Times, its former publisher, Brian O’Flaherty, and the current publisher and editor, Fred Wesley. Sentence was passed on the paper today after it was found guilty of contempt for republishing comments about Fiji’s judiciary made to the New Zealand media by Tai Nicholas, the Secretary of the Oceania Football Confederation. The comments appeared in the sports pages of the FT and the paper claimed, in mitigation, that they’d fallen through the usual editorial checks. That lapse has come at a huge cost.

The Fiji Times itself has been fined $300,000 and has to pay the amount in 28 days. Fred Wesley has been sentenced to a term of six months imprisonment suspended for two years. And O’Flaherty has been fined $10,000. The paper and two individuals concerned also have to pay $2,000 each in costs to the Attorney General’s Office as the applicant in the case.

This is the second time in five years that the Fiji Times has been convicted for contempt of court. In 2008, contempt proceedings were brought against the paper, the then editor-in-chief, Netani Rika, and the then publisher, Rex Gardener.  In that instance, the Fiji Times was fined $100,000, Rika received a three-month suspended prison term and Rika and Gardener were both required to enter into good behavior bonds.

In the interregnum, the ownership of the Fiji Times passed from Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited to Fiji’s Motibhai Group, led by the convicted felon, Mahendra “Mac” Patel. Patel has already served a 12-month jail term for abusing his office as Chairman of Post Fiji by organising the purchase of a clock through the Motibhai company, Prouds. A bench warrant has since been issued for Patel to answer further corruption charges but he maintains that he is unfit to travel to Fiji  because of continuing medical treatment in Sydney.

Is “Mac” Patel a fit and proper person to preside over the stewardship of Fiji’s oldest newspaper, founded in Levuka in 1869? How much longer can he stay away from Fiji and comply with the ownership provisions of the Media Decree? One thing is certain. The continuing drama at the Fiji Times still has a long way to go.