The “vulagi” debate has erupted all over again in spectacular fashion with an astonishing attack on the Labour Party leader, Mahendra Chaudhry, by the Prime Minister, Sitiveni Rabuka, for having the temerity to object to the iTaukei term for visitor to describe Indo-Fijians who have been in Fiji since the arrival of the first Girmit 145 years ago.
Rabuka has described the former prime minister as “weak-hearted and selfish” for expressing the view that when Rabuka says Indo-Fijians shouldn’t mind being called vulagi, it is upsetting for them and doesn’t bring true reconciliation.
No, Prime Minister, it is you who is being weak-hearted and selfish. How dare you defend any Fijian citizen being described as a visitor in their own land. You can have your tame kai Idia like Sashi Kiran and Charan Jeath Singh but tens of thousands of other Indo-Fijians and members of other minorities find it grossly offensive. And even if it is common practice in the vanua to describe non-iTaukei as vulagi, it doesn’t make it right. As the supposed leader of all citizens in the country, you should have the sensitivity to understand that.
It was the failure of the People’s Alliance to call out Liliana Warid before the last election for her own use of the term vulagi that convinced Grubsheet not to back the PAP and Sitiveni Rabuka and to urge my readers to vote for the NFP. Not that they are any better when people like Sashi Kiran and Biman Prasad make excuses for their Coalition colleagues.
I had an angry clash at the time with Sitiveni Rabuka’s principal speechwriter, Matt Wilson, when he defended the use of the term and accused me of being “over-emotional” when I rejected it out of hand and expressed the view that it would damage the Coalition’s election chances. I still believe to this day that it cost the Coalition votes and reduced its potential majority and that the vulagi issue is insulting enough to turn a great many people off the Coalition altogether.
These people don’t even want us to be called “Fijian” in the same way that everyone in Australia is called an Australian, everyone in America is called an American, everyone in Canada is called a Canadian and so on. But to add insult to injury, they want non-iTaukei Fiji citizens born in Fiji to accept being described merely as “visitors” to the country while the iTaukei are the only people who genuinely belong.
As he has many times before, Mahendra Chaudhry has his finger on the political pulse and is leaving FijiFirst in the dust on the vulagi issue and everything else. I strongly urge Grubsheet readers to watch last week’s Straight Talk on CFL-Fiji Village (see below) to appreciate the folly of FijiFirst – on Aiyaz Sated-Khaiyum’s orders – refusing to take part in the program. It has effectively abandoned the battlefield of ideas and forfeited its leadership role in the nation as the party with the majority of seats in the parliament.
With a mass exodus from the country, crime and drugs on the rise and the Coalition mired in scandal and controversy, the question of identity and belonging is going to be a major issue at the next election. Sitiveni Rabuka is already political toast. But if he thinks his party can win by calling those voters who object to be called visitors in their own country “weak-hearted and selfish”, the next election is already lost for the PAP and its enablers and appeasers in the NFP.
POSTSCRIPT: Not quite sure what the “deferences” reference means. Does he mean differences? Who knows. The Prime Minister’s mind has begun to wander to far-off parts the minds of others cannot reach.
A Grubsheet “must watch” to understand the current internal politics of the Indo-Fijian community and how Mahendra Chaudhry – at 82 – still has his finger on the political pulse.
NOTE: It’s moustache back on for the CFL-Fiji Village illustration for Rabuka’s attack on Chaudhry. But as we’ve said before, cosmetics mean nothing.
How Sitiveni Rabuka looks now after a shave. As with all lipstick-wearing pigs, it hasn’t altered a thing.
More insult to injury from Rabuka’s Deputy, Manoa Kamikamica, during his current Investment Fiji mission to Canada. Obviously not a direct quote but the gist of it is equally obvious:
“Our Prime Minister forced you to leave Fiji in 1987 and has just triggered another mass exodus with his racist policies. 37 years later, we still refer to you as ‘visitors’ and don’t think you should be called Fijian. But when it comes to the economy, we regard you as ‘sleeper agents’ of prosperity and want you to give back to your beloved country through your skillset, knowledge and investment”.
A government without shame. Unbelievable.
With all due respect to these senior citizens of Fiji, they’ve had their opportunities at leadership of the country. They haven’t brought the country together or resolved the many social and economic problems they were meant to address.
Them having the vulagi debate today (thank god without lawsuits) after 40 years in the limelight is clear indication they can’t influence the multiracial Fijian population towards one nation.
Rabuka has to live with the shame of being a racist coupist. Chaudhry has to live with the shame of practicing nepotism, throwing away his prime ministership in the way he ignited the itaukei and then being the ‘I know it all’ finance minister when Bai put trust in him to rob the rich and give to the poor.
It’s time for the young to take the country forward. No, not that motor mouth my page my post son who also knows it all.
To be called a “visitor” in your country of birth is terrible .
We knew no other country
We knew no other land
We had no ties to any other country
Our parents and their parents were also born there
How then are we all “visitors”
You racist morons!!
I voted for the coalition, today I watch helplessly as the very thing I thought the coalition would bring is being destroyed. Unity.
Only because of one reason, being called a visitor in a country whose land has been watered with the blood of my ancestors. 140 years we have been here in Fiji, only for a racist to call us a visitor and a weak leader like Biman to clap at that.
Talking of weak leaders, Rabuka isnt even a leader, he’s an imposter. A toad hiding in a man’s skin.
Leaders are people whom the common people aspire to follow, tell their kids to grow up and become like them.
Ask yourself, which politician in the current government would you want your kid to be like.
Zero….nil. All are imposters, looting our beloved land.
It’s rather sad to see that Fiji is drifting into into the unknown; with mass migration of people, favouritism by the iTaukei nationals and treating members of other ethnic minorities less favourably in virtually all works of life, direct race and overt discrimination, ethno-nationalism and the sheer incompetencies of people in power and the role of the military. All these leads me to believe that a government of national unity will NEVER happen in Fiji and it is more than likely that the iTaukei communities are expected to enhance their domination and stranglehold thus making lives of the others miserable in years to come.
I expect at some stage that if this current “ethno-nationalism saga” were to get worse then some other countries like the US or India would intervene. During the first coup in Fiji, India was the first country that had applied sanctions, but now a much more powerful India, the leader of the Global South has enormous political, economic and military clout, and, similarly, the US, has one of the largest Indian diasporas occupying high public offices’ and carries much influence and expect them to either intervene by threatening with sanctions or putting some other economic pressures.
There are also some powerful trade union movements abroad and they don’t like to see injustices and their actions could result in Fiji ending up like Haiti!
I share this verbatim from: https://academictips.org/blogs/the-mouse-trap/
The story of the mouse
A mouse looked through the crack in the wall to see the farmer and his wife open a package. “What food might this contain?” the mouse wondered. He was devastated to discover it was a mousetrap.
Retreating to the farmyard, the mouse proclaimed the warning: “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!”
The chicken clucked and scratched, raised her head and said, “Mr. Mouse, I can tell this is a grave concern to you, but it is of no consequence to me. I cannot be bothered by it.”
The mouse turned to the pig and told him, “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!” The pig sympathized, but said, “I am so very sorry, Mr. Mouse, but there is nothing I can do about it but pray. Be assured you are in my prayers.”
The mouse turned to the cow and said, “There is a mousetrap in the house! There is a mousetrap in the house!” The cow said, “Wow, Mr. Mouse. I’m sorry for you, but it’s no skin off my nose.”
So, the mouse returned to the house, head down and dejected, to face the farmer’s mousetrap alone.
That very night a sound was heard throughout the house – like the sound of a mousetrap catching its prey. The farmer’s wife rushed to see what was caught. In the darkness, she did not see it was a venomous snake whose tail the trap had caught. The snake bit the farmer’s wife. The farmer rushed her to the hospital and she returned home with a fever.
Everyone knows you treat a fever with fresh chicken soup, so the farmer took his hatchet to the farmyard for the soup’s main ingredient. But his wife’s sickness continued, so friends and neighbors came to sit with her around the clock. To feed them, the farmer butchered the pig. The farmer’s wife did not get well; she died. So many people came for her funeral, the farmer had the cow slaughtered to provide enough meat for all of them.
The mouse looked upon it all from his crack in the wall with great sadness. So, the next time you hear someone is facing a problem and think it doesn’t concern you, remember, when one of us is threatened, we are all at risk. We are all involved in this journey called life. We must keep an eye out for one another and make an extra effort to encourage one another. Each of us is a vital thread in another person’s tapestry. Author Unknown
I am wondering why the largest political party in parliament is not part of the national debate. The leader of opposition is overtly quiet on matters of national interest. If he is to be the next PM, he needs to start showing the public that he is a better alternative than the current lot. I haven’t heard him calling out the follies of the coalition ministers. Where is the Leader of the Opposition. Is silence agreement?
The leader of opposition is highly skilled.
He can hear people smile.
in cahoots I would say! I suspect there is a bigger agenda. Govt + opposition, and democracy all are ‘foreign flowers’. This is all a showbiz, self-preserving, self-serving leaders hiding under the veneer of democracy. And all have the same vision on milking the opportunity the best they can and till they can. Who cares about our people, our nation? I suppose they only conduct themselves for what they know. One cannot expect much. Bring back a system where we appoint people on merits not on how they look. Internationalise Fiji – we as a nation have so much to achieve and so many reasons to do so. It’s high time, we bring in overseas talent. Our local leadership is failing us miserably. Our education system is dysfunctional and the unis haven’t produce the sought leadership to thrive through embracing merits and practicing unity in our diversity. Maybe, FNU’s new divisive ideas on training certain sections of the community for leadership will break the bamboo ceiling to get us there. God bless Fiji – our only hope!
Apart from one or two, Fiji hasn’t produced a single leader who the people can look up to.
All are sweet in public before election but bitter once they hold office.
The size of their pockets increase and even carry bags or ask their assistants to carry for them, so they fill up quickly.
That is the brand of politicians Fiji has.
Main tool is talk about race and equality and you have a vote.
These days the constitution is designed as such that politicians with just 500 votes become a minister.
Sad story.
And we have suck ups to these politicians when they are in power.
The show is happening in front of us at the very moment.
Many of those suck ups are prominent people of our society
Vondo loto gang when tide changes
Snake showing his true colours now.
No Vulagi youth in the list of 10 Duke of Edinburgh International Award recipients honoured by the Head of State at Government House yesterday. Good guess on how many of them will eventually brain drain to ANZ. Leadership role models for those who remain would be Rambo, the bonking couple Aseri & Lynda, Biman, Gavoka etc. Elections, please come, so a new credible squad of model leaders can hopefully come through. Isa o Viti Makawa kei Viti Vou!
“These people don’t even want us to be called “Fijian” in the same way that everyone in Australia is called an Australian, everyone in America is called an American, everyone in Canada is called a Canadian and so on”
Very telling examples. You have chosen countries in which the indigenous people have been marginalised to the point of near extinction, and forced to use the word of the… yes, vulagi, to describe themselves and their nations, on a so-called equal footing with the very people who have disenfranchised them.
“Fijian” is an English word. I agree Indo-Fijians have a good claim to it, as co-inheritors of a scarred postcolonial state. Not so sure about the descendants of the Kaivalagi – beachcombers, pastors, colonisers all – who are so quick to lay stake to the names their ancestors imposed across the “new world”. Australians, Canadians, Americans and so on.
Calm down there Graham. You need to understand iTaukei language and culture to understand the term. I’m iTaukei only in my village, I’m vulagi everywhere else in Fiji and we are refereed to as such during ceremonial presentations, sevusevu, qaloqalovi, etc.
Vulagis are actually revered in iTaukei culture. Vulagis to a village will always be treated as VIPs. In the olden days, some were even made chiefs as there was belief that those who traveled from afar had some mana about them or powers. This is why there are so many fights over chiefly positions now. Just like Cakobau is from Ra, Bainimarama from Lomaiviti and Nailatikau is from Tonga, it is the same everywhere else in Fiji.
Unless you add to the iTaukei vocabulary, vulagi is the appropriate term. You are translating it directly into English but not understanding what the term really means in iTaukei culture.
I know exactly what it means. And that meaning is taken by other ethnic groups in Fiji to be literal. So whatever the iTaukei do, branding other citizens as vulagi/visitors in their own country is unacceptable.
The traditional farewell song, Isa Lei, contains the line, “Isa, isa, vulagi lasa dina”. It clearly means an outsider. And non-indigenous Fijians are not outsiders. They have the right to belong without equivocation.
Unda kava ag: No matter how hard you try to qualify or justify the use of the word, we all know ‘vulagi’ is an insulting and derogatory term used in reference to Indo-fijians. We know it. You know it. Of course we know too that natives use even worse language to describe/reference Indo-fijians in your own homes and private gatherings. The rest of your pained attempt at reasoning cannot hide the fact that you speak as a true bigot that you are. Enough already! Stop insulting our intelligence -just stop it. Keep your culture, practice your culture. Don’t force it upon the non-iTaukei citizens born and bred here! The Indo-Fijians know as well that we live rent-free in racist bigot i-Taukei heads. Knock yourselves out hating others while you fast and pray for the very prosperity and successes that you envy and despise others for. Don’t forget to carry the vulagi bible acha.
This is unhelpful and provocative. We would all do better to acknowledge that the KaiViti were here before us, and that the rest of us are here because of colonialism. (A history that has benefitted some over others, in a way that Graham Davis like many colonial beneficiaries has proven himself incapable of acknowledging.) That history has happened, and none of us can change it, but we must acknowledge it. There are provisos to be made on all sides, but the Fijian accommodation of vulagi of all stripes has been, by and large, generous. What we need are voices of friendship and understanding countering the rising clamour of ethnonationalism. We shoot ourselves in the foot by responding with taunts and insults.
Me a “colonial beneficiary”? Are you kidding? My parents came to Fiji as missionaries before I was born to serve the Fijian people. At the age of 12, I was separated from them and sent to boarding school in Australia. After that I carved out a career in journalism. How I am a colonial beneficiary escapes me.
In any event, all this anti-colonial BS is nonsense. The colonists were invited to take over Fiji and did everything they could to leave it in the best possible place to make a go of itself in the modern world. They stopped people from eating each other, brought order, functioning institutions, education and most of what we have today. That Fiji has failed to resolve its issues more than half a century after the British left is Fiji’s problem, not Britain’s.
The new “white man’s burden” is to be exposed to a whole lot of historical revisionism and anti-colonial sentiment. But kindly leave me out of it.
BBC story about Singaporean PM Lee Hsien Loong stepping down after 2 decades is a must read. He was only their 4th PM after independence in 1965, supercharged the economy and doubled their GDP per capita during his tenure. Great lesson for Rambo, his team and supporters: Mr Lee pledged that no citizen would belong to a minority.
We are just 5 years younger but have a colourful lineup of PMs – one of them served for just 5 minutes and received pension for his brief leadership!
Many of our political leaders and government officials have had study tours to Singapore, say “yawa” and make lots of promises but without results to show on the ground right until they retire.
Incidentally, Singapore has just 700+ sq km of land area and ours is 18,000+. That’s yawa!
https://www.bbc.com/articles/cpwg0g8ejyxo