A little reported event in early May was the three-day visit to Fiji of a UN delegation there to assess Fiji’s compliance with the United Nations Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC). The team is reported to have said the Fiji Independent Commission Against Corruption (FICAC) showed promise and needs government support.Papua New Guinea and Australia are also parties to UNCAC from the Pacific, but only Fiji has volunteered to be part of the pilot review programme.This is probably because getting rid of systematic corruption in the civil service was a major reason given for the 2006 military takeover.
Government opponents have ridiculed this motive, and made much of FICAC's lack of success in obtain convictions against those charged with corruption. As previously stated, this an incredibly difficult task without forensic accountants, that only countries like NZ could have supplied. But last week (22 May) we reported on one case under the heading "Corruption Charges and Pitiful Waste."Since then charges have been laid against a Cakaudrove Provincial counsellor for allegedly receiving a four-wheel drive vehicle in exchange for supporting a contractor's bid for major roadworks. And today's Fiji Sun reports an FICAC application for a retrial against former Fiji Ports Corporation Limited chairman, Sialeni Vuetaki, who allegedly approved payment of $177,000 to the Ports CEO without authority of the Board or Higher Salaries Commission.
The Government entity most charged with corruption is the Ministry of Works (the old PWD) where over $300,000 has been allegedly misappropriated. In the past two years 27 employees have been dismissed for various offences and a further 12 employees are under investigation. The Ministry investigation team, working in cooperation with the FICAC, thinks there has been a drastic reduction in corrupt practices and believes that by the end of this year it can confidently claim to have curbed corrupt practices. Fiji Daily Post. For further information about FICAC and its website, click here.
10 comments:
The point that it is difficult to obtain convictions against those charged with corruption without forensic accountants is well taken. However there has been a glaring failure of the military government to act as decisively in this regard as it did when imposing press restrictions and abrogating the Constitution.
The government legal and judicial system, before and after the annulment of the Constitution, has employed several expatriate High Court judges and lawyers. There is no reason to suppose that taxpayer funds are not available to employ forensic accountants in a similar way. Several world renowned accounting firms have branches in Fiji and any, or all, of the firms could have been approached by government to bring in their own forensic accountants from overseas. It is difficult to believe that the firms have been asked, since they are unlikely to have refused what would no doubt be lucrative commissions.
Admittedly the government is on record as having asked both the Australian and New Zealand governments to supply such accountants (presumably free of charge, under ‘aid’ packages) however its failure to make solid progress in this regard seems to indicate that it is not as concerned about cleaning up corruption as it professes to be.
Since endemic corruption is one of the main reasons given for the coup, it is the failure of this military government to act decisively to achieve one of its goals that has caused many in Fiji to view the work of FICAC with a somewhat jaundiced eye.
Its always about Australian and New Zealand AID for nation building.
Yet these obstructionists condemn China's aid to Fiji.
Even the issue about Trans-Tasman spying and communications intercepts of Pacific island states have been selectively ignored.Couple that with the bullying on Trade issues. i.e Pacific Pacer Plus negotiations.
The visit of the UN UNCAC Team was not before time. Anyone who has lived in Fiji for some considerable time would have a perception of how corrupt Fiji has become. They would also have a rough idea of how culturally inhibited we are to informing on those we know to be corrupt (even when we have direct evidence). Let me assure anyone who wishes to seriously be informed that corruption has torn at our entrails and beggared our economy over the past decade. It was not unknown prior to 1996 but the National Bank of Fiji saga entrenched it. Since then, the vultures in our midst have continued down their corrupt path and many of us who know still refuse to come forward. So, to some extent, we have merited our fate. However, a few of us are determined that this continuing erosion of ethical and moral values will end and we are also determined to bring to justice many significant actors in the realm of corrupt practice. Evidence is required of irrefutable wrong-doing and courageous people must come forward to give witness before equally courageous and upstanding judges.
How would justice be served and corruption thwarted were we not to have serving judges nor any Chief Justice of Fiji? Now it is required that lawyers shoulder their responsibility and duty to the State and to their oaths and serve the cause of justice in Fiji. Lining their pockets through graft is now OUT.
Another naive comment here. Why would the government want to engage any accounting firm in Fiji which might well prove to be part of the problem? How do you imagine that considerable sums of money have been allegedly siphoned off overseas over the past two decades? Without the assistance of clever, creative accountants?
Assistance in forensic accounting is required and it should be completely independent and incapable of being subjected to pressure from within. This is self-evident, surely?
Yet another reminder on the issue of corruption in Fiji. Has anyone recalled that Justice John Connors conducted an enquiry, reporting to HE THe President of Fiji concerning corruption within the magistracy? As a result of this enquiry one resident magistrate was suspended. Justice Connors had previously lived and worked in Fiji as a judge of the High Court.
I am confident that corruption has taken place within the court system over many years at many levels of the court system with many compromised individuals, participation. How is it that no politician in Fiji took this matter up? Were they unaware of such practices? Why were they not paying attention to the lack of capacity and integrity of the courts? Something so significant escaped their notice? Yet they were paid by public money to attend to the concerns and the welfare of their constituents. At this very basic level, the politicians in Fiji failed a most fundamental test. One cannot say that they also failed in ensuring they collected their expenses.
Dear Mr Crosbie
I note that you haven't uploaded my original comment yet. I would therefore be grateful if you would kindly use the comment below in its place. I have made two small changes to the paragraph concerning Mr Chaudry's tax matters. One is grammatical (an aprostrophe 's) and one shows apostrophe marks where the irony of my statement 'had done nothing wrong' might otherwise be lost and the meaning misconstrued.
Regards
Jon
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Anonymous has raised some interesting points which I will deal with in order:
The issue of Chinese aid to Fiji was not raised in my posting. However aid from any country or NGO, were it to be freely given and without the expectation of kickbacks, would not be condemned. Unfortunately much of China’s aid is provided in the form of ‘soft’ loans with stringent conditions. In other words Fiji repays China’s largesse at a 2% interest rate and, as part of the ‘aid’ package, Fiji is then compelled to use Chinese consultants, contractors, workers and materials sourced in China to build the developments for which funding has been sourced. Any benefit to the Fiji economy in the form of increased employment or material purchase is therefore virtually nil – and we have to pay interest for that privilege.
Having lived and worked in Fiji for 20 years, I am aware that ethnic Fijian, Indian and European cultural values preclude discussion on a variety of topics. However corruption is not one of them. Honest people, of whatever race or culture, abhor obviously corrupt practices and, if they have positive proof of such practices have, in the past, generally come forward and provided evidence to the relevant authority. How else would knowledge of the NBF and other scandals have surfaced?
My comment that many in Fiji view FICAC with a jaundiced eye is not because we think it shouldn’t exist. It is because, based on past experience of the NBF saga, the Agricultural scam and others, we feel that FICAC will be subject to the same political pressures to investigate some cases but not others. The non-investigation of Mr Chaudry's tax peccadilloes is a case in point (although this may change now that he appears to have fallen out of favour with the present government). However the fact remains that the FIRCA officers who investigated Mr Chaudry were disciplined and relieved of their duties. Whereas he, who had ‘done nothing wrong’ was in the position to be able to offer a general amnesty to defaulters so that he could use the opportunity to regularise his outstanding payments, and was not disciplined at all.
The independence of FICAC is of paramount importance to investigate corruption both pre- AND post-Dec 2006. However it is, sadly, naïve to assume that this government-appointed judiciary will be any more successful than previous judiciaries at prosecuting cases which involve the government. Simply because, under the present circumstances, those cases are unlikely to be brought before it.
Finally, the matter of forensic accountants. Anonymous, worryingly in my opinion, appears to be making sweeping assumptions about the culpable actions of some of the largest accounting practices in the world. Whilst it would be prudent for the government to exercise a degree of caution in the selection and appointment of forensic accountants, it is the fact that nothing has happened in this regard for over two years that is the biggest cause for concern. If, as Anonymous implies, the government should prejudge world renowned accounting practices unworthy of this investigation and if, as we must presume (because they haven’t started work yet), there has been no offer of forensic accountants from other sources – China included, then from where are we to obtain this expertise? In my view, it has to be from the private sector under a tendered consultant commission.
Correspondent 'Jon' fails to appreciate that international firms of accountants which operate in Fiji are a mixture of local and overseas professionals. If these accountants were of such high, ethical standing, why would at least a few not have come clean about the questionable behaviour of some of their clients? Well, a good reason might be that there has been no Whistleblower Legislation enacted in Fiji. There has also been no Freedom of Information Act (prescribed by the 1997 Constitution) and no Code of Conduct for any official paid from the public purse. Why was this allowed to occur? Not a single parliamentarian brought this matter up in any Parliamentary sitting that one may recall. The climate was of course not conducive to such action. Neither did any Media Organisation. Why would they when they had all larded the coffers of the then political set-up. How extremely regrettable this has been for us all in Fiji. No accountability also because the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament did not sit for at least two/three years while a squabble ensued about who was to chair it. So much for the highly questionable conduct of most political parties in Fiji which also failed the country and their constituents of all communities. There has quite simply been no accountable government of any stripe in Fiji for decades. All have assumed their entitlement to raid public coffers was one larded with impunity. If this is not corrupt conduct, then what is?
VII Generation
Perhaps the final comment that should be made in regard to corruption in Fiji is the role played by two significant sections of the population:
The Methodist Church of Fiji and associated religious bodies
The role played by corrupt and allegedly corrupt expatriates of all types: investors, residents, professionals and last but not least consultants from close metropolitan neighbours, remunerated from aid monies (so-called "boomerang aid").
One such consultant remarked to me at a party within his own High Commission: "It is ten years now since I first came up to Fiji". This hit home like St Paul's conversion on the road to Damascus. Yes, ten years - doing what, precisely, for OUR benefit? The lack of clarity or comprehension as to what had just been said was highly revealing.
To whose ultimate benefit have all these consultants continued to perambulate through Fiji and the South Pacific Islands? The Congressman from American Samoa should consider this when he reports back to the US Congress. There has been a surfeit of 'boomerang aid' in the South Pacific region: some of it has been helpful along the way. One does not deny that. But overall, we have been the losers and we have continued to fall behind and to fail on GDP and integrity of governance tests. Even now, I was informed just yesterday by a former parliamentarian, corruption is still evident within government ministries. Well, this may or may not be the case. Transparency International must urgently rate Fiji again on the Corruption Perception Index. It must do so with forensic precision. Fiji was last rated in 2005 at 4 on the Index from 1 - 10. Did the then government take any notice of this? Did the Fiji Media take note? No, they did not. Their lack of seriousness and application is an indictment of their collective role. My own feeling/instinct on this is that Fiji might now rate at 2/3 which is similar to Bangladesh or to India.
Failed foreign policies towards Fiji and the S. Pacific Islands/internal failure of accountability and oversight in goverment/ failure to address all these matters by incompetent and greedy Fiji politicians over many years has led Fiji to where we are now. Impropriety in the funding of poltical parties where 'slush funding' by major media and business interests led to a synergy of conflicts of interest.
This is what brings countries down and leads to a culture of coups/violence towards the vulnerable and last, the prevailing dominance of churches which peddle politics and superstition in lieu of their core business.
These are the symptoms of the Coup Culture. They began in 1987 and were percolating before then. Now they are part of an endemic disease. Are they amenable to a cure? Never point a finger until you have "been here". Why? Because you too are part of this malaise.
The peripatetic 'scribblers' from New Zealand and Australia have lost the plot in the Pacific. They have compounded our problems with their superficial "take" on things. How will they live with this, one wonders? Are they troubled? Do they at least question their imperfect understanding?
"We shall NEVER surrender" : rest assured. We shall continue to fight corruption and compromised governance "with you or without you".
I am concerned by the implication of some earlier views expressed in various postings by Anonymous and VII Generation. Firstly, allegations of corruption in the judiciary. Justice Connors’ enquiry in 2007 received many submissions from various sections of the population, alleging a variety of improper acts ranging from delays to outright corruption.
In the course of his enquiry, Justice Connors found sufficient evidence of unspecified, but presumably improper, conduct in the case of one magistrate, which was serious enough to warrant his recommendation for that magistrate’s suspension. The magistrate in question has since made application to the Judicial Service Commission against his suspension and, to my knowledge, there has been no further decision on the matter.
My point is that if a High Court judge, having been charged with the responsibility of investigating alleged corruption in the magistracy, can find only sufficient evidence of improper conduct (not necessarily of corruption) to recommend the suspension of just one magistrate, then perhaps the endemic corruption alleged to have been prevalent in the court system is a fallacy. I do accept that delays in the application of justice, proof of bias and so forth are all reasons for valid complaint but they are not, in themselves, necessarily ‘corrupt’ practices. Justice Connors’ findings were as critical of the court system (which necessitated the use of hand written records etc) as they were of the conduct of magistrates themselves. Despite extensive research he did not find evidence of widespread corruption since, if he had, these findings would have been made known during Mr Sayed-Khaiyum’s address on 19 May 2008 – refer http://www.fiji.gov.fj/publish/printer_11870.shtml.
No such findings were made known, therefore it is counterproductive to continue allegations that corruption was widespread unless specific proof can be given. If Anonymous, who is ‘…confident that corruption has taken place within the court system over many years…’ has such proof, then why was this not made known to Justice Connors at the time of his inquiry when submissions from the public were called for?
Secondly, the issue of FICAC. VII Generation notes intriguingly (and indisputably) that international accounting firms employ both local and overseas professionals. However the insinuation that the entire profession’s ethical standard is found wanting because some accountants have not “…come clean about the questionable behaviour of some of their clients...” cannot go unanswered. It is a private accountant’s professional responsibility to minimise the tax liability of their client using whatever legal means they can. No one in Fiji would be so naïve as to assume that illegal financial activities never occur, however it does not require ‘Whistleblower’ legislation to be enacted for corrupt practices to be brought to light.
I refer again to my earlier example of Mr Chaudhry’s questionable decision to invoke a tax amnesty to allow him to regularise his tax payments without further penalty. The whistleblowers were penalised yet Mr Chaudhry was not, which raises the question of why this government, when confronted with evidence of wrong doing by one of its highest ranking ministers, chose only to ‘shoot the messenger’. The prosecution of corruption must not be selectively applied since that would make the aim of eradicating corruption almost meaningless. In fact, I believe that Mr Chaudhry’s well publicised attempt to avoid payment of offshore revenue earned through bank interest will have had tremendously detrimental effect on the government’s corruption campaign. My feeling is that it could well have led to a spike in corrupt accounting or business practices since a number of business people may now feel justified in attempting to do the same thing.
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VII Generation correctly notes that no legislation has been passed concerning Freedom of Information as prescribed under Article 174 of our 1997 Constitution. Although the blame for this sits largely on the shoulders of the three subsequent elected governments, an NCBBF working group met to discuss this legislation on 9 April 2008 and advised that The Freedom of Information Paper will be available on the NCBBF website by 11 April 2008 (refer http://www.fiji.gov.fj/publish/page_11560.shtml) However the paper is still not on the website and only one reference to ‘Freedom of Information’ exists in the entire People’s Charter, appearing on Page 18 under the bulleted point that the government will “Enact Freedom of Information legislation”. To my mind this is deeply unsatisfactory since, in view of the recent media restrictions, a valid argument could be made showing that we are now further away from the establishment of this vital legislation than ever before.
The most recent posting by Anonymous appear to me to reflect this government’s position and subsequent action on the issue of corruption. We are constantly told that corruption was rife and that entire Boards (FNPF, AFL etc) were dismissed on this basis. However no proof has been provided against most of those individuals – we are merely told that corruption existed (as if it was already a proven fact) and is being investigated. That 27 government employees have been dismissed for various offences since Dec 2006 is hardly valid reason for a coup being held on the grounds of endemic government corruption. It is worth noting that corruption has been alleged of the military itself, with regard to its regimental funds however unless proven, it too should not be presumed to be guilty of corruption. Anonymous goes on to castigate virtually all sectors of the expatriate population inferring that they, and the aid that some of them have been employed under, have been central in the perceived fall of transparency and level of honesty in Fiji’s government. This is stretching credibility and is unworthy of further comment.
Anonymous gives a variety of correct reasons for corruption occurring, with the failure of accountability and lack of oversight in government being two. It is undoubted that these were failings of the previous government - however they could fairly be said to apply to the present government as well.
My view is that if, when carrying out the coup, the military had acted with speed, efficiency and single minded determination to achieve its purpose, Fiji would now have in place teams of forensic accountants, race-free electoral boundaries and could very possibly already have had an election. Instead the lead up to the coup was protracted and the installation of the subsequent ‘new legal order’ has been even more so.
It is this dilatory attitude which has led to the military becoming embroiled in politics for which it has no aptitude and has left us with a benevolent dictatorship which is under increasing domestic pressure. This is a dictatorship that, if it continues to procrastinate in enacting legislation that is necessary for the aims of the coup to be achieved, or taking action against corrupt individuals, regardless of whether or not they are part of this administration, will appear ever less ‘benevolent’ as time goes by.
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