We had to rely on FijiLive and FijiVillage for this Government release. The same Fiji Times that almost joyously announced Fiji's suspension from the Commonwealth, and so values media freedom, has reverted to its earlier mode of not reporting any Government statement in protest against the Emergency Regulations that censor media releases.
Under the heading C'wealth Can Help Us Break Free FijiLive reports a government spokesman saying Government "believes the Commonwealth can partner with Fiji to resolve its long standing systemic and structural challenges [and help] correct longstanding injustices, inequalities and corruption.”
The spokesman said elections alone will not resolve these problems: democracy must be contextualised within Fijian experience and history. He said Government is looking forward to meeting the team led by Sir Paul Reeves, the special representative of Commonwealth Secretary General Kamalesh Sharma, who will be in Fiji next week.
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Lord Ashdown, the former High Representative in Bosnia, is on record as having said that in Bosnia during his four year tenure there after the Bosnian War, elections came rather low on the list of priorities. At the top end of the list were:
JUSTICE
JOBS
Lord Ashdown is a former Colonel in the British Army and a former leaer of the Liberal Party. So he ought to have some idea of what he speaks. When it was made plain to one or two people in Fiji at that time in positions of influence, that a Truth and Justice Commission was urgently required to sit - long before December 2006 - no one was listening or wanted to listen. Lord Ashdown would have been someone suitable to Chair such a Commission. A Truth & Justice Commission and NOT a Reconciliation Bill might have saved Fiji from where she sits now.
Failing this option, then the Commonwealth representatives due next week have a weighty task in hand. Let us welcome their preparedness to come as all troubled 'family members' should.
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