Unfortunate. Inevitable. Sad. Fiji is fully suspended from the Commonwealth.This outcome was obvious months ago. Ever since the Commonwealth followed the Forum's lead on insisting on conditions that would not --and could not -- be met if Fiji were to carry out the reforms chartered by the Bainimarama government before elections were held.
One can, of course, see where the Forum and Commonwealth are coming from. They had to react to what they saw as an illegitimate regime imposed by the military. The pity is they could not also see that the regime that was deposed was far from democratic, even though it had the support of most ethnic Fijians. And that the only way to break the cycle of coups, and establish a just and more genuine democracy, was to remove race as the inflammatory accelerant from Fiji politics once and for all. The party leaders, Qarase and Chaudhry, the Commonwealth insist Bainimarama include in dialogue do not want this. Race-based parties and electorates guarantee their re-election. That's why their recent letter to Bainimarama copied the Commonwealth's insistence on inclusive dialogue with no conditions and no determined outcomes, and why the Government will always resist this sort of dialogue with politicians like this.
The situation is anomalous but the irony is not hard to see. Read it slowly. Two democratic, non-racist institutions oppose a military regime -----and so unwittingly continue to extend support for undemocratic, racist politicians----- and so undermine the wobbly efforts of the military regime (sic!) ---- to impose democratic, non-racist political procedures.
One can only hope that Sir Paul Reeves' visit later this month and the probability that talks and some contacts will continue off stage, will ease the pain the Commonwealth's decision will inflict on ordinary people in Fiji.
Meanwhile, massive Commonwealth financial support for the ailing sugar industry remains frozen, and the industry, the country's third largest employer, that also needs major reform, totters close to the edge of collapse. Thousands of ordinary people are affected.
I can only echo Ratu Epeli Ganilau's words: "Hopefully by the time we get to elections in 2014 all these things can come back to normal ... [These are the] sacrifices that have to be faced, in order to achieve what we’ve set out to do. Reforms don’t happen overnight. We’re talking about major reforms to the political process.”
Read the Fiji Times story.
Correction: It is the EU, and not the Commonwealth, that is withholding support for the sugar industry. My apologies. But, just as Australia and NZ influence the Forum, and the Forum the Commonwealth, the Commonwealth influences the UN and the European Union. The "succession" is captured in the old nonsense poem --
Big fleas have little fleas
Upon their backs to bite 'em.
Little fleas have lesser fleas
And so on, ad infinitum.
Upon their backs to bite 'em.
Little fleas have lesser fleas
And so on, ad infinitum.
4 comments:
Irony? Plenty of that in your post.
Fiji currently has a non-democratic government that is unwilling to prove its 'mandate' either by referendum or standing for election on their stated platform.
You posit that it is reasonable, nay necessary, for democracy to be reinvented and enforced by an autocrat who will supposedly step aside when the the glad people of Fiji embrace his plans for their peace, prosperity and governance.
There is no history of liberal representative democracies being successfully 'imposed' (your choice of term) outside of popular uprising, or slow evolution.
I'm as opposed as you are to undemocratic, racist politicians; problem is they're a product of the population that elects them. As are the good ones: every country has it's fair share of both.
At least pre-Bainimarama the upright citizens of Fiji could publicly voice their opinions, campaign on issues of importance, petition their representatives, vote bad leaders out, and take bad law to court.
So how exactly is the current situation an improvement?
Your biggest problem still remains: you have no faith in the people of Fiji to evolve politically. Bainimarama touts a vision you agree with, so let's ignore the wholesale disenfranchising of the people of Fiji while Bainimarama takes us all on a shortcut to utopia because we're too stupid to get there ourselves.
@Alterego
It is of course more than unfortunate that the people of Fiji have such a poor taste in politicians. However, over many, many years there has not been that much choice. Given the climate and the counter-prevailing winds favouring a full democratic process: the treatment and the lack of general respect shown to women, half the population, for example, what would one expect? Violence meeted out towards women and children throughout society is hardly conducive to a full democratic evolution. Is it? If it is not physical violence then it is violence of the subterranean, threatening kind which is counter-productive to independent modes of thinking, vital, one would volunteer, for a full democratic evolution. Since neither Australia nor New Zealand nor even the EU have taken any interest of any real depth in such matters, it is scarcely surprising that for now, we would prefer to set all politicians aside. Their efforts to develop and to evolve democracy in Fiji to suit all players in the process have been collectively abysmal. Democracy of any worth and of any sustainability must meet a much higher standard than that set down for Fiji by the international community. In their debatable wisdom, they have chucked out and set aside our concerns for "stability first" - so necessary for even vestigial business continuity (thus employment) and attempted to impose solutions which they would never consider living under themselves. Do not provide prescriptions which you would be unwilling to swallow at home.
As a New Zealander I'm frustrated with the continual anti Bainimarama media and I welcome this blog as a place where I get to hear another side to the story.
I don't think Croz suggested that it was "necessary" for democracy to be reinvented.
I have not been following this closely, my question is: How else was Fiji going to eliminate race from politics? Was "evolution" gradually occuring under the deposed government?
@Anonymous: Have a look at the stats for domestic violence around the world before you run down that tangential path.
As to your comment that I should "not provide prescriptions which you would be unwilling to swallow at home" ... I live in Fiji. I have lived (and stayed) here through every coup. I am a voting citizen. I'm not talking theory from an armchair in a safe, distant land.
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