UPDATE (Events since the main post was written)
In the early hours of Sunday morning, 22 March, the homes of (former Colonel) Sakiusa Raivoce, a security firm recruiter for Iraq , and Fiji Times chief editor Netani Rika were attacked by molotov cocktails (bottles filled with an inflammatory liquid, and fitted with a wick). Rika says he (and Fiji) know who the attackers were. Raivoce said he did not, but said the attackers fled in the direction of Nabua (and the military barracks). Police are treating the attacks as "serious" and possibly linked to previous incidents.
It is possibly significant that earlier, on Monday 16th, anti-Government blogger Raw Fiji News claimed to know from "within the military" that Raivoce was "on the stone-throwing hit list ...[adding] ...The recent spate of cowardly violence by some grown-up indigenous Fijian men, believed to be soldiers, is all planned by Ului Mara, Pita Driti, Epeli Ganilau and Frank Bainimarama."
It is now even more important that the Interim Government condemn these attacks and that the police succeed in apprehending the offenders.
Pro-Democracy Head Says Rocks Thrown at House
Journalist Tamara McLean has a short four paragraph
article on the stoning of Attar Singh's car, syndicated by AAP (Australian Associated Press) to umpteen papers in Australia and NZ. It is worth mentioning because it demonstrates how one short news release can travel so far and influence so many people, as it disperses fact, assumption or falsehood, balance or bias, merely by the press of a computer key.
The Auckland Herald heading read "Pro-democracy head says rocks thrown at house." Singh was referred to as a"pro-democracy politician". Wrong. Attar Singh is the chairperson of the anti-Interim Government Fiji Movement for Democracy. Its membership? Two Fiji and one regional NGOs, two trade unions, and three political parties opposed to the Interim Government. The political parties are the small United People's Party, representing Fiji's "other" races, the National Federation Party (Singh is on its national executive!), and the Soqosoqo Duavatu ni Lewenivanua (SDL) party of former PM Lainesia Qarese. The trade unions are the Fiji Teachers' Association, headed by anti-government Tevita Koroi, and the the smaller of Fiji's two umbrella unions, the Fiji Islands Council of Trade Unions, to which Koroi's Fiji Teachers' Association is affiliated (!), and of which Singh is the National President!
If you can't quite follow this, the so-called "pro-democracy politician"wears three hats. He is an NGO head, a political party executive and the president of a trade union. But he is not a politician. He has stood unsuccessfully for parliament three times, in 1999, 2001 and 2006, when he won 6% (!) of the votes in his constituency. The National Federation Party is an Indo-Fijian party that has lost ground to the Fiji Labour Party that won the 1999 election, to be ousted from power by the "Speight" Coup of 2000. So, the article is factually incorrect. Singh is not, and never has been a politican, and the NGOs aside, the membership of the Fiji Movement for Democracy suggests it is far less concerned about democracy than returning the old SDL Government to power.
The second error of fact is that the "Fijian police have refused to comment on why prominent Fijians are being targeted." The police did nothing of the sort. They said investigations were proceeding, and that the case was difficult because it was dark and there were few witnesses. If they later "refused to comment" to Ms McLean, it was probably because they had nothing to add to the earlier statement. [For the record, it is the Fiji (not Fijian) Police and Attar Singh is an ethnic Indo-Fijian.]
The remainder of the article is supposition based on bias. There is as yet no evidence the attacks were "politically motivated"as the article claims--although it does appear so. Neither is there any evidence, as lawyer Graham Leung is reported to have said, that "it was obvious these 'acts of terror' were being perpetrated by those acting on behalf of the Government." Mr Leung, is it not also possible they could be perpetrated by opponents of the government, precisely because their actions would not be "obvious?" They could even be anti-government soldiers!
Indeed, it defies logic that the Government is behind these attacks at this critical time when it is seeking the support of political parties in advance of the President's Political Dialogue Forum. If the hooligans were anti-Government, their actions could help to derail the Forum. If they were pro-Government, their actions give anti-Government elements the high moral ground. Either way, their actions do not help the Forum process.
Attar Singh is rightly grieved by this cowardly attack. It is understandable he would blame the Government. But belonging to a pro-democracy movement does not of itself make him a democrat. If I judge him wrong, my apologies, but he seems to have rather too many irons in the fire to sound totally convincing on democracy.
But Singh and stoned cars apart, it is disappointing an experienced journalist was so careless and so biased, and an experienced lawyer so uncritical of the "obvious", and so categorical about blame where it may --or may not-- be due.
They may, of course, be correct but for the moment there is absolutely no evidence to back their claims. Had Ms McLean made it quite clear that the article contained expressions of opinion, I would have had no bone to pick with her or with Mr Leung. Their error was in turning opinion into fact, and their "sin" in seeking to persuade others to believe them.
Coupfourpointfive has published six photos of a Saturday May 30th arson attack on the Knolly Street office of the Fiji Post & Telecommunications Employees Association, of which Attar Singh, a very vocal Government critic, is the secretary.
