Discontent at the grassroots August 24, 2007
Posted by Ricardo Morris in Living in Fiji, Media.2 comments
Viliame Gavoka, the former chief executive of the Fiji Visitor’s Bureau, articulates in a letter to the Fiji Times today, the feelings of ordinary people about the political and economic direction our country is headed in.
His letter was about the interim regime’s failure to fully fund the Tourism Action Group (TAG), which is trying to staunch the negative impact of the military coup on that sector on which much of Fiji’s economic health depends.
To illustrate the frustrations at the grassroots at the state of our country he wrote:
“On Tuesday, after an absence of many years, I attended a meeting of the tikina council in my district of Cuvu expecting the usual vanua-type (agreeable) tone to the proceedings.
I was wrong and totally unprepared when one of the elders launched a diatribe against the state of affairs in Fiji, especially the economy and tourism.
The emotion and power behind his words together with the currency of his thoughts surprised and encouraged me.
Surprised that this elder, whose interest hitherto confined to matters of the tikina could articulate so well and with passion, issues of national interest.
And as I looked around the hall, it was obvious that what he said represented the view of everyone in the meeting.
It struck me that while the Fijian people may have acquiesced silently to the state of things in Fiji, no one should take their silence as acceptance.”
On the subject of letters to the editor, two other letters in today’s Fiji Times deserves a mention.
A Surendra Kumar of Nadi, in a letter titled “Bunch of Jokers”, referring to Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama’s “joke” in giving a fabricated election date last week, asks: “Isn’t it possible we put these jokers on the stage? They will definitely beat the Bounty Bubbly show and bring thousands of dollars to boost Fiji’s economy.”
And this one titled “One for the boy” from Allan Loosley of Tavua about army spokesman Major Neumi Leweni’s diplomatic posting to Beijing, should get the gang at the army camp all hot and bothered:
“We all know Neumi Leweni’s transfer to Beijing is a ‘job for the boy’, something this so-called government promised to stamp out.
Due to their cultural isolation from the rest of the world for centuries, most Chinese cannot speak a foreign language and probably one or two can speak Fijian.
Off goes our steadfast major into the valley of billions with his spoken English skills, expecting to make himself understood. I wonder how the Chinese will translate his continual ‘errs’?”
I wonder…
The biggest joker of them all August 20, 2007
Posted by Ricardo Morris in Media, Politics.add a comment
He may have thought it to be a funny joke, but self-imposed prime minister Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama’s gaff in giving an election date to journalists, has backfired.
Last week, after persistent questioning by journalists, he said Fiji would go to the polls at 10am on March 13, 2009, a Black Friday. The date was duly reported by Fiji Times Online the same day. (See earlier Dateline post here.)
But nobody in Bainimarama’s regime was willing to discuss the date the next day, signalling something was amiss.
One unnamed senior government minister told Radio Australia’s Samisoni Pareti that Bainimarama was probably joking because he was constantly being pestered by journalists for a poll date.
Soon enough the man himself confirmed that he was only pulling journalists’ legs. It was a joke, Bainimarama told Radio Fiji Gold News on Thursday.
He said he was not serious when he replied to a Fiji Times reporter’s questions about the election date.
Radio Fiji reported on its website: “He said he was tired of the media asking the same question over and over again in relation to the elections dates. Commodore Bainimarama said he has already stated the election date will be officially announced when the Interim Government is good and ready to do so.”
But his joke has now raised questions about the credibility of the regime’s commitment to democratic elections.
Today, the Fiji Times reports that Shamima Ali, Fiji’s only remaining human rights commissioner (apart from Dr Shaista Shameem), says the comment shows the regime is led by jokers.
“This is the country’s future we’re talking about and if people turn it into a joke then it is sad,” she said.
“And for people who have done it by the gun and reduced it to ridicule, it is really, really sad,” she told the Fiji Times.
Dr Brij Lal, one of three architects of the 1997 Constitution, is also quoted by the Fiji Times as saying “a frivilous joke like this” was “most unfortunate and possibly counterproductive to the national interest in the long run.”
“Many people are already sceptical of the stated aims and ambitions of the interim administration. It simply confirms their scepticism.”
Fiji Times Online, which was the first to report the date, in a follow-up on Saturday said the comment from the country’s leader was taken seriously since the nation was anxious to know when elections would be held.
“He is the leader of the nation and what he says, especially something of such national importance, makes the news,” Fiji Times Online said.
Interim Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says Bainimarama “spoke out of context”, the Fiji Sun reports today.
“He spoke out of context because of the constant harassment by the media,” he told the Sun, in its front page story on the outcry from political parties over Bainimarama’s joke.
“The National Federation Party said if the prime minister could not be serious about something as big as general elections, ‘what could he be serious about?'” the Sun‘s Charlotte Peters wrote.
Unfortunately, as this episode has taught journalists – and the world at large – not everything Bainimarama says can be taken seriously.
Living in Fiji website hacked August 18, 2007
Posted by Ricardo Morris in Media.1 comment so far
Logging on to the Living in Fiji magazine website today to check if some articles I had written for the first issue last year were online, I was redirected to another page.
The site http://www.livinginfiji.com has been taken down by what appears to be Turkish hackers under the pseudonym “Serious Error”. After doing a rough online translation of the Turkish text on the page, it appears the hackers have left patriotic pro-military messages on the website. (See the screen grab below)
There’s also a nearly five-minute long YouTube video embedded in the page that shows Turkish military exercises set to Turkish rap.
Living in Fiji, a quarterly publication, bills itself as the only upmarket lifestyle magazine in Fiji.
I’m not sure if the publishers, Art & Soul Ltd, know about the hacking but I will contact them and see what they say.
UPDATE (August 20): Living in Fiji publisher Rishi Ram responds to an email: “We are in the process of moving servers because of the hack. Hopefully Connect (Fiji’s main ISP) can provide us with a more secure server.”
Cannibals survive for over 100 years? August 18, 2007
Posted by Ricardo Morris in Media.2 comments
At least that’s what the Fiji Times implied in the lead and second paragraphs of an article about the ancestors of a Papua New Guinea tribe that ate four Fijian missionaries.
Sorry for killing, eating your priests
Friday, August 17, 2007
A GROUP of people who killed and ate Fijian missionaries more than a century ago have traditionally apologised to the people of Fiji.
After 132 years, the people of New East Britain in Papua New Guinea have asked Fiji, in particular the families of the four missionaries, for forgiveness.
Dateline Dispatch 