Two years later where do we stand? January 28, 2009

The urge to scream at the way Fiji has fared in the past two years under military rule, culminating in the tragedy of the messy response to the recent floods, has prompted me to revive Dateline Dispatch. Attempting to keep your head above water during trying times, let alone blog sanely about it, can be a challenge. Yet it is something that should be done. More voices of reason must be raised even if the spectre of a recalcitrant military hangs over any of these dissenting voices.

In the first post in more than 16 months, is news that the Pacific Islands Forum leaders have given the Fiji regime led by Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama until May 1 this year to nominate an election date – a date which should fall within this year.

The strongly-worded communiqué issued at the end of the special retreat in Port Moresby at which Forum leaders considered the question of Fiji, came as Bainimarama declined to attend on the basis of his overseeing the disaster relief effort at home.

The disaster couldn’t have come at a worse time for Fiji. As a state, Fiji found itself increasingly isolated even from its brother-nations within the Pacific Islands Forum. Yet it now needs all the help it can, not only to recover from this disaster but also with preparation for an election.

If Bainimarama fails to name an election date before May 1, Fiji could find itself becoming the first Forum member country – and a founding member – to be suspended. The ramifications of such as move by the Forum leaders need not be spelled out. Quite apart from the economic effects already taking its toll, it could mean a prolonged period of military-backed rule. And if the regime’s own statements are anything to go by, that is what most likely will happen. The military are desperate to rearrange the political framework before it will allow itself (so it says) to hand back power to a civilian government.

Fiji Television showed footage of Bainimarama addressing troops at Queen Elizabeth Barracks on Monday. Ominously, Bainimarama was emphatic that electoral laws would be changed during the military’s reign – even if it took 10 years.

And there’s the catch. Constitutional lawyers insist that the Constitution cannot be changed without the sanction of an elected parliament. Yet the military, no doubt buoyed by the October ruling of the High Court which legitimised the President’s actions since the military seized power on December 5, 2006, are adamant they can change constitutionally-entrenched laws through presidential decrees.

History shows all too well that once military officers have seized power, even in the name of cleaning up corruption, they are very reluctant to hand that power back any time soon. Case in point, Pakistan. General Pervez Musharraf staged a bloodless coup in 1999 against the government of Nawaz Sharif and promptly styled himself “chief executive” of Pakistan with a view to “politically restructure” that country. In 2001 he appointed himself president and remained in power for a further sevens years. He only resigned from the post in August last year under pressure of impeachment by a morally strengthened legislature.

And despite all the appearances, the civilians in the interim government contend the military is not running the show. “We are not a military regime … we are a valid interim Government,” interim Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum insisted to TVNZ following the Port Moresby meeting.

In the same interview Sayed-Khaiyum confirmed what Bainimarama had said a day earlier. The interim Attorney-General said an election would only be held once all the political players have agreed on electoral reform. Which brings us back to the issue of legality.

But there’s no point reiterating it since the regime’s top legal adviser seems to have it all worked out. The fact that Fiji has had four coups over the past two decades, he told TVNZ, was “precisely the point”.

“The reason why we’ve had these interruptions to democratic parliamentary governance has been that the system has not been working and that is a fundamental principle people seem to neglect.”

Extrapolating from this logic, it follows that you’ve had coups because the system was broken, therefore to fix the system you stage another coup, which should then fix the system which the previous coups broke.

Get it?

I don’t.

PS: One of the original reasons for the 2006 coup has been all but forgotten. The big promises of exposing the alleged far-reaching corruption of the ousted government has been a disappointment. Although several prominent people have been charged with abuse of office, including ousted Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase himself, none of the allegations are as explosive as Bainimarama made it out to be in December 2006.