Even the Fiji Times Editorial of Tuesday July 15th, outlines some partisan punditry.
The excerpt of the FT Editorial:
An opportunity
EDITORIAL COMMENT
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
THE visit by the foreign ministers of Australia and New Zealand is a tremendous opportunity for our leaders to seek a way forward and out of the nation's political impasse.
We cannot continue to be dragged through months of waiting for democracy because of the selfish, stubborn wills of a minority within the interim administration.
The time has come for those who have usurped power in what was once our democratic home to take charge and be serious about elections. They cannot continue to hold on to power simply because they do not wish a certain faction or political party to return to a position of authority.
Nor can they attempt to predetermine the outcome of elections which should be designed to take the nation forward.
Australia and New Zealand have indicated in recent months that they are willing to take extraordinary steps to help in the return to democracy. Australia recently allowed the appointment of a high commissioner to our mission in Canberra and has permitted the return of a consular officer to Sydney.
New Zealand has continued to gently urge a return to democracy while allowing families with military links to visit that country on humanitarian grounds.
Most regimes would welcome such moves and attempt to find some common ground on which to begin meaningful and hopefully truthful discussions.
The hallmark of the current administration is its refusal to see any further than its own selfish whims and desires. In doing so, it has caused an enormous amount of disunity and tension between people who are normally well-meaning and able to see the best in others.
If this regime is engaging in these talks only to turn around next week and change its mind, there is no use in holding these discussions with the foreign ministers of our closest trading partners.
So far we have heard a myriad of unfulfilled or broken promises from the current regime. Or its leaders attempt to wriggle and squirm out of agreements made at regional or international summits with lame excuses about why it is acceptable for Fiji to renege on a bilateral agreement.
When will this end?
The answer from Voreqe Bainimarama and his interim administration should be one word today. Today his regime must decide whether it truly wants democracy for the people of different races, religions and cultures who make this such a wonderful place in which to live.
Engage openly and truthfully in discussions which will bring us all real democracy before the end of March next year.
And do it today.
The assertions of the Fiji Times Editorial is misleading, as well as myopic:
We cannot continue to be dragged through months of waiting for democracy because of the selfish, stubborn wills of a minority within the interim administration.
The editorial aspires to democracy, but only democracy dictated by these egalitarian neighbors, who forget and neglect that Fiji's democracy is race based. If removing those racial dimensions of Fiji's electoral system was selfish and stubborn as the FT editorial alludes, perhaps the publication and those advocating for accelerated elections, are themselves in the minority and want nothing more for the nation of Fiji, than to be perpetually splintered along race lines.
The misconception of the Fiji Times Editorial continues:
The time has come for those who have usurped power in what was once our democratic home to take charge and be serious about elections. They cannot continue to hold on to power simply because they do not wish a certain faction or political party to return to a position of authority.
Nor can they attempt to predetermine the outcome of elections which should be designed to take the nation forward.
The straw man fallacy by used by the Editor of the Fiji Times is disappointing and erroneously portrays that the Interim Government, as holding on to power simply because they don't wish a certain political party to return to authority.
It is true that, the Interim Government is against those parties which use the race card conveniently and purposely, along with misappropriated state funds, to donate garden tools and outboard motors as vote buying ventures, known as the Agricultural scam.
It appears that the FT Editorial is advocating the continuation of such divisive and immoral displays of political posturing.
The FT Editorial also claims that, the Interim Government is predetermining the outcome of the elections, conveniently neglecting that the only way forward for the nation of Fiji is not through racial or religious bigotry, which the Fiji Times Editor has chosen to defend.
Back to the deliberations of the Ministerial meet up. One sticking point that is bound to crop up in the high level meeting, revolves around the timing of the election, as the International Herald Tribune (IHT) article describes.
Another article from Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) seems to outline the warning which, Australia and New Zealand's Foreign Ministers have suggested if the March 2009 time frame is not met.
Particularly belligerent, are media reports painting the Australian Foreign Minister as, riding in to town like the region's Sheriff and demanding an immediate reassurance, to the pledge of holding the elections in the first quarter in 2009. Such grandstanding demands will ultimately result in logger heads, simply because it would come across as an imperialistic gesture and hugely disrespectful of Fiji's sovereignty. The brinkmanship of holding off aid, as suggested by the E.U, is an ill advised card to play that could result in unintended consequences.
Moreover, the failure of the visiting group to understand the conditionality of the Interim Government's pledge, that hinged on internal factors like electoral reform and the implementation of the 'National Charter'; will simply result in a wasted trip by the South Pacific Ministers and wasted time for all involved.
The except of the SMH article:
Smith to quiz Fiji regime about poll
Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith has arrived in Fiji, putting the nation's coup leader on notice that he expects an unwavering commitment to fresh elections next year.
Smith has arrived in Suva ahead of talks on Tuesday with members of Fiji's interim administration, appointed and led by military leader Frank Bainimarama after he staged a coup in December 2006.
Australia has raised serious concerns about recent comments by Bainimarama that suggest he may abandon an earlier pledge to hold elections in the first quarter of next year.
Smith said he and other South Pacific foreign ministers who have travelled to Fiji this week expected Bainimarama to keep his word.
"We are of course charged with making a judgment about the willingness and preparedness of the interim government to meet the commitment it gave to Pacific Islands leaders to have an election by the end of March next year," Smith said.
"It is very important to the region that Fiji is a fully-fledged member of the Pacific Islands Forum, of the Commonwealth and of the region."
Bainimarama, who has appointed himself prime minister, warned in recent months that he aims to root out corruption and reshape the country's race-based political system before holding elections, which could delay the polls.
Bainimarama briefly broke off contact last month with a group of South Pacific foreign ministers working to assist Fiji in meeting his original commitment to a new vote by March 2009.
Two days of talks by six foreign ministers in the 16-member Pacific Islands Forum - including Smith and New Zealand's Winston Peters - begin in Fiji on Tuesday and continue on Wednesday.
Peters said democratic elections were "critical to the economic and social turnaround of Fiji". Since the coup, "Fiji has seen a huge slide economically and as a consequence it heightens the importance of the work we're doing," Peters told New Zealand's National Radio.
The delegation is the most senior diplomatic mission to visit Fiji since Bainimarama's coup, which critics say has resulted in widespread rights abuses in the country.
Australia and New Zealand, along with the European Union and the United States, are keeping pressure on Bainimarama to restore democracy, but Bainimarama accuses them of interfering in Fiji's internal affairs.
Smith is the first Australian minister to enter Fiji since the coup, and while he will come face to face with Bainimarama at the talks, there are no plans for a private dialogue.
Australia has been a vocal critic of the coup leader, and roundly condemned the expulsion earlier this year of two Australian newspaper publishers working in Fiji.
The publisher of the Fiji Sun newspaper, Russell Hunter, was ordered out of Fiji in February after his newspaper alleged a member of Bainimarama's government had committed tax evasion. Fiji Times publisher Evan Hannah was forced onto a plane to South Korea in May after being labelled a security threat.
The European Commissioner for Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Aid, Louis Michel, said over the weekend that there is deep concern that Fiji's election timetable is at risk of slipping.
He warned that the EU expects Fiji's interim government to hold elections no later than the end of March 2009.
Noting that political groups in Fiji had agreed to dialogue facilitated by Commonwealth special envoy, Sir Paul Reeves, Michel said he hoped it would provide a solution to election-related issues well before the end of the year.
That "would allow the EU's 2008 support to (Fiji's) sugar sector to go ahead," he said. The EU, Australia and New Zealand are major aid donors to Fiji.
Radio Australia's radio program Pacific Beat(MP3) also covered the high level meeting and the expectations that the contact group have. Despite the lofty goals of the visiting group, regarding the timing of Fiji's 2009 election, it appears that those preconditions are presumptuous from the Interim Government's perspective and coming to the meeting with such demands is counter productive.
While the regional powers have urged Fiji to reengage dialogue, subsequently to pulling out of the South Pacific Forum, Joint Working Group last month, after the Interim Government decided to suspend negotiations with the entity in retaliation for Australia and New Zealand's unhelpful stance, reported in a IHT article; Fiji's re engagement should not counted on as a given, with all terms dictated from abroad considered signed, sealed and delivered.
Hopefully, common sense and the adherence to Chatham House rules would prevail in the visiting group, including the wisdom to back off with the preconditions and allow the Interim Government to take their time to do things right, in the progress to democracy. It is monumental and significant for the Interim Government of Fiji, to navigate back to democracy correctly and on the first attempt. Whether the International Community likes it or not; the nation of Fiji wins no medals in rushing to the finish line of democracy, that results in generations of disenfranchised citizenry.
Interim Finance Minister, Mahendra Chaudhry has indicated in a Fiji Village(FV)article that, any demands will not be tolerated.
The excerpt of the FV article:
No Demands Please says Chaudhry
Publish date/time: 15/07/2008 [07:11]
As high powered talks between the interim government and the Ministerial Contact Group is set to get underway this morning, interim Finance Minister Mahendra Chaudhry stressed that no demands from the Group will be tolerated.
Chaudhry told Fijivillage that he is hoping that the members of the Ministerial Contact Group is not coming in just to set demands to hold elections next year.
The Ministerial Contact Group consists of Foreign Affairs Minister of Australia, Stephen Smith, his New Zealand counterpart Winston Peters, Samoan Prime Minister Sailele Tuila'epa, the Tongan Prime Minister Doctor Feleti Sevele and Tuvalu Communications and Tourism Minister Taukelina Finikaso.
The visiting Foreign Ministers Contact Group is also expected to meet with the country's political party leaders.
Ousted Leader of Opposition Mick Beddoes had confirmed that he had been contacted by the Pacific Foreign Affairs office to meet with the Ministerial Contact Group.
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