Bainimarama ignores critics

published by Asianpost on Mon, 04/28/2008 - 17:06

Frank Bainimarama

Fiji’s self-appointed leader Frank Bainimarama will ignore international criticism and push ahead with plans that could see his country’s communal voting system scrapped before next year’s poll.

“Fiji as sovereign state will not be influenced by the international community on what we consider of benefit to our country and her people,” Bainimarama said in a statement.
“If through a process of dialogue and consultations our people are asking for reforms to the electoral system it is the profound duty of the interim government. . . to be responsive and react positively to such calls,” he said.

He said the military coup he led on December 5, 2006 was not a grab for power but a means to bring about changes to restore “true and sustainable democracy.” Bainimarama’s comments came amid criticisms of his government’s plans, revealedlast week, for a forum to discuss the steps needed to change Fiji’s electoral system.

Changing the electoral system would fly in the face of assurances he made last year, when he promised to hold elections in the first quarter of 2009 under Fiji’s current constitution.
In a statement, Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith urged Bainimarama to honour his past promises.“It is essential that the interim government honours its faithful undertaking and commitment,” Smith said.

“Anything that distracts from the holding of elections is counterproductive,” he said. Smith’s comments were shared by New Zealand Foreign Minister Winston Peters and the United States Ambassador to Fiji, Larry Dinger.

“He pledged free and fair elections under the current constitution, with everyone being able to compete, with military accepting the results. That seemed to strike us exactly as the right goals,” Dinger said.

Since seizing power Bainimarama has been a strong critic of Fiji’s communal voting system, which he has described as “institutional racism” that gives too much power to indigenous Fijians.