Coups, globalisation and tough questions for Fiji's future

The General's Goose - three decades of Fiji "coup culture". And what now with the second
post-coup election due this year?

REVIEW: By David Robie of Café Pacific

Historian Dr Robbie Robertson ... challenges "misconceptions"
about the Bainimarama government and previous coups, and asks
fundamental questions about Fiji's future.

When Commodore (now rear admiral retired and an elected prime minister) Voreqe Bainimarama staged Fiji’s fourth “coup to end all coups” on 5 December 2006, it was widely misunderstood, misinterpreted and misrepresented by a legion of politicians, foreign affairs officials, journalists and even some historians.

A chorus of voices continually argued for the restoration of “democracy” – not only the flawed version of democracy that had persisted in various forms since independence from colonial Britain in 1970, but specifically the arguably illegal and unconstitutional government of merchant banker Laisenia Qarase that had been installed on the coattails of the third (attempted) coup in 2000.

Yet in spite of superficial appearances, Bainimarama’s 2006 coup contrasted sharply with its predecessors.

Bainimarama attempted to dodge the mistakes made by Sitiveni Rabuka after he carried out both of Fiji’s first two coups in 1987 while retaining the structures of power.

Instead, notes New Zealand historian Robbie Robertson who lived in Fiji for many years, Bainimarama “began to transform elements of Fiji: Taukei deference to tradition, the provision of golden eggs to sustain the old [chiefly] elite, the power enjoyed by the media and judiciary, rural neglect and infrastructural inertia” (p. 314). But that wasn’t all.

Fiji needs independent watchdog to watch MIDA for future elections

WHILE the Multinational Observer Group’s final report on the first post-coup Fiji general election since 2006 last week found the poll “credible” - as expected based on its preliminary report in spite of the cries of "fraud" by critics - it has offered a raft of recommendations for improvement, including with the news media.

Among these recommendations is a call for an independent watchdog for the controversial Fiji Media Industry Development Authority (MIDA), which had a mixed role during the elections.

Arguing that should MIDA continue its role in future elections, the final MOG report said there was a need for “an independent institution to adjudicate complaints about its actions”.

Citing the 2013 Constitution’s section 17 providing for freedom of “speech, expression and publication”, MOG was in general complimentary about the Fiji news media, saying they “made good efforts to cover the election”.

And thus political parties were “to varying degrees” able to communicate to the public.

Improving Pacific media freedom record … but let’s get real

Pacific press freedom ... maybe not as bloody as elsewhere in the world, but vigilance still needed. Image: AFP/RSF

IT’S GREAT to get some bouquets on media freedom issues instead of brickbacks in the Pacific for a change. But let’s not get carried away. Instead of all the backslapping, what is needed is more vigilance because really it is all about more than watching this space.

Tonga did best in the latest Reporters Sans Frontières World Press Freedom Index, climbing some 19 places to 44th (yes, actually above the United States, but still below the best-paced Pacific island Samoa at 40th).

You would expect a healthy climb during the year, especially with former school teacher and public broadcaster (not to mention publisher of the pro-democracy Koe Kele’a) ‘Akilisi Pohiva finally becoming prime minister of Tonga.

This was an encouraging result in the November 2014 election following the first “democratic” election in 2010.

And it was expected that Fiji would also improve in the rankings after the “return to democracy” election in September – first since the 2006 military coup – flawed though that might be.

From Fiji's dictatorship to 'democracy' – the AUT student team on the job

Mads Anneberg's profile on Ricardo Morris and Repúblika.

THREE STUDENTS from AUT University covered Fiji's historic “from dictatorship to democracy” general election this month.

While the election arguably legitimised Voreqe Bainimarama’s so-called 2006 “coup to end all coups”, the students performed something of a coup themselves.

Not only were they providing the first ever comprehensive coverage of a Pacific national election by a New Zealand journalism school, but their reportage was far superior to much of the Kiwi media that was ill-prepared for the occasion.

In fact, some were unashamedly parachute journos covering a complex event on September 17 that was overshadowed by New Zealand’s own election three days later.

All three students were reporting as a “package” for Pacific Scoop, the course outlet for AUT’s postgraduate Asia-Pacific Journalism course run by the Pacific Media Centre. But while two were on the ground in Fiji, the third was an “anchor” - monitoring, writing and editing stories to provide an overall contextualised story.

A Fiji democratic mandate for the coup leader – what now for the media?

Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum and Rear-Admiral (Ret) Voreqe Bainimarama's Fiji First party is leading the country in the next four years. Photo: Mads Anneberg, an AUT Pacific Media Centre student on internship in Suva with Repúblika Magazine and Pacific Scoop for the elections

By David Robie

IN THE END, it was no real surprise. For 2006 coup leader Josaia Voreqe Bainimarama, who retired recently as the military strongman with the rank of rear admiral, it was a foregone conclusion that he would emerge as the triumphant victor in Fiji’s first general election in almost eight years.

Just as it was inevitable in 1992, when the original coupster - who staged two coups in the same year, 1987 -  Brigadier-General Sitiveni Rabuka made the transition from military backed prime minister to civilian leader.

A major difference is that Rabuka was elected in 1992 on an indigenous supremacy platform of “Fiji for Fijians” while Bainimarama’s Fiji First party is pledged to a multiracial “Fiji for all Fijians”.

The hope is that Bainimarama’s authoritarian streak will gradually mellow and he will come to recognise as an elected leader the critical importance of a civil society discourse with a strong non-government organisation sector and an independent Fourth Estate.

The media was once a proud and feisty part of Fiji democracy. It can achieve that credible status again.

Democracy in Fiji a tender plant – now time to nourish it for the future

The Multinational Observer Group sees Wednesday's general election as a credible expression of “the will of the Fijian voters”. Video: Alistar Kata/Pacific Media Centre/Pacific Scoop

By Fiji affairs columnist and blogger Dr Crosbie Walsh

UNFORTUNATELY, it had to happen but all is not lost.

It started with Fiji Labour Party leader and former Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry – deposed in the 2000 attempted coup – complaining about a minivan showing a Fiji First sticker during the blackout period and another alleged election breach when a disabled voter at St Joseph’s in Suva was assisted by an election officer with no witness present.

Then there were complaints that the counting had stopped when all that had stopped were the announcements, and Radio New Zealand International quoted an unnamed SODELPA official saying its agents had noted anomalies in the transmission and counting of votes, and Fiji Leaks claimed the Multinational Observer Group (MOG) were having “a good holiday in Fiji”.

And then someone calling himself Thakur Loha Singh on a blog said he’d heard of a polling station where the votes of relatives of a candidate mysteriously disappeared and the candidate ending up with a zero vote.”

He said he’d “forewarned political parties of this some time ago.” Not a shred of evidence — but he made sure his prophecy came true.

Fiji elections live blog: Bainimarama takes early lead

Voters in Suva today. Photo: Wansolwara

By Alistar Kata of Pacific Scoop in Suva

PRIME MINISTER Voreqe Bainimarama took an early lead in provisional results in the Fiji general election tonight.

With provisional results from 43 out of 2025 polling stations processed, the Fiji First leader topped the five best-placed candidates with 2339 votes, well ahead of rival SODELPA’s Ro Teimumu Kepa with 628.

But in the party stakes, Fiji First held a narrow lead with 48.3 percent while SODELPA had 42.1 percent.

This is the first election in Fiji since Bainimarama staged a military coup in 2006.

Alistar Kata is a member of the student journalism team covering the Fiji elections as part of their Asia-Pacific Journalism course at the Pacific Media Centre. She is on internship with Wansolwara while her colleagues are Mads Anneberg with the Republika in Suva and Thomas Carnegie and Pacific Media Watch editor Anna Majavu with the PMC in Auckland. 

Their story archive is at Pacific Scoop. Read on with the Live Blog:

Timor-Leste’s Parliament handed ‘humiliating’ defeat over harsh media law

East Timorese journalists raise their hands to approve the Timor-Leste Journalist
Code of Ethics in October 2013. Photo: Tempo Semanal

PACIFIC SCOOP reported this week that East Timor’s Appeal Court had scrapped the country’s draconian new Media Law and sent it back to the National Parliament. The ruling was welcomed with open arms by journalists, foreign correspondents, civil society advocates and democrats.

Problem is that some legal interpretations doing the rounds seem to suggest this isn’t quite the full story. In fact, perhaps, some say, reports “jumped the gun” in suggesting that the court had ruled the law completely “unconstitutional”.

Tempo Semanal, the independent publication run by investigative journalist  José Belo, is probably closer to the mark by saying that parts of the law “violate” the Constitution of Timor-Leste. It is an embarrassing defeat for Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao who had backed the law.

This law is far harsher than the controversial Fiji Media Industry Development Decree imposed by the military-backed regime in Fiji in 2010, which casts a shadow over next month’s election, yet while New Zealand media has had a lot to say about the Fiji media law, it has largely ignored the legislation ushered in by a democracy in Dili.

This is what the Tetum-language Tempo Semanal report said in its stilted English - and the Timor-Leste Press Union, which has been fighting this law from the start, gave a big thumbs-up:

Young reporters offer fresh insights into Pacific 'truths'

REFRESHING to see some younger journos not weighed down by the political baggage of the Asia-Pacific region giving some fresh insights into media challenges - such as Fiji barely a month away from facing its first election in eight years, and also West Papua.

Coup master Voreqe Bainimarama's fleeting visit to New Zealand at the weekend, for the first time since he staged his military putsch in 2006, was crowned by a heady FijiFirst "festival" in Manukau.

Several mainstream media organisations would have us believe that this event was dominated or disrupted by hecklers and protesters.

The truth, unpalatable as it may seem, was actually a resounding success for Bainimarama with most of the 1000 crowd barracking for him, and this was more accurately depicted by Radio Tarana.

A couple of journalists on the Inclusive Journalism Initiative (IJI) programme and Asia-Pacific Journalism course, including a Pasifika broadcast journalist, with a fresh approach, provided a much more balanced and nuanced print story and video report. Well done Alistar Kata and Mads Anneberg!

On a similar theme, Struan Purdie, also at IJI and APJ, filed an excellent report on the realities of media freedom and human rights in the Indonesian-ruled West Papua region. This followed comprehensive and quality news features from Pacific Media Watch editor Anna Majavu. Kudos to you both too!

• Protesters picket Fiji coup-leader's NZ rally
• Media 'freedom' on West Papua exposed
• Two arrested French journalists working on 'freedom' doco
• West Papuan editor appeals for real 'open door' for foreign journalists
• NZ, Jakarta 'colonisers talking to colonisers', says Mana

USP’s attempted gag over media freedom issues stirs international protests

USP protagonists (from left): Acting journalism coordinator and journalism fellow Pat Craddock,
deputy vice-chancellor Dr Esther Williams and journalism lecturer and author
Dr Matt Thompson. Montage: Fijileaks

Café Pacific is on holiday with the publisher looking for “summer” somewhere in western Ireland. But this blog couldn’t stay on hold any longer with all the current shenanigans going on at Fiji’s University of the South Pacific. 

Beleaguered journalism academics Pat Craddock, the acting regional media programme leader who is a New Zealand broadcaster and has long experience at USP and is widely respected on campus, and Australian author, educator and journalist Dr Matt Thompson, have stirred a hornet’s nest in administration circles over the past week because of their frank and defiant talking about media and freedom of speech issues in Fiji. 

The controversy has stirred condemnation by Amnesty International and sparked a column by Roy Greenslade in The Guardian. In the latest statement by Craddock, published by Fijileaks, he has refused to be “silenced” by the university: 

A 'Pacific brand' of journalism? A forthcoming media book tells how

ADVOCATES, campaigners,  journalists and researchers gathered at New Zealand's AUT University today to honour past campaigns for the Nuclear-Free and Independent Pacific Movement (NFIP) and to strategise for the future.

Panel presentations ranged from the US Castle Bravo nuclear test on Bikini Atoll in 1954 - today, March 1, was the 60th anniversary - to the Rongelap Atoll evacuation by Greenpeace in May 1985, the protests against French nuclear testing, the ICAN campaign to abolish all nuclear weapons, the "forgotten struggle" in West Papua, and to the future self-determination vote in Kanaky.

Delegates were also told about a new book being published next month about NFIP issues and journalism - Don't Spoil My Beautiful Face: Media, Mayhem and Human Rights in the Pacific by Pacific Media Centre director and Café Pacific publisher David Robie.

What commentators say:

David Robie has been committed to developing quality journalism in the Pacific, and especially in developing a “Pacific brand” of journalism.
Kalafi Moala, Pasifika Media Association (PASIMA)

Fiji in from the cold - and courted for the asylum seekers ‘Pacific Solution’

THE AUSTRALIAN yesterday featured an “historic come-in-from-the-cold” meeting in Suva between Foreign Minister Julie Bishop with Fiji military-backed regime chief Voreqe Bainimarama in a report by Asia-Pacific affairs editor Rowan Callick.

She revealed to Bainimarama that the past 56 requests for exemptions under the relaxed travel sanctions policy had been granted (except for one on a technicality), with Callick summing up the “warm” meeting like this:

In the Coalition’s most decisive step away from the foreign policy position of the Rudd-Gillard years, it is restoring links with Fiji across the whole of government, including, crucially, defence ties.

Ms Bishop’s meeting with Commodore Bainimarama went for an hour, running overtime.

According to Callick’s report, Fiji’s Foreign Minister, Ratu Inoke Kubuobola, has been "to Australia often, and the government’s second most powerful figure, the Attorney-General, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum, was allowed to travel to Australia over Christmas". Callick wrote:

How media ownership in Fiji chokes the watchdog

Journalists in Suva interviewing Australian Foreign Minister Bob Carr
during his Forum Ministerial Contact Group meeting in Fiji.
Photo: Ministry of Information

By Professor WADAN NARSEY

SINCE 2009, the Fiji regime’s decrees, public stance and prosecutions of media owners, publishers and editors, have effectively prevented the media from being a “watchdog” on government. Some media organisations are now largely propaganda arms for the regime.

[Read the first part of this article at this link for my take on the current performance of the media.]

But it is unfortunate that some critics are targeting journalists, who are minor cogs in the media machine.

The reality is that journalists are totally under the control of editors and publishers, who in turn are ultimately controlled by the media owners.

The real weakness in Fiji’s media industry currently is that Fiji’s media owners are not “dedicated independent media companies”, but corporate entities with much wider business interests which are far more valuable to the media owners than their profits from their media assets.

'Opportunistic, reactionary alliance' - an open letter on Fiji

A one-time outspoken Fiji trade unionist, academic, author and commentator, Scott MacWilliam, who believes in free speech declares in an open letter to the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) president Ged Kearney why he won't be supporting the "Destination Fiji" campaign.

Dear Ged,

UNFORTUNATELY, on this occasion the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) has the situation in Fiji wrong. As offensive as all democrats find a military regime, the party and trade union opposition to the Bainimarama government in Fiji does not have clean hands either.

The trade union officials who are, quite rightly, opposed to many of the restrictions imposed by the regime have been mostly supporters of a political party, the Fiji Labour Party, which is undemocratic, unrepresentative - except of a few cane farmers and long-term party hacks - and definitely not a desirable alternative to the present government. Indeed, the FLP is in the process of forming an electoral alliance with the most reactionary ethnic Fijian/itaukei party which includes all "the born to rule", anti-Indo-Fijian chiefs.  The alliance is purely opportunistic and represents a return to the past which produced the military regime in the first place.

'Safety first for journos', says PINA boss in heated exchange over Fiji media

Michael Sergel's live blog from the Pacific politics forum ... insightful news reports
from him and fellow AUT student journalist Finian Scott have featured on Pacific Scoop.

Discussions on media freedom at the just-ended Pacific Parliamentary and Political Leaders Forum in Wellington have highlighted deep divisions in Fiji media, reports Radio NZ International. Pacific Scoop and Pacific Media Centre Online have comprehensively reported the forum with a team of student journalists who have been running a live blog (see below).

By Johnny Blades of Radio NZ International

FIJI'S GOVERNMENT insists it supports media freedom but has cautioned that it won’t tolerate what it calls misreporting or media coverage which fuels racial division.

But in its 2013 global report, Reporters without Borders says that Fiji journalists still operate under a media decree which imposes the threat of heavy fines or imprisonment as in the case of a recently convicted editor of the Fiji Times.

However Tura Lewai of the Young People’s Concerned Network told delegates at the Wellington forum that media in Fiji is gagged by the point of a gun.

Fiji prisoner beating: 'They treated my son like an animal'

A tearful Viriseini Sanawa tells of the trauma she endured while watching the online video.
Picture: Jone Luvenitoga/Fiji Times

By Nanise Loanakadavu of The Fiji Times

"ISA na luvequ! Oilei turaga! Sa mosi dina na yaloqu, na cava beka e leqa (Oh my son! Oh Lord! My heart is in pain, what is the problem)."

These were words of 42-year-old Viriseini Sanawa, the mother of one of the two handcuffed men being brutalised by a group of men - identified as security forces - in an online video that went viral on Monday night. It is now being investigated by Fiji police.

It was after midday on Wednesday when Sanawa's neighbour called her to watch what they believed was her son being brutalised by the group in the tray of a truck. She said the family did not mention anything about the video until she watched it and confirmed it was her son, Iowane Benedito.

"Isa, koya saraga qo na luvequ. Isa, Iowane na luvequ (That's my son ... Iowane, my son).

Viral 'horror' torture video prompts Fiji Times editorial

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL has called for an independent and transparent investigation into the Fiji assault of two prisoners by apparent plainclothes security forces as a public outcry climbed over brutal torture scenes portrayed in a leaked video.

The global human rights organisation said torture was unacceptable under any circumstances and those responsible for the shocking scenes on the video should be brought to justice.

Police spokesman Inspector Atunaisa Sokomuri said in a press conference in Suva yesterday that the force was disturbed to see the video of what appeared to be the abuse of two men understood to be recaptured prisoners. But added that they were not the fugitives who escaped from Naboro Prison last year.

BRUTAL SCENARIO

Fiji Times EDITORIAL by Fred Wesley
Wednesday, March 6, 2013

AS police investigate the circumstances surrounding a video that shows a group of men brutally assaulting two handcuffed men, a lot of questions will emerge.

Burma’s booming free media big lesson for Fiji

The Burmese regime has decided to "take the bull by the horns and open up the media
arena, with some good results". Why can't Fiji do the same?
Photo: Asian Correspondent.com

FIJI should take note of the recent media transformation in Burma after almost five decades under tight military regime control since the 1962 coup. Apart from dissidents and exiles reporting the "real" stories from within to the outer world, much of the rest of the media had become the docile plaything of the colonels. Not any more. While there is still a long way to go for a free press in Burma, the democratic floodgates have genuinely opened and - surprise, surprise - the media is booming. Café Pacific reckons the Bainimarama regime should open up and encourage a return to a genuinely "free" media (by abolishing the Media Decree) as the country prepares for the lead up to the 2014 general election.

By U Myint Thin in The Irrawaddy

Irrawaddy's U Myint-Thin ... pseudonym for a
Thai columnist. Graphic: Irrawwaddy

MEDIA development is a serious business in Burma. After the government in Naypyidaw decided to open up the country, it picked media as a top priority. For the past 15 months, media development has been the most exciting area which is being closely watched by the international community.

Literally every international media assistance programme has now established a presence inside Burma, offering training and workshops and drafting various media development plans. UNESCO has spearheaded efforts to promote press freedom inside Burma using its vast experience from other developing countries.

For the first time, the country will celebrate World Press Freedom Day on May 3 to herald new media freedom inside the country.

Judicial High Noon for Fiji Times leaves media ‘independence’ teetering

Fiji Times chief editor Fred Wesley ... suspended jail sentence. Photo: Media Freedom in the Pacific
video frame/Cafe Pacific

HARD on the heels of a new decree by Fiji’s military-backed regime effectively gagging reporting about political parties no longer officially “registered”, the country’s most influential newspaper Fiji Times has been clobbered judicially. It has paid a tough price - including a F$300,000 fine and suspended jail sentence for the editor - for “scandalising” the judiciary over reprinting a story from a national New Zealand Sunday newspaper on its sport pages.

“Within Fiji's media industry it is expected that this heavy fine will knock the publication out of business,” writes Fairfax’s Michael Field, a long-time critic of the regime. The draconian 2010 Fiji Media Industry Development Decree, although not involved in this contempt of court case, was widely believed to be aimed at the Fiji Times group, especially a punitive curb aimed at divesting foreign ownership to a maximum of 10 percent. This forced Rupert Murdoch’s Sydney-based News Limited group to cut its losses and sell out completely in 2010 to one of the newspaper's long-standing Fiji directors, Mahendra “Mac” Patel and his Motibhai Group.

“Is ‘Mac” Patel  a fit and proper person to preside over the stewardship of Fiji’s oldest newspaper, founded in Levuka in 1869?,” asks Grubsheet columnist Graham Davis, a media advocate for the regime, noting the businessman had already served a year-long jail sentence for abuse of office when he was chairman of Fiji Post. “The continuing drama at the Fiji Times still has a long way to go.”

RSF media freedom index warns on Fiji, PNG, praises 'Burmese spring'

An archive video of a Paris protest action by RSF over the violence against journalists in Syria. Video: RSF

THREATS to the media in the South Pacific should not be taken lightly in two Melanesian countries, says the Paris-based global press freedom advocacy group Reporters Sans Frontières.

Papua New Guinea has dropped six places to 41st in the latest RSF World Press Freedom Index with the security forces being "regularly involved in attacks on journalists".

 In Fiji, in spite of a 10-place rise to 107th - "explained in part by the decline of other countries in this section of the index, news organisations are threatened under the Media Industry Development Decree with exorbitant fines, or even imprisonment, as in the case of a recently convicted editor of The Fiji Times".

Elsewhere in the South Pacific did not rate a mention in the report, which highlighted the "Burmese spring" in the Asia-Pacific region.

But among other Pacific Islands Forum countries, New Zealand rose five places to eighth and Australia climbed four places to 26th.

Burma was an exception to decline in freedom of information in Asia.

Source: Pacific Media Watch 8187

• RSF World Press Freedom Index