Ossie awards featured in the Panpa Bulletin, February 2021.
By Mark Pearson
The United States has its Pulitzer prizes. Australia has the Walkleys. And journalism education in the region has the Ossies, the Journalism Education Association’s awards recognising excellent journalism produced by students.
The JEA [now JERAA] is Australia-based and most of its members teach at the numerous journalism programs throughout the nation, although each year several students from New Zealand and the Pacific enter the awards.
The awards are named after journalist Osmar S White and are funded from his estate through the generosity of his daughter, journalist and author Sally A White.
Despite the overwhelming Australian membership of the JEA, the awards announced at the association’s annual conference on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast in December 2000 were dominated by entrants from the Pacific and New Zealand.
Reggie Dutt, editor of USP’s highly commended Wansolwara and an editor on the award-winning Pacific Journalism Online. Image: Frontline Reporters video screenshot/USP
Journalism students from the University of the South Pacific under the leadership of course coordinator David Robie won two of the major awards and were highly commended in four others for their reporting of the 2000 Fiji coup.
Leading industry personnel judged the awards, and all praised the efforts of the University of the South Pacific students for their coverage of the coup.
Category judge deputy editor of The Age Online, Mike van Niekirk, said the student journalists working on the publication rose to the challenge of providing high quality reports of a dramatic international news event on their doorstep.
“They did so in challenging circumstances and by providing these reports on the internet they were one of the few sources of information at critical times of the events taking place,” he wrote in his judge’s comments.
“As such, the quality of the writing is of a high standard for students. Taken as a body of work it is very impressive.”
The Wansolwara “one ocean – one people” fish with a camera logo.
There are 12 categories in all.
Sean Scanlon from the University of Canterbury in New Zealand won the award for best print feature for a postgraduate student as well as the JEA executive’s prize for best story in any medium.
The Pacific students’ website Pacific Journalism Online devoted to the daily coverage of the coup won the Dr Charles Stuart Prize for best student publication in any medium while the Pacific students’ print edition Wansolwara was a awarded a highly commended in the same category.
Pacific Journalism Online also won the award for best regular publication.
The Pacific theme continued, with the University of Queensland’s East Timor project highly commended in the best student publication category.
Front page of the June 2000 Fiji coup edition of the USP student journalist newspaper Wansolwara.
Lyn Barnier of the University of Newcastle won the best print news story. Losana McGowan of the University of the South Pacific was highly commended in the category. Judge Chris McLeod, editorial development manager at the Herald and Weekly Times, Melbourne, said the student found herself at the centre of a world-class story: “Her report was a very good descriptive piece about a meeting between students and coup leader George Speight, capturing the feelings of the young people whose safety obviously was at risk.”
The University of the South Pacific also featured in the high commendations for the best television news story category, with a piece by student Christine Gounder on Fiji soldiers contracting malaria while on tour of duty in East Timor. Gounder presented a balanced report on a newsworthy issue and explored its implications on a national basis, said judge Katherine Swan, a journalist with the ABC in Melbourne. She awarded first prize to Mia Scacciante from Queensland University of Technology for a story on the republic referendum in Australia.
Swan also judged the award for best television current affairs by an undergraduate student, which went to Tracey Galloway of the University of the Southern Queensland for a report on battery hens.
The first of the Ossie awards to go to Pacific students . . . the 1995 award for best publication went to UPNG’s Uni Tavur, supervised by David Robie.
News director at K Rock, Geelong, Rob McLennan, juged the best radio news story category, won by Michelle Fraser of the University of Queensland. Tamani Nair of the University of the South Pacific, who “handled a risky situation” with his coverage of the Fiji coup’s first day was highly commended.
Dr Mark Pearson, professor of journalism at Bond University, Queensland, writes a regular “Research and Education” column for the Panpa Bulletin (this publication changed its name to The Newspaper Works in 2012).
The 2000 Fiji coup front man George Speight (left), now serving a life sentence in jail for the attempted putsch. In the background is journalist Jo Nata, who was also imprisoned for his role in the coup. Image: Joe Yaya, Pacific Journalism Online/Pacific Journalism Review
By David Robie
Abstract:On 19 May 2000, an insurrection led by failed businessman George Speight and seven renegade members of the élite 1st Meridian Squadron special forces engulfed the Fiji Islands in turmoil for the next three months. Speight and his armed co-conspirators stormed Parliament and seized the Labour-led Mahendra Chaudhry government hostage for 56 days. On Chaudhry’s release from captivity, he partly blamed the media for the overthrow of his government. Some sectors of the media were accused of waging a bitter campaign against the Fiji Labour Party-led administration and its rollback of privatisation. In the early weeks of the insurrection, the media enjoyed an unusually close relationship with Speight and the hostage-takers, raising ethical questions. Dilemmas faced by Fiji and foreign journalists were more complex than during the 1987 military coups. As Fiji faces a fresh general election in August 2001, this article examines the reportage of the Coalition government’s year in office, media issues over coverage of the putsch, and a controversy over the author’s analysis presented at a Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference in Australia.
THE GOVERNMENT of kidnapped Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry, Fiji’s only Indo-Fijian prime minister in thirty years of independence, achieved economic success in its one year in office. Indo-Fijians make up a minority 44 percent of the island nation’s 800,000 population. But on Friday, 19 May 2000, failed businessman and kailoma (part-Fijian) George Speight, along with seven renegade soldiers from the élite 1st Meridian Squadron forces stormed Parliament and took the Chaudhry government hostage in the name of “indigenous Fijian supremacy”. “We’re not going to apologise to anybody and we’re not going to step back, and we’re not going to be daunted by accusations of racism, or one-sidedness,” Speight declared. “At the end of the day, it is about the supreme rights of our indigenous people in Fiji, the desire that it be returned — wholesome and preserved for the future.” (Robie, 2000a: 19)
Many of Speight’s group, like their leader, had dubious reputations:only five days before the coup, Speight appeared in Suva’s High Court on charges of extortion. He also had a grievance against Chaudhry’s government for his dismissal as chief executive from Fiji Hardwood Corporation Ltd, and also from Fiji Pine Ltd. Chiefly associates stood to lose lucrative timber deals if Chaudhry had remained in office.
However, Speight essentially achieved his aims, before releasing his key hostages: purported abrogation of the multiracial 1997 Constitution, written after the coup of 1987 and replacing the 1990 Constitution which enshrined “Fijian paramountcy” (but kept Fiji excluded from the Commonwealth); the de facto resignation of the 80-year-old President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara; a non-elected indigenous administration; and an amnesty for the kidnappers. (The core group was later charged with treason, a capital offence in Fiji). Meanwhile, the country was plunged into economic chaos.
A year after the attempted coup, a military installed interim régime declared illegal by the Fiji Court of Appeal on 1 March 2001 had been reinstated by President Josefa Iloilo as a caretaker government to steer the country uncertainly towards a general election on August 26; hundreds of impoverished families were “living in atrocious conditions … because of the madcap escapades of George Speight and his goons” (Turaga, 2001); preliminary treason court hearings had been opened against 12 alleged plotters; and Suva newspaper retrospectives were reluctant to look too closely at controversy over the media’s performance during the crisis.
The cover of the “coup coup land: The press and the putsch” article edition of Asia Pacific Media Educator, 2001.
When Chaudhry was released from captivity on July 14, he partly blamed the media for the overthrow of his government (Fiji One News, 2000). Some sectors of the media were alleged to have waged a bitter campaign against the People’s Coalition Government and its rollback of privatisation in the year after the Fiji Labour Party-led coalition had been elected in a landslide victory in May 1999 (Pacific Journalism Review, 2000: 134-164). In the early weeks of the insurrection, the media enjoyed an unusually close relationship with Speight and the hostage-takers, raising ethical questions (see Field; Parkinson; Robie,2000b).
This article examines the media controversy leading up to the putsch, the coverage of the crisis itself and analyses the role of the media as a factor in the upheaval. It also considers political sympathies of journalists, news organisations, and a hostile response from some media industry executives in Fiji to an earlier version of this article delivered at the Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference at Mooloolaba, Queensland, in December.
Fiji Islands and the media
Fiji has a highly developed media industry compared with most other Pacific countries. Until 2000, it had four major monthly or bimonthly news magazine groups, Islands Business International, Pacific Islands Monthly (PIM) (Murdoch), The Review and Fiji First (both locally owned). However, Fiji First faded from the public eye and PIM, the region’s oldest and for many years the most influential magazine, announced its closure a month after the putsch. Islands Business was relaunched as the southern edition of Pacific Magazine in January 2000 after a merger with the Hawai’i-based publisher, Pacific Basin Communications. The three daily newspapers are the Rupert Murdoch-owned Fiji Times (circulation reportedly up to 55,000 during the Fiji crisis but usually around 32,000 week days) and the struggling Fiji government-owned Daily Post, with a third daily, The Sun, which was launched in September 1999. (The Sun is owned by a consortium of Indo-Fijian importers, C J Patel and Co Ltd and Vinod Patel and Co Ltd, and the flagship company of Fiji’s caretaker régime, Fijian Holdings Ltd.) The two smaller dailies do not have independently audited sales, but are both believed to sell around 6000 copies a day. Broadcasters are Fiji Television Ltd, which has one free-to-air channel and two pay channels; the private Communications Fiji Ltd (FM96) radio group; and the state-owned Fiji Broadcasting Corporation. The Daily Post and The Review news magazine share a website, FijiLive, while The Fiji Times is hosted at FM96’s Fiji Village website.
On 15 May 1987, Lieutenant-Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka’s régime ordered both newspapers, The Fiji Times and the original Fiji Sun, to stop publishing indefinitely while armed troops and police occupied the two offices. The next day, May 16, became the first time (apart from once during a hurricane in January 1986) in more than a century that The Fiji Times was not published. The military régime began a purge of political critics and opponents by arresting them without charge. The Fiji Sun, jointly owned by the Hongkong-based Sally Aw Sian publishing empire and New Zealand publisher Philip Harkness, eventually closed
rather than publish under self-censorship restrictions.
There was an exodus of experienced journalists from Fiji after the Rabuka coups. At the start of the Speight attempted coup, the bulk of Fiji journalists were young, relatively untrained and with limited experience. The median age of journalists was 22 with a large bulge in the 21-25 age group. Almost half of Fiji journalists (47 percent) had no professional or educational qualifications at all, and the median experience was 2.5 years. (Robie, 1999a)
Chaudhry and the media
In May 1999, the Fiji Labour Party won the largest electoral mandate since the country became independent in 1970. After more than a decade as an opposition leader and robust trade union leader, and a seemingly good working relationship with journalists, Mahendra Chaudhry got off on the wrong foot with the media industry virtually from the day he took office. The appointment of his son, Rajendra, as his Private Secretary deeply damaged his credibility with the media and the public. Political commentator Jone Dakuvula observes that the Coalition government was on the defensive from day one: “There was no honeymoon period” (Dakuvula, 2000a). But Chaudhry and the People’s Coalition had the most concern over The Fiji Times, arguably the country’s most influential news organisation. Over the next few months, The Fiji Times appeared to wage a campaign against the fledgling government. According to deposed National Planning Minister Dr Ganesh Chand, an economist and former academic at the University of the South Pacific:
One of their lines was that we were not delivering our manifesto immediately; numerous editorials were written on this, and the general tenor of the articles, the locations, the pictures, focus, and most of all, the inaccuracies, all were anti-government. I complained to the [Fiji], Media Council (1) numerous times and judgements against The Fiji Times began coming out. (Chand, 2000.)
According to researcher Nwomye Obini of USP’s Department ofDevelopment Studies, who conducted a content analysis of Fiji Times coverage on the Chaudhry government’s year in office and the coup, the newspaper “bombarded” the prime minister with problems in both editorials and news reports in contrast to previous governments (Obini, 2000).
As the date of the coup approached, the tension grew day by day. Nurses kept making threats, and finally went on strike on May 12, a week before the coup … A rift was even reported between the Commissioner of Police and the Prime Minister. (Ibid.: 15)
Michael Field, a veteran Pacific Affairs reporter for Agence France-Presse news agency, considers several events were covered with a “fixed” approach which encouraged an unfairly negative impression of the Coalition.
One was the infamous tea lady incident which helped create an air, I suppose, of corruption or immorality in the newly elected government. My own view of this was that it was something of a setup job in which the media went along for the ride, and may have, in the longer run, helped to destabilise the government . . . (Field, 2000a)
Field also makes the point that the election result was “remarkably clear but the media, or elements of it, were reluctant to accept it”. Some sections of the media were in his view “arrogantly anti-democratic”. Also, some of the journalistic decision-making was personal. Dakuvula regards The Fiji Times as an example of a newspaper which was “blatantly antagonistic” towards the government:
The agenda of The Fiji Times was to delegitimise the elected government by creating a climate of scandal, loathing and fear so the Fiji Labour Party, at least, would not be able to effectively implement its manifesto. (Dakuvula, 2000b)
Part of the blame lay with the Coalition government itself. There was no evidence that the administration tried to develop a media strategy to establish positive relationships with journalists and use contemporary “spin” techniques to sell its reforms to the public. But sociologist Dr Sitiveni Ratuva argues that the Chaudhry government’s poor relationship with the media was a weakness shared with the previous Rabuka administration.
Both governments had information ministers who did not know how to handle public relations matters, especially how to deal with the media. They were both confrontational. The media’s response also took the same line — confrontational. The media portrayed Rabuka and company as corrupt and inefficient and Chaudhry as arrogant and anti-Fijian. (Ratuva, 2000)
According to Ratuva, the portrayal of Chaudhry basically fed into the rising tide of ethno-nationalist mobilisation. Although the media did not create the conditions for the ethno-nationalist upsurge, it did provide the nationalists with the “legitimacy” to roll on. For media analyst Pramila Devi, this was nothing new. In a paper almost a decadee arlier, analysing the 1992 general election campaign, she had found both The Fiji Times and the Daily Post practised “self-censorship” with a “bias towards a certain ideology”:
It is the same ideology that is shared by the [Great] Council of Chiefs, the military, the Soqosoqo ni Vakavulewa ni Taukei (SVT) and large segments of the ethnic Fijian population. That putting this ideology in practice relegates half of Fiji’s population to a third-class citizenry did not matter. (Devi, 1992: 35)
Decisions by the Chaudhry government not to renew the work permit for reappointed Fiji Times editor-in-chief, Russell Hunter, a former senior journalist on The Australian, and to block Canadian Ken Clark’s work permit after he was appointed chief executive of Fiji Television Ltd — both cases leading to legal action — alienated the media from government (2). Another important factor was the commercial interests of large businesses, major advertisers and corporate opponents of the Coalition government’s efforts at rolling back the privatisation policies adopted by the Rabuka government.
As the Government’s relationship soured further, “payback” time finally came for the press. Chaudhry chose an invitation by the Media Council to launch the Fiji General Media Code of Ethics and Practice on 26 October 1999 to deliver an extraordinary speech damning the Fiji news media generally, singling out three media organisations and prominent individual journalists.
Chaudhry indicated that his government was considering establishing a “swift justice” media tribunal to provide remedies in defamation cases. Moves were also considered to licence foreign-owned media with an annual fee of $20,000. (The Sun, 1999a)
The tribunal proposal, in particular, prompted Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) president William Parkinson to complain: “[Chaudhry’s] attacks against the media were draconian to say the least.We have not had those threats made since the military government in 1987” (Ibid.) Parkinson, managing director of Communications (Fiji) Ltd, owners of FM96 in Fiji and stakeholders in radio stations in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, said he was seriously concerned. Chaudhry questioned whether international media and local media were suffering a “crisis of ethics” and falling credibility.
When day after day a particular reporter writes nothing but anti-government stories with facts manipulated and distorted to discredit and embarrass the government, one is left in little doubt as to what the agenda of the particular reporter is. (Chaudhry, 1999)
Senior political reporter Margaret Wise, who has close links with the party founded by former coup leader and prime minister Sitiveni Rabuka, Soqosoqo Ni Vakavulewa Ni Taukei (SVT), was clearly the journalist Chaudhry had in mind. He named her later in the speech. Wise has been publicly questioned over her style of journalism (see Robie, 1999c: 115), alleged partisan beliefs, accusations of “skirt journalism” tactics, and close ties with Rabuka. So-called skirt journalism was given public prominence by Weekend newspaper publisher Josefa Nata over a series of exposés about women in Rabuka’s life when another prominent journalist was named (3). Hinting that the newspaper could be breaching the Public Order Act, Chaudhry said:
The matter is even more serious than a breach of media ethics and my government is quite concerned at what is happening. Is The Fiji Times carrying the torch for people engaged in seditious activities? The newspaper needs to take a serious look at where it is headed. Is it not fanning the fires of sedition and communalism by giving undue prominence to stories that are really non-stories (Chaudhry, 1999)
Reaction was confined to defensive statements from media industry people, but with no initial publication of the speech. Nor did the media canvas civil society opinions. The government responded to what it called “media hysteria” with eight-page advertisements— including the speech — in both The Sun and Daily Post, costing $16,000 at taxpayers’ expense. (Fiji Sun, 2000). The Fiji Times voluntarily published Chaudhry’s speech after four days and responded with a two-page editorial. Describing the speech as a “rambling diatribe riddled with contradictions, half truths and untruths,” the editorial added:
Chaudhry has been escalating his attacks on the media — in particular the country’s most successful news organisation, The Fiji Times — in an effort to create a climate in which the public would besoftened up for his draconian legislation. (Fiji Times, 1999)
However, the self-interest of media responses did not go unnoticed by the president of the Fiji chapter of Transparency International, Ikbal Jannif: “It seems to me that media wants accountability — for everyone except itself.” (Jannif, 1999: 164).
The coup coverage
After putschist Speight and his gunmen kidnapped the Coalition government, it was astonishing how “captive the journalists were to Speight” (see Robie, 2000b, 2000d; Parkinson; Woodley; Field 2000b). In a sense they were hostages too, even providing a human shield at times of confrontation between the rebel group and the military at
checkpoints: “The media pack offered Speight a profile and credibility — it aided the rebel leader’s propaganda war.”
Even though essentially it was a struggle for power within the indigenous Fijian community, and a conflict between tradition and modernity, the inevitable polarisation of races undermined objectivity. It was apparent to then Daily Post editor Jale Moala that many local reporters had become “confused by the heightened emotion at the time, the use of emotive language and the pleadings of the opposing forces”, as they were drawn into different sides. (Moala, 2000) This, he recalls, was true of both indigenous Fijian and Indo-Fijian reporters.
Fear may have also played a role. As a result, the perpetrators of the terrorist action, led by George Speight, received publicity that at the time seemed to legitimise their actions and their existence. Some argued that the situation may not have deteriorated as quickly as it did if the media had played a more responsible role. But therein lies one of the dilemmas of Pacific Islands political journalism: the extended family system, the tribal and chiefly system and customary obligations may blur the view of the journalist, especially if he or she is indigenous. (Moala, 2001: 125-126)
Moala (Ibid.: 127) points to an example of a Fijian journalist falling foul of a high chief. Josefa Nata, an investigative journalist and journalism trainer who had “cut his teeth” at the original Fiji Sun newspaper, exposed the business dealings of Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, who at the time had been Fiji’s prime minister since independence from Britain in 1970. He was treated as an outcast. Nata later gained notoriety as Speight’s media spin doctor and is now on Nukulau prison isle awaiting trial for treason (4).
For Moala, lack of leadership in some newsrooms was a significant factor. Observed Michael Field: “I left [Fiji, after two months, and as the longest-serving foreign reporter] wondering how much of the coup and its twists and turns was the product of the media itself”. (Field, 2000c) International journalists highlighted the inexperience of some local journalists. According to The Australian’s Brian Woodley:
They got on with reporting the story, a corps of dedicated youngsters with hardly a gram of experience among them. Most are not long out of high school. (Woodley, 2000)
Indeed, there was a steep learning curve for Fiji journalists but with many showing remarkable courage and commitment. It was a harrowing and testing time for the country’s media — the dilemmas were far more complex than during the 1987 coups. Radio Fiji’s general manager (public broadcasting) Francis Herman said: “Our journalists have been threatened, abused, beaten, had stones thrown at them — it goes with the job”. (Herman, 2000) But it was also a time when professionalism needed to rise another notch. Moala considered some reporters stayed too long in the parliamentary complex, “making the outside world believe they were enjoying the hospitality of the terrorists and becoming too familiar with them” (Moala, 2001: 129)
At times, there was strong sympathy among some journalists for the “cause”, even among senior editorial executives. There was tension between the role of “objective” journalist and an instinctive feeling about what should happen in the country.
One of the news organisations that drafted a policy to cope with the crisis was the Daily Post. It covered the putsch with perhaps greater caution than some other local media. In the early stages, the newspaper established guidelines for reporters, photographers and subeditors. Along with the code, it sought greater emphasis on the “effects” of the crisis on the people and the economy and downplayed events inside the parliamentary complex. Guidelines were not formally written, in case they got into the hands of rebels and became a source of threats or reprisals as happened in the trashing of Fiji Television on 28 November 2000 (Robie 2000b: 8). The guidelines:
The newspaper would not use the word “coup” in its coverage.
The events of May 19 would be reported as a kidnapping and hostage crisis; George Speight was to be reported as either the leader of the kidnappers, the gunmen or the hostage takers, but never as “coup leader” to avoid giving him legitimacy in the minds of indigenous Fijians.
The group who stormed Parliament were to be described as “gunmen”, “terrorists” and “kidnappers”.
Use of photographs of George Speight and his supporters inside the parliamentary complex were to be restricted to avoid giving them too much publicity.
George Speight was never to be described as a nationalist working for indigenous Fijian interests; he was to be reported as Suva businessman George Speight, leader of the kidnappers, or leader of the terrorists. (Moala, 2001: 131)
Some news media regularly switched reporters covering events inside the parliamentary complex to prevent them getting too close to the rebels. But in spite of precautions taken by news media groups to defend their integrity — FM96 ran editorial policy notices on air, effectively saying “trust us” — news media credibility was eroded. A senior executive and two news staff of Radio Fiji by the military were detained by the military on October 20 in an attempt to intimidate them into revealing their sources about a major split in the military. Although the highly sensitive news story itself was evidently wellsourced — demonstrated by a mutiny two weeks later on November 2, claiming the lives of eight soldiers — it lacked balance, such as official comment.
Deposed minister Dr Ganesh Chand accused The Fiji Times of destabilising the Coalition government during its one year in office before being ousted by “waging a war” through articles and the courts when the government refused to extend editor-in-chief Russell Hunter’s work permit; losing most complaints lodged by his government with the Fiji Media Council (1); of employing a senior journalist alleged to have close relationships with two prominent political personalities; and of its northern reporter “riding around with rebels” at Labasa on Vanua Levu Island. (Coalition, 2000) Publisher Alan Robinson described the attack as “grossly defamatory”, adding that the allegations “contained not the tiniest grain of truth”. (Fiji Times, 2000a) The following day, The Fiji Times published a front page story, alleging that police were investigating the “stripping” of government-owned furniture and other household goods from Chand’s state home. (Fiji Times, 2000b) Chand filed a defamation writ against the newspaper. (High Court, 2000) and the police investigation was dropped.
In another incident, two journalists based in Labasa were arrested. The Fiji Times and Radio Fiji’s northern correspondents were charged on November 13 with unlawful assembly and unlawful use of a motor vehicle over the seizure of a military barracks by rebels. (Pacific Media Watch, 2000). They were publicly defended by their editors, but it took almost six months before the charges were eventually withdrawn on May 11.
The media response
After this paper was originally presented at the JEA conference on December 6, a PINA Nius Online email report misrepresenting the paper was distributed to Pacific newspapers five days later, stirring up a “political storm” (see Café Pacific, 2001). A campaign of bitter personal attacks against the author followed on the JEANet and Penang Commonwealth editors email listserves over the next two weeks. A two-page article published in Pacific magazine presented the furore as a 12-round “boxing match” fought out on the internet, heavily slanted in favour of The Fiji Times and PINA (Pacific, 2001). The magazine cited a formal complaint by the newspaper’s expatriate publisher and editor-in-chief to the University of the South Pacific, alleging “manufactured ‘evidence’ to establish an erroneous conclusion” (rejected by the university). The magazine did not interview the author or seek a copy of the paper, nor did it canvas views of other media commentators supporting the analysis.
The author replied to the attacks in an interview with Myra Mortensen broadcast on Radio Australia’s Pacific Beat, saying it was an irony that news organisations claiming to support media freedom were trying to gag a journalism academic. (Radio Australia, 2000) New Zealand Herald columnist Gordon McLauchlan wrote that USP had courageously “upheld academic freedom and firmly opposed this deplorable attempt at censorship by journalists” (McLauchlan, 2001) Rejecting The Fiji Times criticisms and protesting against Pacific magazine’s misrepresentations, Association of University of the South Pacific Staff (AUSPS) spokesperson Associate Professor Scott MacWilliam said in a letter to the editor:
AUSPS is concerned that while The Fiji Times and other news organisations purport to support the freedom to express opinions, such opinions are only acceptable if they sustain the same organisations’ views of themselves. (MacWilliam, 2001)
While the author’s main arguments were never published in the Fiji media, other views of foreign journalists who do not live in Fiji but which supported The Fiji Times/PINA perspective were (see The Sun, 2001a, 2001b; Daily Post, 2001). Reprisals were threatened against the journalism programme at USP, but there is no evidence that students suffered from the controversy. USP journalism students had also covered the crisis, winning Ossie Awards for their efforts, and graduates are employed at 15 news organisations across the Pacific (Robie, 2000d)
On the anniversary of the attempted coup, Fiji newspapers were reluctant to debate the shortcomings of crisis coverage. In the only article published examining the media and the coup, The Sun’s Samisoni Pareti cited two diplomats as supporting the view that coverage was “not that bad”. However, Mary-Louise O’Callaghan, writing in The Australian, had earlier questioned whether the local press should bear some of the responsibility for the political turmoil that had engulfed the South Pacific. (O’Callaghan, 2000) Remarked Michael Field in The Fiji Times: “The problem is that in Fiji there are more and more politicians, supported by a cabal in the local media that makes war on other reporters, who say they are not part of this world and wish to be left alone.” (Field, 2001)
The media climate after the general election in May 1999 arguably carried some responsibilty for misconceptions about the People’s Coalition Government in Fiji. No journalist seriously analysed the manifesto of the Fiji Labour Party in order to help public understanding of what the government had pledged to do. It had been the intention of the Coalition government to publish a special supplement in The Fiji Times marking its achievements after one year in office. However, the supplement, dated May 20, the day after the putsch took place, was dumped. The only serious analysis of the deposed government’s performance was written by Fiji Times features editor Bernadette Hussain and published in a USP journalism programme training newspaper (Wansolwara, 2000b) and matched by Agence France-Presse.
Hussain concluded that the Coalition government had been seriously misrepresented. Outlining many of the achievements — such as scholarships and an integrated village development project totalling F$12 million for affirmative action; reducing the cost of living for poor people of all races by removing customs duty and value added tax for essential food items such as rice, flour, cooking oil, tinned fish, powdered milk and tea; and increasing welfare allocations for the disadvantaged from F$3.3 million to $11 million — it was clear that the government was “genuinely concerned about the plight” of ordinary citizens. In the nine months since Hussain’s article, few journalists have attempted to analyse the privatisation policies reasserted by the Qarase government without a mandate. The best éxpose has been a 53-minute video documentary, In the Name of Growth, about the exploitation of indigenous women workers by an indigenous company, the PAFCO
tuna canning plant at Levuka. This was made by filmmaker ‘Atu Emberson-Bain, a deposed Labour senator and former USP academic. (Emberson-Bain, 2001)
Conclusion
Critics regard The Fiji Times, in particular, as having had a hostile editorial stance towards the Chaudhry Government. In spite of claims that it has treated all governments similarly, the newspaper is viewed by critics as antagonistic and arrogant. The focus of news media coverage after the election was to play up conflict. Politics were portrayed as an arena of conflict between the new multiracial reformist government and the conservative indigenous opposition. Coverage did not improve after the Qarase régime consolidated its hold on power. In contrast with media coverage after the 1987 coups, democratic values were not so vigorously defended.
While the news media was fairly diligent, and at times courageous when reporting hard news developments, and the views of prominent politicians, and political parties during the conflict, it was not so effective at covering civil society’s perspectives. Fiji lacks enough critically thinking journalists who can provide in-depth, perceptive and balanced articles and commentaries. Most serious commentaries and analysis during the crisis were provided by non-journalists.
The political scene in Fiji is still highly uncertain and there are confusing scenarios about the result of the forthcoming election, even rumours of a further coup should the Fiji Labour Party retain a majority. It is critical that the Fiji news media maintain independent coverage of political and socio-economic developments. But it is also equally vital that independent journalists, media commentators and academics sustain critical assessments of the role of the media in the wake of the putsch and in future nation-building.
Notes
1. Adjudications were made by the [Fiji] Media Council over three complaints
by Dr Chand against The Fiji Times and two against Fiji Television. In the case of the three complaints against The Fiji Times, No 90 on 11 November 1999 was upheld, No 101 (undated, 2000) partially upheld, and No 102 (undated, 2000) dismissed; however both complaints against Fiji Television (Nos 99 and 100, undated) were upheld.
2. Ken Clark was eventually granted a two-year work permit, although he was on a three-year contract; Russell Hunter returned to Fiji in August 2000 on a further three-year-contract after he appealed to the interim authorities.
3. The term “skirt journalism” in Fiji implies the use of sexual relations to gain privileged information from politicians. For other accounts of examples of alleged skirt journalism, see Jo Nata (1994), “Why we did not publish: The other woman”, The Weekender; “Rabuka and the Reporter,” Pacific Journalism Review (1994), 1 (1) 20-22; Jale Moala (2001). “Political reporting and editorial balance”, p 133, in David Robie (ed.), The Pacific Journalist: A Practical Guide.
4. Jo Nata is also former coordinator of the Fiji Journalism Institute, the training
arm of the Fiji Islands Media Association (FIMA), which has been defunct
since 1998 amid controversy over its donor-provided funds.
References Café Pacific (2001), “The Press and the Putsch controversy”: www.asiapac.org.fj/cafepacific/resources/aspac/fiji3148.html Chand, Dr Ganesh (2000), Email interview with the author, November 27. Chaudhry, Mahendra (1999), “Fiji news media faces crisis of ethics?”, in “Chaudhry and the Fiji Media”, Pacific Journalism Review, January 2000, 6 (1) 134-146. Coalition (2000), Press release: “Journalists implicated in terrorism”, August 21. Dakuvula, Jone (2000a), “Barrett and lessons of May 19”. Fiji’s Daily Post, November 30, p 5. — (2000b), Interview with the author, November 17. Daily Post (2001), “The strange saga of Speight’s siege”, by Graeme Dobell, April 29, 2001. Devi, Pramila (1992). Print Media in Fiji: Fostering Democracy or Ethnocracy? Fiji Institute of Applied Studies, Research Report No 2.
Emberson-Bain, ‘Atu (2001), In the Name of Growth. [Video]. Suva: Infocus Productions.
Field, Michael (2000a), Email interview with the author, November 26.
— (2000b), “Clueless in coup coup land,” The Fiji Times, June 30, p 7.
— (2000c)), “Farewell to coup coup land,” The Fiji Times, August 8, p 7.
— (2001), “Return to coup coup land”, The Fiji Times, May 19, p 33. Fiji One News (2000), News item, July 14.
Herman, Francis (2000), Unpublished interview with Phil Thornton, June 11.
Jannif, Ikbal (1999), “Transparency and the Fiji news media,” in Pacific Journalism Review, 2000, 6 (1) 158-164.
High Court of Fiji (2000), Writ of Summons, “Chand v Fiji Times Ltd and Margaret Wise”, September 20. Islands Business (1999), Editorial, November.
MacWilliam, Scott (2001), “Getting the facts straight — and more”, letter to the
editor, Pacific magazine, April, p 6.
McLauchlan, Gordon (2001), “I’m staying away from Fiji until …”, Weekend Herald, February 17-18, p A23.
Moala, Jale (2000), Email interview with the author, November 13.
— (2001). “Political reporting and editorial balance,” 125-143, chapter in Robie, David (ed.) The Pacific Journalist: A Practical Guide. Suva: Journalism Programme, University of the South Pacific.
Obini, Nwomye (2000), “Coup 2000: Responsible Journalism: The Fiji Times?”, Unpublished research paper, 63 pp.
Pareti, Samisoni (2001), “Media and the coup”, The Sun, May 19, p 25. Pacific Journalism Review (2000). “Chaudhry and the Fiji media”, in the “Blood on the Cross” edition. 6 (1) 135-165. Pacific Magazine (2001), “New Zealand academic stirs up Pacific storm”,
February, pp 42-43. Pacific Media Watch (2000), “3108: Journalists charged for ‘associating with
rebels’,” November 14: www.usp.ac.fj/journ/nius/docs/nov00/3108.html
Parkinson, Tom (2000), “Pens ready, Speight’s army shoots to thrill,” The Age,
June 3.
Revington, Mark (2000), “Guns and money,”NZ Listener, August 5, pp 30-31.
Radio Australia (2000), “Myra Mortensen’s Pacific Beat interview with David
Robie”, December 21: www.asiapac.org.fj/cafepacific/audio/robiera.rm
Ratuva, Sitiveni (2000), Email interview with the author, December 13.
Robie, David (1989), Blood on their Banner: Nationalist Struggles in the South Pacific. Zed Books, London.
— (1999a), “Campus newsrooms in the Pacific: Some comparisons between
Fiji and Papua New Guinea”, Australian Studies in Journalism, 8: 176-196.
— (1999b), “Payback time for news critics,’ on Café Pacific website, October 29.
www.asiapac.org.fj/cafepacific/resources/aspac/fiji5.html
— (1999c), “Café Pacific and Online Censorship: Cyberspace Media in an Island
State,” AsiaPacific MediaEducator, 6: 112-120.
— (2000a), “Melanesian dominoes.” Index on Censorship: 4: 19-21.
— (2000b), “Taukei Takeover: The Media Anatomy of a Coup.” Australian Journalism Review, 22 (2) 1-16.
— (2000c), “Fiji coup: Why the media were also Speight’s hostages,” The Independent (NZ), July 12, p 16.
— (2000d), “Frontline Reporters: A Students’ Internet Coup”, paper presented at the JEA conference, Mooloolaba, Queensland, December 6. The Fiji Times (1999), “The Fiji Times hits back”, October 30, republished in Pacific Journalism Review, 6(1):147-153. The Fiji Times (2000a), “Chand blames Times for régime’s fall”, August 25, p 3. The Fiji Times (2000b), “Chand faces theft probe”, August 26, p 3. The Sun, (1999a), “Media under fire,” October 27, p 1. The Sun (1999b), “Government responds to Media Hysteria (advertisement), October 30. The Sun (2001a), “Dorney praises Fiji media”, March 5, p 3. The Sun (2001b), “More praise for media’s coverage’, March 14, p 5.
Turaga, Mika (2001), “The faces of poverty after May 19”, Fiji Sun, May 19, p 25. Wansolwara (2000a), “Journalists deny links with rebels,” September 2000, p 14. Wansolwara (2000b), “The Coalition’s vision,” September, p 9.
Woodley, Brian (2000), “Courage under fire,” The Weekend Australian, Media section, June 8-14, p 6.
David Robie is senior lecturer and journalism coordinator of the University of the South Pacific, Fiji Islands. He covered the 1987 Fiji coups and his book covering this period was Blood on their Banner: Nationalist Struggles in the South Pacific (Zed Books, London, 1989). This article is republished from Asia Pacific Media Educator research journal. An earlier version was presented at the Journalism Education Association (JEA) conference,Mooloolaba, Queensland, 5-8 December 2000.
Young and Brave: The student coverage of the George Speight coup in May 2000. Image: IPI Global Journalist
By Sean Ransom,compiled from reports by USP journalism coordinator David Robie and USP student journalists Christine Gounder and Tamani Nair
Fiji’s young media corps had a front-row seat to a strange coup in the Pacific Islands in 2000.
On May 19, businessman George Speight led a group of armed rebels into Fiji’s Parliament, took the multi-ethnic government hostage and then waited as the nation’s military and tribal leaders gave into his demands one by one.
The situation ended ended 10 weeks later, on July 26, when Speight and many of his followers were arrested by Fiji’s army.
Rebel leader George Speight (centre) adresses the media on talks with the military at the Fiji Parliament in Suva. A businessman and former government official, Speight had been scheduled for a court hearing the day of the coup to address corruption charges. Image: IPI Global Journalist
The military installed a new civilian government and called for elections in three years.
Covering this insurrection was a test for Fiji’s mostly young corps of journalists, who have an average age of 22, and average only 2.5 years of experience, according to University of the South Pacific journalism coordinator David Robie.
Robie writes that at first, some of them had trouble determining the legality of the would-be regime.
A few showed a too-swift readiness to give legitimacy to, and cozy up with Speight’s rebellion.
Fiji’s print media largely failed to give insightful and critical analysis.
Even when the media performed well, mob violence forced some shops to close their doors.
Ransom, Sean. (2000, Third Quarter). Young and brave: In Pacific island paradise, journalism students cover a strange coup attempt for course credit. IPI Global Journalist.
The Fijian crisis is not about the rights of ordinary people, says veteran Pacific affairs journalist David Robie, it is about ‘a Third World oligarchy which has failed its people’.
ByMark Revington
Sometimes power in Fiji doesn’t come from the barrel of a gun. All it takes is the threat.
During the first 10 days of the Fijian coup, some of the best reporting and analysis carne from the journalism students at the University of the South Pacific (USP), on their Pacific Journalism Online website. On the 11th day, the website was closed down.
The previous night, supporters of George Speight had trashed the studio and offices of Fiji Television, following criticism of Speight during a current-affairs show.
Pacific Journalism Online immediately posted a transcript of the programme, with its caustic criticism and political commentator Jone Dakuvula‘s observation that all the talk about indigenous rights was simply a smokescreen for a naked power grab. And vice-chancellor Esekia Solofa immediately closed it down “as a security measure” after threats were made against the university. (The website, which had been recording around 20,000 hits a day, was eventually put back in cyberspace, hosted by the journalism department of an Australian university.
Right there you had the paradox of coup-coup land (as Australian journalists have dubbed Fiji), encapsulating the two great “isms” — globalism and tribalism — sweeping the post-Cold War world, detailed by American scholar Benjamin Barber in his book Jihad v. McWorld. Look on the business pages of any paper, says Barber, and you would be convinced the world was increasingly united, that borders were increasingly porous. Look only at the front pages and you would be convinced of the opposite; that the world was increasingly riven by fratricide and civil war.
The forces driving the coup were a complex mix, including a class struggle, and a reaction against Mahendra Chaudhry‘s rollback of privatisation and its opportunities for personal power and lots of loot. Some of the businessmen said to be behind the coup, whose names are on lists circulating in Suva and by email through cyberspace, are all in favour of a free flow of capital as long as it ends up in their pockets.
Yet the coup leaders relied for their power base on an insular, tribal intolerance. It was a coup that combined primitive appeal to indigenous Fijians, with the media savvy of glib frontman Speight. And an echo of colonialism from a gun-toting band supposedly seeking to shake off the colonial shackles, (Threats and censorship are traditional weapons of heavy-handed colonial powers such as France to keep their Pacific colonies in line).
Although Speight obviously has little regard for democracy, he knows the value of a soundbite only too well, and used the media. In turn, they offered him a profile and credibility. “They fuelled the crisis and gave Speight a false idea of his importance and support,” says USP journalism coordinator David Robie.
Pulled in at the last minute as the great communicator, Speight communicated so well that there is a theory that he mounted a coup within a coup, using his new media profile to get his own way. “There is a feeling that events didn’t unfold the way some people had planned,” says Robie.
Trouble in cyberspace
Robie, who also coordinates Pacific Media Watch, a group dedicated to examining issues of ethics, censorship, and media freedom in the Pacific, had been through it before. In 1998, ministers in then Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka’s government had tried to close down Robie’s own media and politics website — Café Pacific — and revoke his work permit in what was seen as the first test of the 1997 Constitution’s freedom of expression clause. The prime mover was then Assistant Information Minister Ratu Josefa Dimuri, one of Speight’s key supporters. The politicians backed off after a two-week media controversy.
An award-winning journalist, and author if seven books, New Zealand-born Robie has been an impassioned chronicler of Pacific currents for decades, an interest developed while working as an editor and correspondent for Agence France-Presse news agency in Paris during the early 1970s. After returning to the Pacific in 1977, he began covering Pacific affairs as a freelancer.
Robie witnessed the bloody struggles for independence of the 1980s, and the attempts of independent Pacific nations to chart a nuclear-free course. He reported on the violence between France and Kanak activists in New Caledonia and the massacre of Kanak activists at Hienghène in 1984 that almost provoked a civil war. He was harassed by French secret service agents and arrested at gunpoint by the military in New Caledonia, was on board the Rainbow Warrior when it evacuated irradiated Rongelap Islanders from their atoll, leaving the ship one day before it was sunk in Auckland by French secret service agents. He was in Fiji when Labour Party leader Dr Timoci Bavadra was elected prime minister in 1987, and covered the subsequent coups.
He wrote the book Blood on their Banner, published in 1989, a detailed analysis of the struggle of indigenous people around the Pacific against the remnants of colonialism. The epilogue is just as applicable today in Fiji. “The death of democracy in Fiji was a blow to many nationalists in the South Pacific, putting the struggle of the Kanaks and other liberation movements in jeopardy,” wrote Robie, who recorded how Rabuka went on a big military spend-up, forging closer ties with France and Indonesia, the two nations so adept at using force to put down indigenous populations in their Pacific colonies.
Thirteen years on and not much seems to have changed in Fiji, says Robie.
“Chauvinistic, nationalistic struggles of this kind, based on nepotism, racism, opportunistic crime, opportunities for corruption and suppression of the human rights of others, undermine genuine indigenous struggles such as the Kanak struggle for independence from France in New Caledonia. After all, Fiji has been independent since 1970. In that time it has had indigenous governments except for one month in 1987 when Dr Bavadra was prime minister, and one year in 1999-2000 with Chaudhry.
“What have they done in all this time for the underprivileged indigenous villager? Why are they blaming the Chaudhry government after three decades of failure by Mara and Rabuka and the chiefly oligarchy? This is about a Third World oligarchy which has failed its people.”
In another one of those ironies that constantly emerge, both Dr Bavadra’s government and that of Chaudhry wanted to help Fiji’s poor, often at the expense of cosy business arrangements. Chaudhry may have been too abrasive in his political style, but his heart appeared to be in the right place. His government gave priority to genuine policies to improve health, education and social development.
“It would be fair to say that the Chaudhry government achieved more in one year than the previous Rabuka government achieved in seven years,” says Robie. “The real problem, not the racial stereotyping which Speight insisted upon, was the rollback of privatisation and an emphasis on development for the poor.”
Rabuka’s former Finance Minister Jim Ah Koy, reputedly one of the richest men in Fiji, was hellbent on privatisation in Fiji, and is one of those rumoured to be behind the coup. The rumours were so strong that Ah Koy felt compelled to make a statement, denying any complicity and launching a vicious on Chaudhry. It was run as a full page in all three daily newspapers and read out in full on Fiji Television.
Speight’s dubious business dealings have been well-documented by The Sydney Morning Herald, notably in a piece by Marian Wilkinson headlined “Mahogany Row”, which laid out in detail how Speiught, as chairman of the government-backed Fiji Pine Ltd and the Fiji Hardwood Corporation, stood to make a lot of money from the sale of mahogany forests to US interests. Chaudhry’s government questioned the price Speight was prepared to accept, and the deal, and sacked him.
Speight also appeared to have been involved in pyramid selling in Queensland, where he spent eight years as an insurance and banking broker.
Fiji’s 2000 coup frontman George Speight . . . the forces driving the coup were a complex mix, including a class struggle, and a reaction against Labour prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry’s rollback of privatisation. Image: Joe Yaya/USP Journalism
Paying the price
Fiji, says Robie, is paying the price for years of failure in moral and professional leadership, and failure to develop cohesive, homegrown policies to cope with the impact of globalisation. “Years of corruption, blatant self-interest, short-term band-aid policies, and a neglect of the urdan and rural poor communities since independence have taken their toll. It is rare that politicians with vision and genuine selfless commitment to island development have emerged.”
Where to now? Anyone who knew Chaudhry would not have been taken in by his acceptance of kava and a whale’s tooth — the traditional Fiji peace offering — from his captors, says Robie. There are Australian and New Zealand judges on the bench in Fiji who are reported to be anticipating a challenge to any new government, not only on legal grounds but also on the grounds that the the coup was a violation of the constitutional rights of the Fijian people.
There is an interesting precedent, from Trinidad and Tobago, where the two main ethnic groups are descended from India and Africa. On July 27, 1990, a radical Muslim group took the Prime Minister and Parliament hostage at gunpoint, and stormed the state-run television. Their leader, Imam Yasin Abu Bakr, declared on national television that he had overthrown the government and consigned them to history. Prime Minister Arthur Robinson was shot in the foot during the six days the government was held hostage, then released to add his authority to a settlement for the release of the hostages.
As soon as they were freed, he refused to honour the agreement, saying it had been signed under duress. Over the following months the rebels were arrested and jailed.
After being convicted of treason for leading the 2000 coup, George Speight is currently serving a sentence of life imprisonment in Fiji.
Revington, M. (2000, August 5). Guns and money.NZ Listener, 174(3143): 30-31.
[Profile of David Robie after the George Speight coup in Fiji, May 2000].
Fiji 2000 coup leader George Speight . . . an extraordinarily symbiotic character of the crisis was how the media turned, as the Melbourne Age's Tony Parkinson put it, "a two-bit terrorist into a celebrity". Image: Pacific Journalism Online/USP Journalism
Some reporters and news organisations were too ready to give legitimacy to George Speight’s “two bit” rebellion. The Fiji print media in particular failed to give insightful and critical analysis, writes David Robie.
By David Robie in Suva
It is too easy to generalise about the media or those who work in it, especially over coverage of the Fiji insurrection — the third attempted coup in 13 years.
Criticisms should differentiate between types of reports: contrasting those of the on-the-spot specialist — whether local stringer or regional specialist with long-term knowledge — with those of visiting “crisis” reporters, or “parachute journalists”.
It was astonishing how captive the journalists were to terrorist leader failed businessman George Speight. There was an extraordinary symbiotic relationship between them.
In a sense, the news media were hostages too, even providing a human shield at times of confrontation between the rebel group and the military at checkpoints.
Few journalists in the Fiji media industry, who have a median age of 22 and media experience of 2.5 years, had experienced the two successful military coups in 1987 staged by Sitiveni Rabuka. Nor did many have experience of covering other major political crises.
The media contingent in Fiji was mostly dominated by Australians and New Zealanders. However, there was a liberal sprinkling of Britons, two Japanese crews, a couple of Americans, a correspondent for Le Monde, and a handful of Filipinos.
All three major international newsagencies — Agence France-Presse, Associated Press and Reuters — were reporting too. The media pack offered Speight a profile and credibility — it aided the rebel leader’s propaganda war.
Fuelled the crisis
The media, in fact, fuelled the crisis and gave Speight a false idea about his importance and support — it gave him “political fuel”. Some sectors of the foreign media did not grasp the complexities of the crisis, that this in fact was a power struggle embracing the indigenous Fijian community.
They reported it in terms of racial stereotyping, and assumed that the majority of indigenous Fijians supported the coup perpetrators.
“I don’t know where they got this idea that the majority of Fijians support this coup,” remarked political commentator Jone Dakuvula on the controversial Close-Up programme on Fiji Television. “We only have about a thousand people sitting at Parliament — there are about 400,000 Fijians”.
He added: “It’s very simplistic to use words like ‘majority’ or ‘minority’ because you can’t actually base it on any real knowledge about what people out there in the rural areas feel. Most ordinary people are just watching and observing what’s happening — they’re not active participants in this coup.”
On the other hand, there were many examples of insightful reporting on websites in the so-called “Internet coup” — analysis was generally available on some websites in the mainstream media, certainly in Fiji.
One disturbing feature of Fiji local coverage — and international coverage too — was the failure to fairly report the “civil society” and the range of views outside of the main protaganists.
An international audience could be forgiven for thinking that there were really only two major players in the Fiji crisis — Speight and the military. Not even the deposed elected government (those MPs who were free) was given much media coverage.
Indo-Fijian voices ‘frozen out’
Academic and independent analysis was barely touched. Indo-Fijian voices were largely “frozen out” by the media as if they did not exist.
Speight was the apparent coup leader — a kailoma (mixed race) and a failed businessman, who tore off his balaclava to reveal his identity after the seizure of Parliament on 19 May 2000 in what was billed by supporters and the news media as a “civil coup”.
In fact, his six accomplices were renegade soldiers of the élite Counter Revolutionary Warfare Unit set up by Rabuka to protect himself and any indigenous government and a total of 39 military defectors eventually moved into the parliamentary compound.
By the end of five weeks it had emerged that Speight had been recruited for his exceptional communication skills just hours before the insurrection began. The real power was former British Special Air Services major Ilisoni Ligairi who had been recruited by Rabuka to set up the CRW unit.
In 1987, Rabuka staged both coups for “indigenous Fijian paramountcy”. In 2000, George Speight led the latest putsch for the same reason, arguing that Rabuka had betrayed the cause by supporting the 1997 Constitution which laid the foundation for a multiracial and democratic future for Fiji.
On 27 July 1998, the new Constitution came into force. It included cross-communal voting and established the first Human Rights Commission in the South Pacific. The country officially became known as Fiji Islands, and the people Fiji Islanders.
Mahendra Chaudhry, the country’s first Indo-Fijian prime minister whose Fiji Labour Party won the largest ever mandate in the May election to head a People’s Coalition government, was deposed by Speight, assaulted and threatened with a gun to his head.
Pugnacious political style
With an abrasive, pugnacious political style derived from his trade union background, Chaudhry was hated by some indigenous Fijians even though his administration had arguably done more in office during one year for both the rural and urban poor of both Fijians and Indo-Fijians than previous largely indigenous administrations.
However, the “race card”, as played out by Speight, his supporters and the news media, is “misleading and mischievous”.
George Speight . . . the “race card”, as played out by him, his supporters and the news media, was “misleading and mischievous”. Image: Pacific Journalism Online/USP Journalism
Chaudhry is not the problem, nor are the Indo-Fijian communities. As former University of the South Pacific politics lecturer Teresia Teaiwa adds: Fiji’s problem is Fijian. Increasingly problematic configurations of indigenous leadership in the country.
Fiji has a complex racial and religious mix in its population of about 800,000 with mainly
Christian indigenous Fijians (51 percent) slightly outnumbering Indo-Fijians (44 percent), both Hindu and Muslim, with the rest being mainly European and of mixed-race descent.
During the last coup period, the news media faced far more grave threats to their independence and integrity than during the Speight insurrection. On 14 May 1987, Rabuka assured news media executives that they could rely on a “censorship free press”, but he warned against inflammatory reporting.
Both The Fiji Times and the Fiji Sun bitterly condemned Rabuka and the coup in an editorial next morning.
Rabuka’s regime ordered the two newspapers to stop publishing indefinitely while armed troops and police occupied the two offices. The next day, May 16, became the first time (apart from once during a hurricane in January 1986) in more than a century that The Fiji Times was not published.
Purge of political critics
The military regime began a purge of political critics and opponents by arresting them without charge.
One newspaper, the Fiji Sun, remained defiant, championing democracy and the freedom of the press. Publisher Philip Harkness refused to be intimidated and would not agree to publishing after the coup until freedom was restored. Directors Miles Johnson and Jim Carney were detained without charge when the Fiji Sun was closed after the second coup.
In spite of the two previous coups, covering this insurrection was a testing challenge for Fiji’s mostly young journalists. While the journalists generally came out with flying colours, there were some flaws that ought to be examined.
One was the readiness of some reporters and news organisations to give legitimacy to Speight’s rebellion. Another was the failure of the print media, in spite of the piles of newsprint covering the event, to give insightful and critical analysis.
Reporting of a major crisis of this kind is generally accompanied by analysis in quality overseas media. It is the one advantage that print media has over radio and television — and is essential when news websites are providing this.
Initially, The Fiji Times had no doubt where it stood:
“Outrageous and criminal … We have witnessed how one moment of madness will set this country back by decades. This illegal takeover must end. The democratically elected People’s Coalition has to be restored.”
Sympathised with the rebels The Fiji Times never repeated that message and in fact later in the five weeks appeared to strongly sympathise with the rebels.
The newspapers quickly referred to “self-proclaimed head of state” George Speight when clearly there was only one legitimate President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara. Likewise, Ratu Timoci Silatolu was being called “interim prime minister”.
Just because the elected government was being held hostage, it did not mean that it was no longer the legal government.
The Fiji Times published the only profile about Speight’s pyramid sales and insurance career — written by a News Ltd journalist. (A Murdoch News Corporation subsidiary owns the Fiji Times.)
There was no in-depth local profile written, something matching a mahogany-and-Speight piece in The Sydney Morning Herald by Marian Wilkinson which exposed how the coup leader stood to gain a financial “killing” from an American timber resource company — until the Chaudhry government was swept to power and trashed the deal.
By day seven, the Fiji Sun was already calling the rebels the “Taukei civilian government”.
Criticism of the media was beginning to emerge. The fact is that some journalists had basked in the glow of coupmaster Speight — something that is hard to imagine in hostage situations in other countries. And this raises ethical questions about how “cosy” the media was with the terrorists.
Said one foreign journalist: “They [rebels] feed us, give us a bathroom and look after us. I like them.”
Fiji Television raid
But that was before the Fiji Television raid on May 28 after which many international journalists fled the country.
The big issue, never satisfactorily resolved, centred on whether journalists should place themselves under Speight’s unpredictable temperament by entering the parliamentary compound.
Other questions centred on the ethics of giving Speight a media platform, at will, to “sound off” only metres from where 30 MPs, some who had been assaulted with a gun put to their head, were being detained incommunicado.
Part of the extraordinarily symbiotic character of the crisis was how the media turned, as the Melbourne Age’s Tony Parkinson put it, “a two-bit terrorist into a celebrity”. More sobering still, it was a tale of how some journalists obsessed with putting themselves in the middle of the story, risked becoming “tools of Speight’s crusade to dismantle Fiji’s democracy”.
Added Parkinson: “We have seen a mass outbreak of this virulent strain of ego-journalism. It is not a pretty sight and it raises an awkward ethical question: to what extent have the visiting media in Suva become unwitting accomplices in George Speight’s brutal game of brinkmanship?
“Virtually from the moment the rebels seized control of Suva’s parliamentary compound, it wanted to be seen to parachute into the danger zone. This meant an obscene rush to get inside the compound and do on-the-spot reports on Speight, the megalomaniac of the moment.
“The media were in hot pursuit of images of masked men with guns, who would do insane things to achieve their aims. It was a heady and addictive brew. Some media organisations overdosed.”
Inside the compound
Reporters (admittedly mostly local) spent nights on end inside the compound trying to explore the innermost thoughts of Speight. They drank kava with his supporters. One journalist shared a pizza with Commander Jimmy, Speight’s brother. He always wore a balaclava so he had to filter his meal through the mask.
The souring of the rebels’ relationship with the media came only after Sydney newspapers ran banner headlines such as The Sydney Morning Herald’s THE MADNESS OF KING GEORGE .
It was thanks to international media that local journalists became more detached in the reporting with the playback from abroad of terms like “coup”, “insurrection” and “rebellion”.
Whatever the pork-and-dalo carnival atmosphere in Parliament grounds, the issues needed to be faced honestly.
This was about an act of terrorism with hostages’ lives under threat. Indigenous chauvinism does not override human rights.
David Robie is senior lecturer and journalism coordinator at the University of the South Pacific. This article was first published by The Independent in New Zealand. It was abridged from a research paper, “Taukei Takeover: The Media Anatomy of a Coup”, that he presented as a keynote speaker at the Australia and New Zealand Communication Association Conference at Ballina, NSW, July 3-5. This paper was later published by Australian Journalism Review (22(2): 1-16).
2000 Fiji coup leader George Speight and media minder Jo Nata being questioned by the media at Parliament House. Image: USP Pacific Journalism Online
By David Robie in Suva
Ten government ministers and backbench MPs held hostage by gunnmen in Fiji’s Parliament in a self-styled “civil coup” were freed early today after being forced to resign from office.
They included Assistant Information Minister Lekh Ram Vayeshnoi and Assistant Housing and Transport Minister John Ali.
Explaining on a local radio station why he had given in to the pressure, Ali said: “Sometimes you have to use your sixth sense to avoid complications.”
They were freed about 4.30 am. One of the 10 freed captives was a bodyguard of Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry.
About 20 parliamentary staff were released earlier.
Chaudhry, held captive with his government since the gunmen seized the Parliament complex on Friday morning, was due to be seen by two doctors this morning after he reportedly collapsed last night and was treated by Red Cross officers.
His son, Rajendra Chaudhry, who is the prime minister’s private secretary, was also reported to have signed his resignation and was expected to be released soon.
Sported a black eye
Rajendra Chaudhry told a reporter he was “fine,” but he sported a black eye.
Journalists inside the Parliament complex reported that the self-proclaimed Head of State of the rebel government, businessman George Speight, had expected an overnight assault on Parliament by the country’s military forces which have vowed loyalty to the constitutional government.
However, an estimated 50 armed dissidents are inside Parliament, including younger members of an elite force from the military.
Yesterday, Sitiveni Rabuka, leader of two military coups in 1987, said he still hoped his “shuttle diplomacy” between the President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, and the rebel regime would defuse the hostage crisis.
But Speight has declared today a “rest day” from negotiations.
Ratu Mara, who has declared a state of emergency, appealed on nationwide television last night for the “terrorists” to end their two-day-old insurrection.
In an exclusive interview with Fiji Television, Rabuka said he hoped that those who “pepetrated this illegal and treasonous act” were brought to justice.
Two military coups
Rabuka staged two military coups in 1987 to depose an elected Fiji Labour Party-led coalition government in 1987, but he later played a key role in drafting the multiracial 1997 constitution which restored genuine democracy, and he has since been a Commonwealth peacemaker in the Solomon Islands ethnic conflict.
Before serious dialogue could begin between Government House and the coup leaders, Rabuka said he had sought to persuade the gunmen to:
Free Prime Minister Chaudhry, the Fiji Labour Party-led coalition government and parliamentarians;
Lay down their arms; and
Leave the Parliament complex.
Police and the military yesterday and last night tightened security around Parliament and the central business district of the capital, Suva, which had been ravaged by widespread looting and arson on Friday afternoon.
Damage was estimated at more than F$30 million — 167 shops were looted and five shopping buildings gutted by fire.
Police reported more than 200 arrests and 39 men were yesterday charged in court with looting and damage to property. The Suva Magistrates Court will continue to hold special hearings over the weekend.
Coup leader Speight warned authorities not to try to take Parliament by force or he would not be responsible for fatalities.
Denied assault reports
He denied reports that Prime Minister Chaudhry had been physically assaulted and threatened with death.
He branded the reports as “scandalous and deserving to be treated with the utmost contempt”.
The “cabinet” lineup named by Speight last night was shaping up as a list of Taukei, or indigenous nationalist extremist identities and dissidents within Chaudhry’s coalition government partner parties.
Besides Speight as “prime minister,” other posts included “deputy prime minister” Ratu Timoci Silatolu, of the Fijian Association Party; “foreign affairs” Senator Berenado Vunibobo, former Finance and Foreign Affairs minister in Rabuka’s government; “national seurity” Savenaca Drunidalo, a former senior army officer; “Fijian affairs” Ratu Tu’uakitau Cokanauto, a Bau chief and Ratu Mara’s brother-in-law, “home affairs” Colonel Metuisela Mua, former head of the Fiji Secret Service.
A prominent journalist and publicist, Jo Nata, was named as an adviser to Speight.
Ratu Mara paid tribute to Rabuka’s attempts to resolve the hostage crisis and appealed for the attackers “who terrorise our nation and threaten the lives of its government” to give in peacefully.
In his television address, Ratu Mara described Rabuka as a “trusted and invaluable mediator between Government House and the terrorist group.”
“I wish to declare to the nation that I will use all the authority and resources at my command to bring about a just and peaceful solution to a tragic chapter in our history,” he said.
Ratu Mara added that he would not bow to threats and coercion.
This article was first published by The New Zealand Herald Online. David Robie is senior lecturer and coordinator of the journalism programme at the University of the South Pacific in Suva, Fiji.
Journalism schools and media freedom groups have protested to the University of the South Pacific for suspending its Pacific Journalism Online website, describing it as a violation of press freedom.
Appealing for the website to be reopened without delay, the critics have have cited the university’s duty to uphold and defend the twin principles of academic freedom and free speech during Fiji’s political crisis.
They have also appealed for the university to allow the award-winning training newspaper Wansolwara to be published freely.
A special edition of the paper, dealing with the Fiji crisis, was published early in June in spite of threats by some senior administrators to censor or prevent its distribution. But the online edition is still barred. [In 2023, the online edition is now published as Wansolwara News].
The media watchdog RSF noted that the website had been suspoended by the university authorities on May 29 for “security reasons” a day after Fiji Television was trashed by supporters of rebel leader George Speight.
“Gagging a website that merely publishes news, and in a professional manner, is a violation of press freedom.”
— Reporters Without Borders
RSF’s general secretary Robert Mènard said in a letter to USP’s vice-chancellor Esekia Solofa that “gagging a website that merely publishes news, and in a professional manner, is a violation of press freedom”.
‘Strike at heart of press freedom’
Professor John Henningham, head of the University of Queensland’s journalism department, said: “Such an action strikes at the heart of press and media freedom, and sends a very disturbing message to the fine group of students who in the midst of their study of journalism at USP are contributing to increased awareness of the Fiji coup.
“Suspension of a news and information-based website is equivalent to closing down a newspaper or television station, and clearly breaks the most fundamental principle of press freedom to which all journalists (and academics) are pledged.”
Associate professor Chris Nash, director of the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism at the University of Technology Sydney, which is hosting an alternative website for the USP journalism students (www.journalism.uts.edu.au), expressed his “deep regret and profound concern” over the website closure.
“The academics, journalists and journalism students of Fiji are being watched by the rest of the world,” Nash said.
“There is a great deal of sympathy for their current plight, but nonetheless there are expectations of what appropriate professional behaviour would encompass in the current situation.
“These expectations are similar to those of hospitals, doctors and nurses in a civil conflict — they are expected to rise to the situation.
“The suggestion that journalism staff and students, and indeed any academics, might somehow desist from reporting, communicating and publishing on the current situation is akin to suggesting that doctors and nurses should turn their backs on wounded people in a conflict. It is unconscionable.”
‘Two flames of freedom’
Associate professor Mark Pearson, head of journalism at Bond University and a former president of Australia’s Journalism Education and Research Association (Jeraa), said: “Please let your [student] journalists do what they must: provide independent, objective reports of the crisis in their print, broadcast and online media. Please instruct your staff to allow Pacific Journalism Online and Wansolwara to publish freely with your blessing.
“Please show the world that two flames of freedom are burning brightly in the Pacific despite the recent political events: the flame of academic freedom and the flame of press freedom. Let history judge USP proudly.”
David Venables, president of JEANZ, said it was “important that media organisations and universities everywhere do not compromise freedom of speech or press freedom and cave into threats of violence.”
“We understand the students have petitioned you for reinstatement of the website. We urge you to accept their petition and reopen it,” he added.
Murray Burt, president of the Commonwealth Journalists’ Association, said: “I have watched [the students’] writing closely. For the most part it has been excellent — tempered, insightful, lawful and credible in its very closeness to the action. There has been a measure of bravery, too, which should not be forgotten when the dust settles.
“I have visited your beautiful campus. I hold your journalism programmes in high regard. It would be a shame if the respect won in the Commonwealth and South Pacific were sullied by an attack of bureaucratic timidity.”
USP’s journalism coordinator David Robie said the suspension was an “unfortunate” decision and a “blow to the developing professionalism and enthusiasm” of student journalists.
“Any notion that journalism students shouldn’t do real journalism is absurd. This is what journalism education is all about — integrated theory and practice on the job.”
He said he had appealed to the university administration for a review of the decision to get the website reopened as soon as possible.
“It has been closed three weeks now and the longer it is left like that, it will have a damaging effect on the students’ education. Many of the teaching materials and links are online and now cannot be accessed by students,” Robie said.
University authorities have made no public comment since the closure.
The USP administration eventually relented after suspending the website on 29 May 2000 and reopened the website on 28 June 2000 and the following month the School of Humanities board of studies passed an unanimous resolution condemning the university for having closed it. In December that year, the USP students were awarded the Dr Charles Stuart Prize for the best publication — Pacific Journalism Online — in any medium and other awards, and treated to a standing ovation for their coup coverage at the annual Ossie Journalism awards of the Australian Journalism Education and Research Association (Jeraa).
First published by Campus Review (Australia), v10(24), June 28-July 4, 2000.
USP shuts down student journalism website, Fiji Daily Post, 21 June 2000. Image: Screenshot Daily Post
By Mithleshni Gurdayal
Journalism students at the University of the South Pacific have expressed dismay over the forced shutdown of their website, Pacific Journalism Online (PJO), by the university vice-chancellor Esekia Solofa.
Vice-chancellor Solofa instructed the website to be shut following the attack on Fiji Television by a mob on May 22.
The website is used by second year students for practical assignments and internet classes. The website also hosted Wansolwara, the newspaper put together by journalism students.
Online editor Christine Gounder said: “USP’s action was unacceptable and poses a serious threat to media and academic freedom.
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists media watchdog’s protest over the violations of media freedom in Fiji during George Speight’s attempted coup in 2000. Image: CPJ/19 July 2000.
“It is disappointing and disturbing. It was a sudden decision made by the university and we, the journalism students, were not consulted on the matter,” she said.
Wansolwara editor Reggie Dutt also slammed the university’s decision, saying that the vice-chancellor had acted in haste.
“USP’s action is in violation of media freedom and portrays hypocrisy. It would have been better if the students and the lecturer were consulted before shutting us off.
“We were just gaining popularity but now we are cut off,” he said.
“The sad thing is that we are not even being given a formal explanation on the matter.”
International press agencies and journalism schools have also criticised the university’s decision to shut the website and most have described this action as “gagging media”.
Professor John Henningham, head of the University of Queensland journalism department, said such an act was a strike at the heart of press and media freedom.
“Suspension of a news and information-based website is equivalent to closing down a newspaper or TV station and clearly breaks the most fundamental principles of press freedom to which all journalists are pledged.”
David Venables, president of the Journalism Education Association of New Zealand, said it was important that media organisations and universities everywhere did not compromise freedom of speech or press freedom and cave into threats of violence.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the university administration that the vice-chancellor was “only taking precautions” [in view of the attempted coup situation in Fiji].
She said the VC was mindful not to be caught up in the crossfire during the political crisis.
USP journalism coordinator David Robie’s account of the website shutdown on 29 May 2000 and later reopening during the crisis as published in Pacific Journalism Review.
In years gone by these "parachute journalists" would have provided most of us with our only contact with the ongoing crisis. But the internet has changed all that.
By Jeremy Rose
The Fijians have taken to calling them “parachute journalists”. The reporters, that is, who drop in from around the globe to file stories on the island nation’s latest coup.
Lacking local contacts, unable to speak Fijian and with only a flimsy grasp of an incredibly complex society, the journalists’ reports have, in general, been strong on atmosphere and weak on analysis.
That lack of local knowledge has seen too many foreign correspondents allow George Speight and his gunmen to successfully reduce the coup to an ethnic-Fijian vs Fiji-Indian power struggle.
In years gone by these “parachute journalists” would have provided most of us with our only contact with the ongoing crisis.
But the internet has changed all that. Sites such as FijiLive.com not only provide up-to-the-minute news items on the crisis, they carry in-depth pieces of analysis by people who know what they’re talking about.
People such as Victoria University’s Pacific studies lecturer Dr Teresia Teaiwa who wrote a penetrating piece towards the beginning of the crisis whuch convincingly argued that the “race card was misleading and mischievous”.
Dr Teaiwa, a former history and politics lecturer at the University of the South Pacific in Suva, also signalled the possible secession of Fiji’s western provinces as a result of the coup — something not picked up by the mainstream media for another 10 days.
Then there are pieces by people such as Professor Brij V Lal, a member of the commission that drew up the 1997 constitution. Professor Lal, Like Dr Teaiwa, argues that the coup has more to do with “the restructuring of power within indigenous Fijian society” than race.
Political commentator Jone Dakuvula writes movingly about visiting Mahendra Chaudhry’s wife, Virmati, at their home in Suva. He describes sitting around the kitchen table with both indigenous and Indian Fijians discussing the current crisis.
USP student journalism best
Some of the best reporting has come from the University of the South Pacific’s Journalism Programme in Suva. The Journalism Programme’s website (www.usp.ac.fj/journ/) was a goldmine of information until it was shut down by the university . . . “for security reasons”.
The shutting down of the website followed its publication of a transcript of a television interview which was said to have led to the ransacking of Fiji Television by Speight supporters. The transcript would have been lost to cyberspace were it not for the quick work of Wellington’s Scoop (www.scoop.co.nz) which picked it up and republished it. It’s well worth a read.
Despite protests by the journalism programme coordinator David Robie that the closure of the site amounts to censorship, the university is sticking to its decision to close it down. It’s to be hoped that the work of the students finds its way into some of the other internet sites.
Fiji's 2000 coup frontman George Speight . . . . Image: Joe Yaya/USP Journalism
By David Robie in Suva
Fiji’s Great Council of Chiefs is meeting at a military camp near Suva to decide how to respond to the attempted coup and hostage taking at Parliament.
The Council’s deliberations will determine the fate of three men: President Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry who is being held captive with several of his MPs, and rebel leader George Speight.
The first two are well-known public figures and leaders. The third is a man who burst into the spotlight from out of nowhere last Friday morning.
He has been branded as a terrorist by both the country’s president and the leading daily newspaper, The Fiji Times.
But just five days ago he was a local timber industry businessman with a modest profile and reputedly an undischarged bankrupt.
Although rumours of an impending coup attempt had been rife in Fiji for weeks, few people took them seriously. And self-proclaimed rebel prime minister Speight, with shaved-head and measured voice, was not on the list of aspiring coup-makers.
Even though he regularly played golf with Sitiveni Rabuka, the man who staged Fiji’s first two coups in 1987 which ended with the country becoming a republic and ostracised by the Commonwealth, Speight’s armed takeover of Parliament was a surprise to the former military commander.
Cult figure
At first, Rabuka seemed an ideal mediator. He had been something of a cult figure among young indigenous Fijians after his early exploits and his first biography Rabuka: No Other Way. He was again a celebrity earlier this year with the publication of his life story in the book Rabuka of Fiji.
He had been the dominant political figure in Fiji for more than a decade. Ironically, he was also a key architect of the 1997 multiracial constitution, which led to his crushing defeat by Chaudhry’s Fiji Labour Party-led coalition a year ago this month.
However, after early “shuttle diplomacy” between President Ratu Mara, and Speight in several attempts to resolve the hostage crisis, Rabuka finally ran foul of the kidnappers.
Speight said he no longer trusted Rabuka.
The former coup leader was scathing about Speight and his fellow kidnappers in an exclusive interview with Fiji Television.
Rabuka scoffed at Speight’s claims to have seized Parliament on behalf of indigenous Fijians.
“I don’t know why he is claiming to be acting on behalf of indigenous rights like I did in 1987. I’m still waiting for him to say this in Fijian,” Rabuka said.
White settler descendant
Speight, a mixed-race fourth-generation descendant of a white settler in Fiji, is the son of Opposition parliamentarian Savenaca Tokainavo, who is among the hostages.
Tokainavo, a dairy farm farmer also known as Sam Speight, is reportedly depressed about his son’s actions in seizing Parliament.
George Speight’s paternal grandmother is from Naivicula village in Wainibuka, about 10km from Korovou in Tailevu, near Suva. His mother is from Ra in the western sugar cane belt of the main island of Viti Levu.
The family is popular over its local community development activities.
During last year’s election, Speight stood as a proxy candidate for his father on a ticket for Rabuka’s SVT party. Savenaca Tokainavo defeated nationalist Iliesa Duvuloco — now the “lands minister” in Speight’s rebel government — at the polls.
“Nobody thought Speight had this sort of fanatical streak,” said a colleague who declined to be named.
Last Monday, he pleaded not guilty on exchange rate and extortion charges in the High Court in Suva.
Surprised over brush with law
Rabuka said he was surprised by Speight’s earlier brush with the law.
According to The Fiji Times, Speight is also an undischarged bankrupt.
“He was director George Speight of the Wattle Group, an Australian investment company which siphoned millions of dollars from the Australian police, Fiji citizens and life savings,” alleged the newspaper.
Speight is seen by some associates as bearing a grudge against the Labour Party-led coalition and Prime Minister Chaudhry because he was dumped as chief executive from the Fiji Hardwood Corporation and also from the board of Fiji Pine Ltd.
The coalition’s Forests Minister, Poseci Bune, an indigenous Fijian, sacked him when the cabinet moved to halt privatisation policies of the Rabuka government.
Speight is understood to have earlier basked in the patronage of former Finance Minister Jim Ah Koy in Rabuka’s government.
He has no apologies for what is seen as an unashamedly racist and pro-Fijian stance.
‘Not apologising’
“We are not going to apologise to anybody and we are not going to step back, and we are not going to be daunted by accusations of racism, or one-sidedness,” Speight said early in the crisis.
“At the end of the day, it is [about] the supreme rights of our indigenous people in Fiji, the desire is that it be returned — wholesome and preserved for the future.”
Speight says people don’t need to have the “mind of an Albert Einstein” to understand the plight of indigenous Fijians. He believes expressed grievances had fallen on deaf ears.
The irony is that while many indigenous Fijians distrust the Labour-led government’s policies on land tenure for landless Indo-Fijian cane farmers, Chaudhry has initiated many far-reaching reforms for the benefit of all rural and urban poor Fiji Islanders and boosted education, health and welfare.
Asked whose coup was better planned and executed, Rabuka would not be drawn into comparisons with Speight, saying such judgements were best left to observers.
But he adds: “We went down a similar road in 1987. It led us nowhere. Speight should pull out of this treasonable act while there is still time.”
David Robie is senior lecturer and coordinator of the journalism programme at the University of the South Pacific in Suva, Fiji. This article was published in The New Zealand Herald.
