A loose cannon threatening Fiji

MEDIA RELEASE

A loose cannon threatening Fiji

Nukua’lofa, Tonga: Saturday 24th March 2012

Landforce Commander, Colonel Mosese Tikoitoga, is the Fiji military's latest weapon of intimidation aimed directly at the people of Fiji. His recent torrent of statements, obviously authorized by Fiji’s dictator, Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama, is poisoning the political atmosphere.

It is impossible for Fiji to embark on free and open consultations on constitutional change when the army is adopting a threatening public stance. Colonel Tikoitoga is reinforcing the warnings already given by the dictator through speeches, interviews and military parades and marches. The signal Tikoitoga is sending from headquarters is that the army is in charge, it is watching, and ready to act if the Commodore gives the order.

Colonel Tikoitoga has demonstrated once more that, like his leader, he has great difficulties with the truth and has a crude and clueless appreciation of politics.

This is very evident in his recent lectures to Fiji’s politicians about multi-racialism and claims they are clinging to the 1997 constitution because it permits them to appeal to their ethnic voters. He is also demonizing politics and threatening to wipe it from the face of Fiji society.

He is obviously staking out Bainimarama’s claim for the army to have a permanent and aggressive role in the political life of Fiji, against all the principles of liberal democracy. He is telling a massive lie when he claims that the 1997 constitution was abrogated as soon as the Bainimarama coup was executed in 2006. This, he says, was part of the army’s “clean-up” of Fiji. His statement underlines the dysfunctional and chaotic nature of the Bainimarama regime.

Colonel Tikoitoga plainly does not know that the number one priority of Bainimarama after 2006 was to uphold the 1997 constitution. He supposedly did that until 2009 when the Court of Appeal ruled his government was illegal. It was only then that Bainimarama purported to abrogate the constitution. By that time it had become part of his so-called Peoples Charter and it is still a bulwark of that misconceived and illegitimate document. So even though the constitution has been allegedly thrown out, it remains central to his policies. That is what is meant by dysfunctional government.

Tikoitoga appears to believe that if racial voting systems are removed from the 1997 constitution the people of Fiji will immediately stop voting on racial lines. This is stupid thinking. It will take a long time for the populace to fully embrace multi-racialism, especially after the damage to interracial relationships caused by the Bainimarama coup. Dictatorship, laws and decrees will not change attitudes that are deeply entrenched among Fijians and Indians. Tikoitoga himself is a key figure in one of the most racist institutions in Fiji. Membership of the Fiji military forces is nearly 100 per cent Fijian. Tikoitoga, the new apostle of togetherness, should tell the nation what his plans are for recruiting Fiji Indian soldiers. In all my years in the Fiji Armed Forces I never heard concerns raised internally about its overwhelming dominance by indigenous Fijians. Bainimarama wanted it to remain that way. Indians were to be largely excluded, just as they have been shut out from Cabinet and other parts of government.

In his obsessive dislike of politics, Tikoitoga is ignoring the very concept of political rights. He does not understand that politics extends through all levels of society. It is part of life. Tikoitoga continues to justify the 2006 coup, repeating all the false and phony justifications for it. In doing this recently, he made the outlandish claim that Bainimarama was motivated by his understanding of the principles of democracy! In another outrageous statement recently, Tikoitoga maintained that the Fiji army’s role was no different from that of the New Zealand Army! He knows absolutely that this is a bold-faced lie. The New Zealand Army has never committed treason, established a dictatorship, and suppressed and brutalized New Zealanders. The Landforce Commander is also telling lies when he says the Fiji military will not play a special part in the constitutional consultations. He is making it very clear in his public posturing that the army will act as an enforcer, to fulfill the will of its Commander. It is ready to support whatever action he takes, even if that is another coup. The best option for Colonel Tikoitoga at this point is exile to Mali where he could offer to advise the coup leader there, Captain Sanogo, how to completely stuff up his country.

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