The military has today made it clear that the SDL, Fiji Labour Party, National Federation Party and United People’s Party are wasting their time if they are pushing for the 1997 constitution to come back with some amendments.
The four parties are having discussions and are planning to make a joint submission to the Constitutional Commission that the last elected parliament should be reconvened, changes to be made to the electoral system under the 97 constitution and the next elections be held under the revised 1997 constitution.
However RFMF’s Land Force Commander and spokesperson Colonel Mosese Tikoitoga said the military which started the process to bring changes to Fiji will not allow this.
“If these four political parties continue to harp that they can go back to that old constitution, go back to that old ideology, then somebody’s got to tell them that they live in an unreal world. No one, and the military will not allow it, for them to talk on that ideology. Maybe I should make it very clear now that if they continue to do that then they can’t be party to the process that we are doing now. I think that’s the bottom line. They can’t be involved in the current process because their ideology is still very discrimatory, their ideology is still very racial and Fiji doesn’t need that.”
Colonel Tikoitoga said they will not allow politicians to bring back the 1997 constitution.
“It’s a pity that they think they can bring back the parliament of 2006 or 2005 to 2007. It is a pity that they think the military will stand aside and let them bring all these types. We clearly mandated ourselves, the Fiji Military Force and the current government mandated itself to finding ways forward that will not have coups again. And we will not have coups again if we do a constitution that’s fair to all, that we are all Fijians, that there is no ascendency of one particular indigenous group over the other and that has to be the way to go forward.”
He said the military does not even want a revised 1997 constitution.
Colonel Tikoitoga said the decision is to start new.
“You’ve got constitution experts to rewrite a new constitution. If you want to make submissions on the new constitution, you are most welcome to make submissions on the new constitution. But to make reference to the 1997 constitution, it’s too late to come back. We are moving forward, it’s wasting their time and it’s only confusing the public of Fiji more. We need to move forward and we are moving forward. Why confuse the citizens by saying we go back to the 1997 constitution because we will not go back to the 1997 constitution.”
SDL Leader, Laisenia Qarase said people must be free to express their views on the constitution and their view is to make electoral amendments to the 1997 constitution, reconvene the last elected parliament and have elections under the revised 97 constitution.
He also said there should be no interference in the constitutional process.
Fiji Labour Party leader Mahendra Chaudhary said he has received feedback that people still want the 1997 constitution however amended.
National Federation Party General Secretary, Pramod Rae said they will continue to express their view that there are many good things in the 1997 constitution.
Story by: Vijay Narayan