Blanchflower objects to question

FICAC senior counsel Michael Blanchflower in the Laisenia Qarase Fijian Holdings trial today objected to questions raised by Qarase’s lawyer that it was not unfair to indigenous Fijians how the FHL shares were allotted in the early 1990s.

Qarase’s counsel Tupou Draunidalo questioned FICAC witness and former FHL CEO Sitiveni Weleilakeba whether he thought it was unfair to other indigenous Fijians when his company Stiks Investments applied for 150,000 Class A shares in FHL.

Weleilakeba said that he took the opportunity to invest when it was offered to him.

He went on to say that at the time, FHL was well known in the indigenous Fijian community and the opportunities at FHL were well known to the community.

Upon questioning, Weleilakeba also said that the option to take a loan from the Fiji Development Bank to purchase shares was also well known to the indigenous Fijians.

However, Blanchflower objected to Draunidalo’s question to Weleilakeba that this would mean that the allotment of shares were not unfair to the community.

Blanchflower said Weleilakeba cannot speak about fairness or unfairness to the indigenous Fijian community as people would think differently on this issue.


Story by: Vijay Narayan