Does the Fiji Labour Party support a level of race based voting?
Fijivillage has today questioned Fiji Labour Party Leader, Mahendra Chaudhry whether he supports race based voting as the party’s submission to the Yash Ghai led Constitution Commission had called for 26 reserved seats for the different races.
While Chaudhry had said earlier this week that the FLP always supported the one man one vote system, Labour’s submission proposed that 12 parliamentary seats should be reserved for the Itaukei, 10 for the Indo Fijians, three for the General Electors and one for the Rotumans.
When questioned, Chaudhry confirmed that Labour wanted only the people from the particular ethnic group to vote for the ethnic based reserved seats which means that they would vote along racial lines for the reserved seats.
Chaudhry said according to the FLP, this seems appropriate for now and they had hoped that the race based system could gradually be phased out.
While Prime Minister, Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama has stressed that there will be no race based voting in Fiji and the old politicians are scared because they have to face the judgement of all Fijians, Chaudhry said Labour’s view on the voting system should also be respected.
He said the FLP wanted one third of the parliamentary seats to be elected along racial lines.
However, he admits that this can no longer happen and they have to accept the one man one vote system which is in the 2013 constitution.
Story by: Vijay Narayan
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