It is the Prime Minister and the Attorney-General who have shown their insatiable greed for power by running all over the country and using forums to shamelessly display their gutter level political wares.
This has been highlighted by the Leader of the National Federation Party, Professor Biman Prasad after comments by the Acting Prime Minister and Attorney General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum in the Fiji Times today where he says power hungry politicians have nothing to offer the country and want to just get in.
Sayed-Khaiyum reportedly made these comments at the Nadi Women’s Forum.
Prasad says Sayed-Khaiyum should look at himself in the mirror to see how he has become the defacto PM.
He says this is coming from a man who came to power through the barrel of the gun and as the Attorney General, he has been responsible for many draconian laws that were shoved down the throats of people to simply ensure both he and the Prime Minister consolidated their hold on power.
Prasad says it is hypocrisy of the highest order for the Sayed-Khaiyum to label others as power-hungry when he and the Prime Minister hold multiple key cabinet portfolios and ministerial responsibilities.
He also says who can forget the Level 9 debacle of December 2018 when Sayed-Khaiyum led his caucus into hiding for 48 hours to avoid being served in person the electoral petition.
Prasad asks if that wasn’t a despicable and cowardly act of a power-hungry politician, then what is.
He adds Sayed-Khaiyum can continue blabbering all he wants but the reality of the matter is their 15 years of dictatorial rule will end at the hands of the voters in the elections.
Meanwhile, Fiji Labour Party Leader, Mahendra Chaudhry says Sayed-Khaiyum’s statement regarding power hungry politicians who have nothing to offer the country, is in fact an apt description of Sayed-Khaiyum himself.
He says if anyone in the country is power hungry, it is him and the cap fits him perfectly.
Chaudhry says instead of making hollow statements about opposition politicians and political parties, the minister should be looking at his own failed record in office.
He says they have seen unprecedented social, economic and political turmoil under his government’s stewardship where previous governments had done better.
The FLP Leader further says the national debt crisis, a severe economic recession, high rates of poverty and unemployment particularly among youths and escalating costs of living were all critical issues even before COVID struck.
He says Sayed-Khaiyum was forced to slash the 2019/20 budget by a massive $1 billion because of debt unsustainability, drastically reducing expenditure in the social sector and no other government had such a dismal record in office.
Chaudhry says the minister could well take a lesson from the Labour government’s sound management of the economy and state finances resulting in a record 9.6% economic growth in 1999/2000. He says Sayed-Khaiyum is in no position to be pointing fingers at anyone else.
As for election manifestos, Chaudhry says release the election date and they will release the manifestos.
He says Sayed-Khaiyum should know that party manifestos are released once an election date is declared, not before.
Questions have been sent to Attorney General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum. He is yet to respond.
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