Sharma hopes Bainimarama and Qiliho appeal is heard in July

The lawyers for former Prime Minister, Voreqe Bainimarama and former Police Commissioner, Sitiveni Qiliho have now opted to withdraw Qiliho’s application for bail pending appeal citing that the substantive appeal needed to be heard expeditiously.

Bainimarama and Qiliho appeared before Justice Chandana Prematilaka in the Fiji Court of Appeal for hearing in Qiliho’s bail pending appeal application.

Defence lawyer, Devanesh Sharma says Qiliho had served a large part of his sentence and was hopeful that the appeal would be heard soon.

He explained that the appeal against conviction and sentence for Bainimarama and Qiliho is largely straight forward and that he would limit the appeal to three grounds which relate to the law.

Sharma also says that one of the grounds on which the appeal against sentence was based on was the fact that the then Acting Chief Justice Salesi Temo did not recuse himself after making remarks about Magistrate Seini Puamau where he had also commented on her sentence being invalid, prior to having heard the appeal against sentence.

He says he is working on the appeal to be placed in the upcoming sessions of the Court of Appeal and is hopeful that it would be placed in the July session.

This is the appeal of the conviction and sentence in the University of the South Pacific case.

Bainimarama got an early release in November last year while Qiliho is still serving time in prison.

On May 9th last year, Bainimarama was sentenced to 1 year imprisonment after being found guilty of one count of attempt to pervert the course of justice in the USP case while Qiliho was sentenced to 2 years imprisonment for the charge of abuse of office.

The Appellants now await a call over date from the Court of Appeal to fix a hearing date in the July session.