Government MP and National Federation Party Leader, Professor Biman Prasad confirms that they will be ensuring the Accountability and Transparency Commission, Code of Conduct and Freedom of Information laws are enacted after committee discussions.
Professor Prasad confirmed this when he and former Attorney General, Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum were questioned during the State of the Economy Dialogue organised by Dialogue Fiji.
Sayed-Khaiyum was questioned on why for 9 years after the 2013 Constitution came in, the FijiFirst Government did not enact the Accountability and Transparency Commission, the Code of Conduct and the Freedom of Information laws, although these laws were supposed to be enacted according to the constitution.
Professor Prasad was also questioned on why the laws have not been enacted in the 3 years that the Coalition Government has been in place.
It was raised to them that we are talking about the economy, but if there is corruption and abuse of office, we know there will be continuous wastage of taxpayers' money.
Professor Prasad says they expected the FijiFirst Government to enact some of those laws.
He says the bill is in parliament before the committee and they are hoping that the law will be enacted soon.
Sayed-Khaiyum says the point is that the government previously enacted the FICAC Act and ratified the UN Convention Against Corruption and also put itself up for a peer review by a developing country and a developed country.
He says they tabled the bill regarding the Accountability and Transparency Commission in 2018 and the committee took its time, and we then had the 2018 elections.
Sayed-Khaiyum says in 2019, we had COVID.
He adds they had enacted the Freedom of Information Act but the Transparency Commission would have helped.
Sayed-Khaiyum says the government needs to bring that bill as it brings about a new level of accountability.
He says the ball is now in the current government's court.
He further says the organisation that was going to implement the Freedom of Information Act was the Accountability and Transparency Commission.
While reacting to this, Unity Fiji Leader, Savenaca Narube says that is exactly what politicians do - they promise us a lot and they do not deliver.
