How should the South West Pacific region's media outlets and professional journalists respond to the suppression of press freedom in Fiji? Clearly it is our view that Davis and News Corp and Sky have failed. But what is the right approach here? Let us not be too hasty in our analysis. Let us try and go deeper.
Consider some other problems in the region. The journalistic profession is not the only one in which destructive tensions leading to injustice are evident. How should the region's jurists and judges view the internal tensions within the ranks of their own profession now that Fiji's judiciary, so long reliant upon justices from neighbouring administrations, has been sacked? What does the deep-rooted tension manifest in Fiji's judiciary for many years say about the standards of the region's judicial judgments, about the quality of the region's jurisprudential education, about the rectitude of regional professional legal bodies? Of course, the reach of the legal profession's network is not confined the region itself.
Or consider the region politically in terms of the way the Pacific Forum operates, the way ANZUS relates to it, how the UN's voice is respected among the nations of the region, and the influence of the EC and various international committees and bodies that administer complex agreements, promote trade, travel and tourism. Think also of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) which among other things promotes the rights of the region's indigenous Melanesian peoples. What are the elected politicians in the various regional governments and inter-government agencies to make of the sacking of the judiciary, the abrogation of the constitution, all on the back of the initial dismembering of its parliamentary democracy, let alone the suspension of the great Council of Chiefs? Davis' contribution seems to be motivated by a despair, shared by Bainimarama, that the historical experiment in Fijian political independence has had its day and now the only thing to do is to wipe the slate clean and start again. The region, they imply, will simply have to accept that fact.
But this despairing view suggests that Fijians are a different species from others in the region and in this instance particularly different from Australians and New Zealanders. It is a view that implicitly assumes Fijians cannot handle constitutional parliamentary democracy and instead need a "despot for diversity." This view of Fiji's current and immediate future almost imperceptibly slides into the swamp of an uncritical post-modern cultural relativism that anticipates a totalitarian rule.
Davis opines that Bainimarama's way may be the only way and so appeals to his own version of South Pacific exceptionalism, except we would have to ask whether this isn't a disguised form of racism against the good people of the land of his birth. Davis accepts Bainimarama's view that Fiji has a basic need for military or militarised government. But even if Bainimarama was to concede that the preconditions are right for elections today, Fiji's problem, which Davis's journalism does nothing to combat, remains. Fiji's problem is not the racism of the Qarase-SDL government - Fiji's political problem is the military's presumption of a "reserve power" that arrogates to itself the right to determine the timing of any election, the interpretation of any constitution, and the composition and performance of any government when it is finally elected. As by-product of his work, Davis might win favour among Fiji's illegal elite, but the reality of military "reserve power" is the reality which he, in his eagerness to put forward a "good story", successfully and totally avoids.
Bainimarama says that to have elections tomorrow will simply be a return to the racist politics of the previous Government. Yes, but to wait until September 2014 with this untrustworthy military commander in charge gives no guarantee that the military will have given up its role as primary advisor and manipulator of the head of State. Davis's view that Bainimarama may be the "best chance" for Fiji and the region (inc Australia and New Zealand) is a form of journalism that avoids the issue of justice. His version of South Pacific "exceptionalism" implies, with Arthur De Gobineau, that "dark skinned races are fit only for military governments"? Parliamentary democracy under the thumb of a military dictatorship is still a military dictatorship. If Bainimarama is Fiji's "best chance" then why not now just leave things as they are? Why not dispense with this charade of a return to democracy and simply announce that Fiji has finally arrived at where it has to be? But, then racism has not been eradicated and the 5 years are needed as the designated timeline to demonstrate that Fiji can now do things in true Fijian style. This is mere wishful thinking. Clearly Bainimarama has no immediate plans to disestablish the military from its political dominance. The Commander's definition of "racism" is intentionally vague to give him maximum manoeuvrability; his identification of the underlying problems he was called upon to fix have changed on an almost daily basis since he assumed office. What is clear however is that under his command the military is determined to maintain its assumed "reserved power". And in that context Davis's view that Bainimarama is Fiji's "best chance" is a hopelessly naïve, if not childish, playing with the possibilities of journalistic spin doctoring.
Parliamentary democracy under a constitution requires a system of public legal governance that is willing to work through lawful and constitutional means with an eye upon the volatility of the electorate and the structural injustices that prevail from generation to generation. Just politics requires patience, that Christians confess comes as a gift of the Spirit of God.
In his interview with Bainimarama, Graham Davis allows the usurper to once again intemperately parade Laisenia Qarase as a racist. This is a purely unprofessional acquiescence in propaganda and libel, from a man impatient to have his view dominate Fiji's public view of itself. Davis simply lets it pass. For all his attempt to air an "alternative" view, his sympathy for one who has been misunderstood, he thereby promotes a most egregious "good guy, bad guy" classification, which he says has to be avoid if reality is to be faced. When is he going to use his position to allow the one accused to answer the revelations he puts forward in this (patently childish) "exclusive".
The coalition government of Laisenia Qarase achieved more in the seven months after the May 2006 election, in terms of bringing that broken country together, than the Commander of the Military has done through his persistent and treacherous threats to lawful government, or via his own illegal tenure since the December 5th 2006 coup. Let us, then, list the resulting devastation in terms of major public legal institutions that has resulted from this process which Davis has been so keen to promote - both before the military took over and subsequently.
1. The former Police Chief who had begun the reform of the service was forced from the country with threats being made to his life. Since then the Police has been run as an arm of the military.
2. The coup was staged after the lawful military commander had come to an agreement in Wellington with the lawfully appointed Prime Minister - and with that broken promise the coup drove a wedge through Fiji's relationship with New Zealand.
3. The imposition of a state of emergency resulting in deaths and other illegal assaults upon citizens. Now those found guilty are reported to have been released from prison on Community Supervision Orders.
4. The dissolving of the Great Council of Chiefs.
5. The sacking of Chief Justice Fatiaki.
6. Persistent military appointments to non-military institutions.
7. The sacking of the judiciary
8. The abrogation of the 1997 constitution
9. The suppression of the media and curbs on free speech.
10. The undermining of freedom of association for dissenting groups and those who hold opinions different from what the military deem to be "safe".
11. And finally, an absurd naïve proposal that assumes that racism can be overcome without a parliament in five years.
Davis's articles and interview thus allows for the view that the Qarase-SDL regime was racist because it sought to fulfil its own party mandate to its indigenous constituents who had elected it in elections declared free and fair by all and every independent outside observer group. As I have said, Davis allows Bainimarama to accuse Qarase of racism and he does that by blurring the historical record as if the 1997 constitution was Qarase's document. It was not. It was an all party multiracial outcome that passed every judicial body overseeing it. Qarase did not invent the racial voting system - this policy was developed under Ratu Mara's leadership in the '60s. As an election winner Qarase was simply doing what every PM has had to do - manage it! Live within it. And for doing so he is accused of racism.
On the hand one wonders why Davis would turn so resolutely allow the conscientious Methodist, Laisenia Qarase, to be continually slandered by a man who, on the public record, has shown repeatedly that his word can not be trusted.
In sum, Davis' journalism is merely a failure to criticise the régime in control in Suva, and by presenting himself as the correspondent working "behind the front lines" can only embolden the injustice perpetrated by Bainimarama et al on his fellow professionals in Fiji who can not now do their work. His fellow professionals in Fiji deserve something much better than what has been unkindly presented to them on this occasion.
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May
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