From Election To Coup In Fiji

Provides an analysis of the lead-up to, the outcome, and the aftermath of Fiji's historic 2006 election - including the December coup. Contributions from ex-Vice President Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi; ousted Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase; interim Minister for Finance Mahendra Chaudhry; and an array of leading commentators.

This book explores the factors behind - and the implications of - the 2006 coup. It brings together contributions from leading scholars, local personalities, civil society activists, union leaders, journalists, lawyers, soldiers and politicians - including deposed Prime Ministers Laisenia Qarase and Mahendra Chaudhry. The 2006 Military Takeover in Fiji: A Coup to End All Coups? is essential reading for those with an interest in the contemporary history of Fiji, politics in deeply divided societies, or in military intervention in civilian politics.

Since independence in 1970, Fiji had endured four coups and four constitutions. Each of the four constitutions prescribed different electoral systems. After eight years of military rule by 2006 coup leader Frank Bainimarama, the long awaited 2014 election was the first under a radically new Constitution, which introduced a new electoral system based on proportional representation and a single constituency. The election was won by Bainimarama's FijiFirst Party, who subsequently embarked on a process of shifting the political configuration of Fijian politics from inter-ethnic to trans-ethnic mobilisation. The People Have Spoken provides a unique collection of articles about the 2014 election in Fiji. It captures the important issues that have plagued Fiji over the years including ethnic relations, power politics, coups, ethno-nationalism, youth and media censorship, to name a few. It provides an excellent mixture of contributors (both Fijian and non-Fijian) including academics, a political party representative, a member of the Election Commission and a member of the international monitoring group.

By rights, the island nation of Fiji should be thriving. It is easily the most developed country in the South Pacific; it is a hub for regional transportation and communication links, the home of international diplomatic, educational and aid organisations, with a talented multiethnic population. Yet, since its independence it has suffered two military coups in 1987 and an attempted putsch in 2000, resulting in strained institutions, and disrupted improvements to essential infrastructure, and to educational, social and medical services.

May 19, 2000. Fiji's democratically elected multiracial government is hijacked by a group of armed gunmen led by George Speight, and held hostage for fifty days. Suva, the capital, is torched and looted as Speight's supporters gather on the lawns of the parliamentary complex, dancing, cooking food, celebrating the purported abrogation of the constitution that brought the People's Coalition government to power. The country is plunged into darkness yet again, enduring the pain of three coups in a period of just thirteen years. The process of healing and reconciliation, symbolised by the enactment of a new Constitution, unanimously approved by Parliament and blessed by the powerful Great Council of Chiefs, lies discarded, as winds of ethnic chauvinism sweep through the countryside, damaging the fragile fabric of multiculturalism that was carefully constructed by so many over many years. The economy is on the brink of collapse, investor confidence has vanished, and the best and the brightest are seeking succour on other shores. Fiji falls victim, yet again, to the prejudice and greed of a section of its people. This book gathers together a handful of memoirs of those tragic events in Fiji. They were written while the gun was still smoking; personal, anguished reactions of people from all walks of life, concerned about a country they all love but deeply distressed by the developments there. They are first reactions. They will in time become essential building blocks for a larger interpretive framework of academic analysis about origins, processes and impacts. Straight from the heart, these memoirs will be remembered as the people of Fiji and their friends elsewhere contemplate the wreckage and ruin brought about by that act of madness in the month of May 2000.

Gathering together a handful of memoirs, this book considers those tragic events when Fiji's democratically elected multiracial government was hijacked and held hostage for 50 days in Suva. These are personal, anguished reactions from people of all walks of life, concerned for the distressing developments in their country.

"On 14 May 1987, Colonel Sitiveni Rabuka led a raid on Fiji's Parliament House in the nation's capital, Suva, to remove a government dominated by Fijian Indians. The coup sent shock waves around the world and changed forever our view of the tanquility of our Pacific neighbours. Rabuka: No Other Way is Sitiveni Rabuka's own story - told for the first time. It describes the man behind the coup, the growth of tensions between the Fijian racial and political groups and the events that precipitated military action."--Bac cover.