No law in Fiji say UK lawyers

By MICHAEL FIELD

Last updated 15:12 28/02/2012

A major British legal group has declared that the rule of law no longer operates in Fiji.

The Law Society Charity says in a just published report that there is no peaceful and lawful way to challenge Fiji's military regime.

There is no democracy and the independence of the judiciary cannot be relied on, they say in a report Fiji: The Rule of Law Lost, the Charity considers the effect on the Rule of Law in Fiji of the events of 2009 and beyond.

It said the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) has had its competence and independence reduced to an unacceptable level and that regime controls and restrictions make it virtually impossible for an independent legal profession to function appropriately.

The group, set up by the Law Society of England and Wales, noted that the United Nations tried to investigate the rule of law in Fiji in 2009 but were denied entry.

The charity's chair, Nigel Dodds, made a private visit to investigate last November.

Since his investigation Fiji dictator Voreqe Bainimarama has lifted the martial law he imposed in 2009, replacing it with new forms of control.

The charity noted that there is a notice posted to the walls of the courts stating that "no proceedings challenging the constitutionality of the Government's acts can be issued."

It said the DPP, Josaia Naigulevu, was dismissed along with the judiciary in April 2009.

The most recent appointee to the role of DPP is Ayesha Jinasena, a Sri Lankan on a two-year contract.

It said the DPP and the Fiji Independent Commission Against Corruption had been taken over by the newly qualified and lawyers imported from Sri Lanka.

Jinasena was sacked and ordered to leave Fiji in November due to "lack of confidence by the police".

She was replaced by New Zealand lawyer Christopher Pryde.

The Charity found that Chief Justice Anthony Gates had used his personal connections with Sri Lanka to recruit Sri Lankan judges in large numbers on short-term, renewable contracts.

"The quality is held to be variable. Maintaining independence from government in their position must be difficult," it said.

The Charity noted that the judges dismissed in April 2009 were given no reasons, no notice, and no compensation for loss of office.

"It is apparent that their sin was to comply with their oath of office and to act independently rather than any misconduct," said the Charity.

"It is difficult to conceive of a more obvious attack on judicial independence."

The military rule had removed the Fiji Law Society of the power to register lawyers, with the power given to the Chief Registrar, who was military appointee, Major Ana Rokomokoti.

The removed the Fiji Law Society files after threatening to arrest staff if they did not hand over the files.

- © Fairfax NZ News

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It is interesting to note that on the bottom of the UK Lawyers Gazette , this comment appears by a John Connors :

Fiji: The Rule of Law Lost by Dodds

Submitted by John Connors on Mon, 27/02/2012 - 21:05.

Where can I obtain a link to the report or a copy of it please?

Fiji's Sinking Economy

Did you hear that they’ve dispensed with the captain of the Italian cruise ship;
He suffers from premature evacuation….

Reminds me of our own two evacuated crustaceans, called Captain BainiLamulamu & a petty officer called Khaiyum at the helm of Fiji's sinking of Fiji's economy .......

Fiji Regime desperate grasp for funds causes tourists to bolt

Fiji's interim government has increased airport departure tax by a third

The rise of $FJ50 brings the total departure tax to $FJ150 ($NZ105).

NZ's Flight Centre executive general manager Mike Friend said the increase came into effect on Friday without any notice to travel agents.

He said his agency is giving customers who no longer want to go to Fiji an alternative.

"We're offering anyone that's paid a deposit to go to Fiji, if they want to look at another destination, we'll move that deposit over, and in effect start the booking again for them."

However Fiji Tourism Minister Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says the increase was announced in November by the Finance Minister and he cannot understand why people are up in arms about it.

Mr Friend said that when countries such as Australia and Britain increased their departure tax, a period of 12 months notice was given.

Copyright © 2012, Radio New Zealand

Young People of Fiji respond to Junta's justification of "Shoot to Kill" Decree

On the 19th of january, 2012, the Young People's Concerned Network (YPCN) of Fiji released a Press Release with a rejoinder to the regime's accusations against young people.

"If long standing Democracies like the United States and Australia, decide to have Anti-Terrorism Laws that are labelled discriminatory and repressive, this does not mean Fiji can to do the same, as it is unreasonable to compare the POAD2012 with other Anti-Terrorism Laws given Fiji's Human Rights track record"

so says Young Peoples Concerned Network President, Peter Waqavonovono,

"Even in the USA and Australia, critics often allege that anti-terrorism legislation endangers democracy by creating a state of exception that allows authoritarian styles of government and they challenge the Law in their courts every day.

For this Decree to work, we should have had a generation worth of Human Rights and Civic Education programs already in place". 



Responding to an earlier press release by the YPCN , the Regime's toxic (dis)information sporangium, Mrs Sharon Smith Jones (an Australian national employed by Bainimarama's regime) labelled the young peoples opinion as "ignorant", and accused the YPCN of attempting to manipulate public sentiment.

Miss Smith-Jones (not known for her abilities as a Historian) sibilates that young people have "misread" Fiji’s recent political history .......

and - further claims that her latest Decree is a step to :

..." prevent and Combat domestic and international terrorist threats in all their forms“.

Waqavonovono says that the Government Press Release is also the first time a Government Official has revealed the type of "terrorists" they are keeping an eye on, which seem to include Politicians and Religious Leaders who have or continue to engage in their daily activities.

Says Waqavonovono,

"To also suggest that people who do not believe in interfaith and multicultural values can now be seen as Terrorist and isolated is a far cry from the amount of red tape and legislative rationale behind terrorism-like Laws adopted by The United States of America or Australia, whose judicial systems also provide much checks and balances to ensure misuse is meet with remedies" (not present in Fiji)

The YPCN is also very mindful of the Human Rights track record of the regime - which includes :

• Arbitrary Detentions
• Inhumane Treatment and Abuse of Human Rights Defenders (Journalists, Politicians, Religious Leaders and Pro-Democracy Activists)
• a couple of well publicized Deaths occurring whilst in State organized Detention.

..... and does not see much changing under the decree.

Waqavonovono, who has also been detained on occasions by the Junta for his pro-democracy values said that, the regime could not realistically compare the Decree to the Anti-Terrorism Laws of other nations.

"This is because in Fiji, the necessary awareness and education in understanding, human dignity, Civil and Political Rights are not even understood."

In the YPCN press release, Waqavonovono points out that the regime's poor human rights track record and inability to defend human rights defenders, politicians, and pro-democracy advocates whilst in arbitrary detention is a compelling reason to seek a re-look of the powers and provisions in this Decree to provide for more checks and balances.

If their Decree's cannot consider human decency, and recognize a separation of powers, he says, Youth of Fiji cannot possibly take the Regime's promises seriously.

He also says that in the opinion of the YPCN, it believes that that in the wrong hands the POAD2012 can turn people away from engaging in future consultations with the regime to deliver Constitutional and Electoral Reform.

As if to draw attention away from the heavy-handed dismissal of the young David, the Goliathan Jones, perfidiously said the regime "valued" youth and praised their own Junta Youth programme.

But Waqavonovono was quick to remind the hubristic Jones of the regime's audacious acts as follows :

• Downgraded the Ministry of Youth to a Department
• Cut its budget
• Removed National Youth Day
  
• Shelved the National Youth Service Scheme

Followed by a full break down of the State's Value of Youth as indicated in the 2012 Budget :

• National Youth Band - $100,000
• National Youth Day - $50,000
• Youth Devp : - Food for course pax - $28,000
• National Youth Advisory Board - $15,000
• Adult and Community Education - $20,000
• Voluntary youth organisation training program - $100,000
• DEAP - $30,000
• Youth Capacity building - $400,000
  

GRAND TOTAL for Youth development is $743,000.

If this sum is divided amongst the 308,000 youths living in Fiji, each youth will receive $2.41.

Therefore the Regime's value of the Fijian Youth is $2.41 per youth.

Woopeee dooo. ... (very touching and very valued indeed.)

Waqavonovono asks for more voices to hold the regime accountable and remind them of their promises.

"As the nation moves towards restoring our Democracy, let us never lose sight of our responsibilities and roles in shaping this nation"

YOUNG PEOPLES CONCERNED NETWORK 
www.ypcnfiji.com - ypcn.sec@gmail.com 
The Young Peoples Concerned Network FIJI is a group made up of strong minded and strong 
willed young people of Fiji who are concerned about issues that affect them and understand the
importance of having their voice heard and taking direct action to shaping positive change.

Foreqe's Vogonsphere

Sooo ...... what have we here luvequ's - oh its only yet another lowdown nefarious decree (yawn).....

Gee, I do wonder what we the multitudes are doing to Generalisimo Frankistein that frightens him so ?

And, oh I also see here in the newspaper that Cranky Voranky and his so called Attorney General ayrse-wipe wish to bestow a new Constitution on the great unwashed ... wippeee whoo !

Well first I just want to say this to Voranky ...... Constitutions (please pronounce this carefully- it's not "conti-shoeshine") are usually ordained and established by the people.

Patrick Henry , the man who once said : " GIVE ME LIBERTY or GIVE ME DEATH" also said :

"The Constitution is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government......."
__________

"Bad men cannot make good citizens. It is when a people forget God that tyrants forge their chains. A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience, is incompatible with freedom. No free government, or the blessings of liberty, can be preserved to any people but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue; and by a frequent recurrence to fundamental principles.

But of course Voranksky won't understand this because his version of his (very own) conti-shoeshine will be "ordained and established" not by the people, but by only 2 people - himself 'The Tyrant', and his Aiyars-kick.

See I am a simple housewife and grandmother . The way I see it is like this. We have 2 forces pushing and shoving each other on an everyday basis in Fiji. First we have the power-hungry military regime bullies, who operate like they have to show their power everyday (and bugger everything else including the economy).

Mark Tokarski (Amercian Philosopher) said about power :

"Power is as power does. Power does not exist on its own or sit there like toothpaste on a shelf waiting to be grabbed by a shopper. Power is grown, taken by force, nurtured, exercised and used to to grow more power."

The decrees that Aiyarse-wipe puts out almost on a daily basis is the basis for the junta's power-grabbing Vogons who do this on Vorenky's instructions solely to atomise and isolate the Fijian population from each other. Like Hitler's regime, Bai and Arsi's sole aim is to strike petrified fear into all and sundry & get abject compliance in all things. All that does not serve the regime's purpose must be expunged.

Because of this we see fear in the populace, and this makes the regime happy because the power is growing (together with the paisa , and the arrogance) as fast as jungle wabosucu.

However, I am reminded of why the regime is continually vomiting decree after draconian decree. It is simply because they are afraid of the people and what they think.

For this reason I am secretly nourished by the great writer Terry Pratchett who wrote "Small gods" when he said:

"Fear is strange soil. Mainly it grows obedience like corn, which grows in rows and makes weeding easy. But sometimes it grows the potatoes of defiance, which flourish underground."

What amazing truth he speaks ... one only has to look at the recent uprisings around the world to bear witness to this reality !

In 1978, a science fiction comedy series created by Douglas Adams, called , The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was released, told the story of The Vogons, a fictional alien race from the planet Vogsphere

Vogons are horrid and slug-like but vaguely humanoid, are bulkier than humans, and have green skin. Vogons are described as mindlessly bureaucratic, aggressive, having "as much sex appeal as a road accident" and the writers of "the third worst poetry in the universe".

Here is a picture of what one looks like, and my Guide Description of what to expect each time you see a Vogon:

Here is what to do if you want to get a lift from a Vogon: forget it.

They are one of the most unpleasant people on Earth. Quite evil, also bad-tempered, bureaucratic, officious and callous.

They wouldn't even lift a finger to save their own grandmothers from the Ravenous NurBano Beast of Baal without orders signed in triplicate, sent in, sent back, queried, lost, found, subjected to public inquiry, lost again, and finally buried in mangrove for three months and recycled as No.1 Commerce Commission price-regulated prescription drug for diarrhoea.

The best way to get a drink out of a Vogon is to stick your finger down his throat, and the best way to irritate him is to feed his grandmother to the Ravenous NurBano Beast of Baal. Also, on no account should you allow a Vogon to read decrees at you.

The series tells that, far back in prehistory, when the first primeval Vogons crawled out of the sea, the forces of evolution were so disgusted with them that they never allowed them to evolve again.

Through sheer obstinacy, though, the Vogons survived (partly by adapting a misplaced, badly malformed, and dyspeptic liver into a brain). They then emigrated en masse to their own star cluster where they form most of their bureaucracy, and patrol the galaxy demolishing planets wherever they go.

Hmm .. sounds familiar ..

Just so you recognise a Vogon when you come across them .. they are roughly human-sized, although much bulkier, with green or grey skin from drinking too much kava. Their noses are above their eyebrows from wanna-being-highfalutin all the time. Because of the severe bureaucracy they operate under this is the reason their noses are so flat - from being repeatedly smacked in the face by the paddle creatures under the sand on Vogsphere whenever they had an independent thought.

"The frightening thing about the Vogons was their absolute mindless determination to do whatever mindless thing it was they were determined to do. There was never any point in trying to appeal to their reason because they didn't have any."

_______

Well I don't know about you but I for one refuse to belong to Foreqe's Vogonsphere, and as Bubu ramps it up for 2012 , the power of the pen beckons once more.... let's hear it again from Patrick Henry:

"for this is the only way we can hope to arrive at truth and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings."

All aboard ragone's .. let's make this year we take the Vogon mothership DOWN !!!!

Young People in Fiji speak out against latest draconian decree

Press Release:

Youth Activist speaks on PUBLIC ORDER (AMENDMENT) DECREE 2012

A Fiji based youth and human rights activist has issued a word of caution as the announcement of the lifting of the Public Emergency Regulations (PER) was made over the weekend and replaced by the Public Order Amendment Decree 2012 (POAD2012).

"There are a few irregularities in the POAD2012 and possible clauses that can be taken out of context and force the current regime into a Human Rights Disaster. As we move towards reinstating Democratic values and processes, we cant afford to limit the access of information, movement and gathering of persons, and curtail further the freedom to speak"

says youth and human rights activist Peter Waqavonovono.

The Youth Activist who was awarded in 2010 for he's work in Human Rights by the Frontline Human Rights Defenders Organization claims that "in the wrong hands, this Amendment Decree can be used to term any individual or organization as a terrorist, hinder free thought, censor our media, and prevent the participation of citizens in Fiji on the Constitutional and Electoral reform processes that are planned.

This is contrary to the comments made at the 14^th SESSION OF THE HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL ......

where Fiji promised to: ..........

...... set in place necessary legal instruments and vital processes necessary to the holding of fair and truly democratic elections and show a firm commitment to upholding and protecting human rights including that of human rights defenders. Waqavonovono says that,

"The fact that human rights violations committed under the POAD2012 cannot be judicially questioned, compensated or challenged is a sign for caution."

Waqavonovono has also questioned the relevance of the Decree in time where there are no signs of Public Unrest or desire to cause any harm to the nation.

"I would imagine that the decree should have gone further to suggest remedies to the insecurities of the regime, like investment in peace and human rights awareness and education programs, promotion of civic education, demand anti-violence models and culture within all state run agencies and departments (including the Education system), promotion of Inter-cultural awareness and sharing programs, and the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation type model."

The Youth Activist also is encouraging Fiji young people who make up more than 60% of the nations Population, to prepare for the Electoral and Constitutional Reform processes that are set to happen. Waqavonovono concludes:,

"We must ensure that our voices are heard and that they are seriously taken into consideration.

We will be the generation that defends this Democracy and need to know how it works and evolves, therefore we need to be involved from the very beginning and not brought in as rubber stamps.

The time to sit back and let others lead and negotiate on our behalf because of age is gone, now we need to take hold of our own destiny and make purposeful contributions and demand fair engagement / participation models"

Ho-hum and Tinkle-doo in the Kingdom of Pu

Ho Ho Ho
What have we here ?
a potlatch pow-wow for all we know
a Casino deal for a trinket and a beer

Hau Hau Hau
in 2001, Larry Claunch great American Brave
first smoked a pipe and dug a howl
at Nukudrau with Sour Kai Yum as knave

Pow Wow Wow
in 2011 , Apache Larry waves dollars in the air
Running Frank tosses him the Casino plough
I am Chief Wella Wella - he says ... hehehe .... Dough-Me - Multi-millionaire.

Ho Ho Ho
Surprise Surprise - Sour Kai Yum is quite the Apache's chum
With Aunty Num Bum sitting pretty like Chief Crow
What has Running Frank & the Red Indians dealt Fiji on the jungle drum ?