This was the chiefs’ first chance to make their collective presence felt on the political firmament since Bainimarama took over the reins.

Dev Nadkarni
Last month, Fiji Interim Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama suspended all Great Council of Chiefs’ (GCC) future meetings and ordered its offices shut.

The GCC, a 55-member constitutional body mainly comprising hereditary chiefs among other prominent indigenous citizens, is charged with such functions as electing the country’s President, Vice-President and some senate members.

For the first time in the country’s history, the GCC rejected the President’s nominee, Ratu Epeli Nailatikau, for the Vice President’s position, which fell vacant after Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi resigned following the December 5, 2006 coup.

Nailatikau, himself a high chief and a former armed forces commander, is foreign affairs minister in the interim cabinet. Most GCC members did not view his association with the interim administration favourably and also saw his nomination as being foisted on them by Bainimarama. Two of the three chiefly confederacies thumbed down the nomination.

An angry Bainimarama lashed out at the GCC’s stand of having rejected the nominee on the grounds that he was a part of the ‘illegal’ administration, saying they were placing their personal interests above the national interest, before ordering closure of its offices.

Several high profile members of the GCC have been facing the heat since Bainimarama began his “clean-up” campaign last December. While a few of them have been ousted from their high positions on statutory bodies, others are said to be under investigation for financial irregularities. News reports also say the army has been keeping a close watch on some of them.

This was the chiefs’ first chance to make their collective presence felt on the political firmament since Bainimarama took over the reins, and their rejection of the presidential nomination was not wholly unexpected. It was a confrontation waiting to happen.

Unfortunately for Fiji, it comes at a time when things seemed to have been taking a turn for the better after the March meeting of the Pacific Islands Forum countries’ foreign ministers in Vanuatu. There was a discernible thaw in Australia and New Zealand’s rigid, isolationist approach to the problem in Fiji since last December.

A Joint Working Group comprising regional leaders, officials from Australia, New Zealand and Fiji besides nominees of the interim administration has been formed to work on the recommendations of the Vanuatu meet—one of them being the 36-month timeframe for elections set by the interim administration.

Meanwhile, the European Union, which met with a delegation from Fiji, asked for an earlier deadline for the polls—to be held before March 1, 2009. It has also asked the Bainimarama administration to recognise the independence of the Great Council of Chiefs—something it is bound to find hard to swallow especially so quickly after its drastic action last month.

The army under Bainimarama has long viewed the chiefs with suspicion—particularly after the GCC endorsed the previous government’s Reconciliation Bill in July 2005. It is worth noting that the interim administration’s Fijian Affairs minister is Ratu Epeli Ganilau, a former army commander who was relieved of his duties as chairman of the GCC in 2004 amidst a controversial technicality (just before last month’s sudden development, he had gone on record saying that his ministry could take action on GCC members if it wanted to).

Many chiefs who have found their way into powerful positions in the country’s statutory bodies are wealthy and still wield influence over their people as they ride around in their expensive late model four wheel drives known in Fiji as “Ratumobiles”.

What are the options for the GCC in the face of its suspension? Will its members—used to the trappings of power first given it by the British in 1876 and then institutionalised by the country’s constitutions since independence and a multi-million dollar taxpayer funded annual grant—continue smarting under this huge snub for long?

Will they go back to their people and try to create a groundswell of support for themselves? Are the chiefs capable of banding together to whip up an indigenous backlash as ousted Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase has repeatedly been warning? While opinion is divided on this question, there is no doubt the chiefs’ support base has eroded substantially in recent years owing to a number of factors. There is a growing belief that the chiefs no longer have the kind of absolute command they had on their constituents in the past.

In any case, the interim administration does not believe they have the clout they did in past years. In an interview with this columnist in early March, Bainimarama had said his administration did not see any possibility of an indigenous backlash.

He said the people of Fiji had “seen through their corrupt chiefs” and pointed out examples where people had defied chiefly orders to oppose his coup by not participating in protest marches in Suva and speaking out in the media against their opposition to the coup—something unheard of in Fiji’s hierarchical society.

Yet, after last month’s developments, the army doesn’t seem to be so sure. Following the GCC closure, some of the chiefs announced a meeting to discuss matters further at a different location and reports said the army quickly moved in to prevent this from happening. It also took in a prominent GCC member for questioning following his pronouncements during the recent meeting.

Colonel Pita Driti, hitherto the army’s silent strongman, became vocal soon afterwards and clamped prohibitory orders on the assembly of people anywhere in the country. That makes it illegal for the chiefs to address their people in public unless they have police permission to do so. Whether they are able to mobilise support among their clans on ideological platforms such as respect for traditions of the chiefly system or the fact that this was yet another unconstitutional action is questionable at this point. Clearly, even the chiefs are unsure if that tack would work. Even if it does, any action would likely be confined to pockets rather than across entire regions.

What might however fan a popular uprising, if at all, would be the continuing economic downturn: if people continue to face wage cuts and lose jobs as they have been since December 5 last year; if the interim government fails to come up with tangible results of its “clean-up operation” and if it fails to take corrective economic measures in the coming months.

A perception of widespread economic distress would be a far more opportune time to sow the seeds of a mass movement fuelled by ideological and emotional sentiments.

That is the kind of climate the chiefs -or for that matter any other party interested in changing the stats quo—would find worth dying for.

The interim administration must urgently do everything it can, especially on the economic front, to prevent yet another flashpoint that may well prove to be Fiji’s worst yet.