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May 30, 2012 10:13:11 AM
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| http://www.fijilive.com/news/2012/05/sdl-will-not-obstruct-elections-says-qarase/43706.Fijilive | |||
Fiji’s Soqosoqo Duavata Ni Lewenivanua says it has no intention of obstructing the 2014 elections or the constitution-making processes, but wants the process to be fair and independent. SDL leader Laisenia Qarase said in a statement said it is his duty as party leader to point out flaws in the election and constitution-making processes being implemented. “As a nation we must ensure that these processes are credible and fair to the people of Fiji and to the international community,” said Qarase. Qarase said the SDL wants to be heard by the Constitution Commission but they want an independent commission. He said it is important that the consultation processes are inclusive, participatory, free, fair and transparent. He said they would like to see an independent body handle the voter registration and the entire election process. That independent body should be the independent office of the Supervisor of Elections, he said. However Attorney General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum said the 2006 elections which had an independent supervisor of election and an independent electoral commission still had a lot of flaws as reported by the European Union. Sayed-Khaiyum said there were 20,000 mistakes in the electoral rolls and 9.7 per cent of the votes were invalid. Constitution Commission chair Professor Yash Ghai said earlier the commission is very much independent and it hopes to carry out a transparent public consultations towards the drafting of a new Constitution. By Mereani Gonedua and Keresi Nauwakarawa |
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Fiji’s Soqosoqo Duavata Ni Lewenivanua says it wants the process to be fair and independent.
SDL will not obstruct elections, says Qarase
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Investment level looks favourable
07:04 Today
Investment Fiji chief executive Ravuni Uluilakeba
Taken from/By: FBC News
Report by: Ritika Pratap
http://www.fbc.com.fj/fiji/2355/investment-level-looks-favourable-
The foreign investment level forecast for this year looks favourable says Investment Fiji chief executive Ravuni Uluilakeba.
Investment Fiji has received a total of 51 investment proposal with a value of $211m for the first quarter of this year.
This is an increase of 7.5% compared to the previous year.
Uluilakeba says with an increase in number of registered projects, it can be said that foreign investors are beginning to have confidence in Fiji.
_“The impact when you look at the positive aspect looks very promising because of the numbers coming in this year and similarly when you compare the trend of registration over the last three year. So those are the critical points that we are looking at especially when looking at two to three quarters down the road.” _
The top five booming sectors include Services, Tourism, Wholesale , Retail and Manufacturing , Agriculture and Forestry.
The new and major investors are mostly from Australia, China, NZ, Malaysia and India.
Investment Fiji is targeting to achieve foreign investment of up to $699m this year.
Qantas pulls directors from Fiji airline
- From: AFP
- May 29, 20122:47PM
QANTAS has withdrawn its four directors from the board of Air Pacific, saying it was clear that Fiji’s military regime wanted to take complete control of the carrier.
Qantas, which has held a 46 percent stake in the airline since 1998, said the withdrawal would have immediate effect in the Pacific nation controlled by strongman Voreqe Bainimarama who took power in a 2006 coup.
“The action is a response to intervention in the management of Air Pacific by the Fiji government, including the issue of a decree designed to reduce Qantas’s role on the board,” it said in a statement.
“The government has made clear its intentions to unilaterally take absolute control of Air Pacific under the new decree. In the circumstances Qantas believes it is appropriate to remove its four directors.”
Under Fiji’s Civil Aviation (Ownership and Control of National Airlines) Decree issued in March, at least two-thirds of Air Pacific’s board of nine must be Fijian citizens, meaning only three directors can be foreigners.
As a result, Qantas’s four directors will step down to ensure Air Pacific remains compliant with the decree, the Australian airline said.
Qantas said since its involvement in Air Pacific, the carrier had been effectively controlled by Fijians and its only right under law had been to have four directors on a board where a two-thirds majority must endorse major decisions.
Qantas retains its rights as a shareholder and will continue to consider options for the potential sale of its stake, it added. The Fiji government said this month it was in talks to buy the Australian flag carrier’s holding.
Bainimarama seized power in a bloodless coup, pledging to root out corruption and introduce a one-person, one-vote system intended to end entrenched racial inequalities in the nation of 840,000.
But he reneged on a promise to hold elections in 2009, tore up the constitution and introduced emergency measures that muzzled the media and banned public meetings.
He repealed the emergency laws earlier this year, but also strengthened decrees giving the police and military sweeping powers.
The government has already announced that Air Pacific, which posted a loss of Fj$3.6 million ($2.0 million) in the 12 months to March 2011, will change its name to Fiji Airways next year.
Chaudhry, Qarase union = Mutually Assured Destruction
By GRAHAM DAVIS
(Fiji born and educated Mr Davis is an international award-winning Australian journalist. He blogs at grubsheet.com.au)
There have been few things more startling in recent weeks than the prospect of a political union between the party of indigenous supremacists in Fiji and the only Indo-Fijian ever to become the country’s prime minister.
That union would see Laisenia Qarase’s SDL Party in some form of association with Mahendra Chaudhry’s Labour Party to try to thwart any plan by Frank Bainimarama to morph into a democratically-elected prime minister at the promised elections in 2014.
Both men have spoken publicly about working together to find common ground to contest the elections. And while they haven’t yet defined the precise nature of any alliance, it’s clear from those comments that the proposal is being seriously considered.
CHAUDHRY GETS
BALL ROLLING
It was the wily Mr Chaudhry who got the ball rolling, saying that despite their deep differences in the past, he saw nothing strange in Labour uniting with a rival political party to “salvage the country from a despotic government”.
Mr Qarase stunned everyone by describing it as “a very good idea. I think it is important that we find some common grounds and fight the next election on those common grounds”, he said.
Quite where any discussion between the two has got isn’t clear. Yet even by the byzantine standards of Fiji politics, the prospect of these two old warhorses in passionate embrace is an extraordinary one.
It represents a triumph of the age-old truism that “my enemy’s enemy is my friend”. Their mutual hatred of Voreqe Bainimarama evidently far eclipses their own dislike and distrust for each other. But why would the country turn to these two again? There’s evidence aplenty that both Mr Chaudhry and Mr Qarase treated the electorate with disdain during their respective periods in government. Both of them certainly overplayed their hands.
For all his undoubted political strengths, Chaudhry as prime minister was dogged by perceptions of arrogance. Certainly, any sensible Indo-Fijian assuming the country’s leadership for the first time would have made managing indigenous sensibilities their first priority.
SEWING SEEDS OF
OWN DESTRUCTION
But, alas, Chaudhry did nothing of the sort and arguably sowed many of the seeds of his own destruction in the disastrous George Speight coup of 2000.
For his part, Laisenia Qarase – having gained power in the wake of that coup – overplayed his hand by trying to free Speight and his gang and by pushing through legislation to promote the indigenous cause against the wishes of the man who’d installed him as prime minister – Voreqe Bainimarama. For months, the military commander demanded that Qarase back off. He didn’t and guaranteed his own downfall in the subsequent takeover of 2006.
The notion that Mr Qarase and Mr Chaudhry can now work together is both mad – as in deranged – and MAD – as in ensuring Mutually Assured Destruction. Does anyone else in Fiji seriously think that these two failed leaders can forge their vastly opposing political forces into some kind of tilt at government in 2014?
One – Mr Qarase – stands for the paramountcy of one race, the iTaukei, over all others and actively worked in government to disadvantage other races through the Qoliqoli or coastal resources bill and the proposed changes to land title. The other – Mr Chaudhry – heads an ostensibly multiracial party in Labour but with a high Indo-Fijian component who still see themselves as having been the targets of Mr Qarase’s programme. The idea of any form of union not only reeks of an ill-considered marriage of convenience for short-term political gain but makes no practical sense whatsoever.
How on earth could the SDL’s hardline indigenous supremacists work with the Indo-Fijians they habitually describe as vulagi-visitors to Fiji – rather than equal citizens? How on earth could members of the Labour Party – and especially Indo-Fijians – work with those they regard as the architects of their demise in 2000 and their political disadvantage since?
TOO HARD TO
STOMACH
For Mr Chaudhry and Mr Qarase, Mutually Assured Destruction would surely come at the polls as their traditional supporters find the whole crazy notion simply too hard to stomach.
All of which suggests that Voreqe Bainimarama must be rubbing his hands with glee at the prospect of an alliance of his political enemies.
He knows they won’t be able to share the same bed for long and already has strong evidence from the Lowy Institute opinion poll that he would romp home at the head of a multiracial party and become elected prime minister in his own right.
Of course, nothing is guaranteed. As they say, a week is a long time in politics so the two years and four months to September 2014 is an eternity. But will these “blasts from the past” even be contesting the next election?
Laisenia Qarase is currently facing corruption charges that carry a jail sentence and – if convicted – a permanent ban from standing for public office.
And there’s serious doubt that the SDL will ever be able to meet the regime’s stipulation that only multiracial parties can contest the 2014 poll. For his part, Mr Chaudhry will also have to explain to voters where substantial sums of money from Indian donors ended up.
In the meantime, both Mr Qarase and Mr Chaudhry have regained their political voice – thanks to the lifting of censorship – and are actively positioning themselves for whatever happens after the Constitutional Commission completes its work.
Their idea to join forces is just plain dumb.
Cane farmers angry at enormous losses sustained in the past three years due to gross milling inefficiencies, are demanding a guaranteed minimum cane price of $80 per tonne.
They also want to be compensated by FSC should the TCTS rise above 10, considering that since 2009 the TCTS ratio has reached an unacceptable high of 13.5-14.
Among other demands, cane growers want the removal of the FSC board and senior management and officials of the Sugar Ministry, whom they hold responsible for the deepening crisis in the industry since 2009.
They want the reinstatement of all industry institutions unlawfully dismantled in 2009. Growers also want the $14.7m of their money from the Sugar Cane Growers Fund unlawfully converted from loan to equity in the SPF Ltd, a company which was insolvent at the time, to be returned to the Fund by the Government.
The demands were made at a General Body Meeting of the National Farmers Union in Lautoka on Saturday 26 May attended by some 400 growers from Rakiraki to Sigatoka in the Western cane belt.
In a statement after the meeting, NFU general secretary Mahendra Chaudhry said farmers made a number of demands which they want addressed and resolved in the coming season.
“The demands are legitimate and must be addressed to save the sugar industry from collapse,” Mr Chaudhry said.
“There is no point in the current authorities blaming others for their own failures. The downward spiral began in 2009 and clearly points to who is responsible,” he said.
“Growers are demanding a guaranteed minimum price of $80 per tonne because this is what they would be getting if the TCTS were maintained at a ratio of 10,” Mr Chaudhry said.
It is not surprising that growers are increasingly opting out of cane cultivation and diversifying into other cash crops and livestock husbandry.
They feel they have been completely marginalized in an industry in which they have a 70% stake with the dismantling of industry institutions in which they were represented such as the Sugar Cane Growers Council, the Sugar Commission of Fiji and the Fiji Sugar Marketing Ltd.
Since then, the industry has been beset with chronic problems of milling inefficiency and malfunctioning which have resulted in massive financial losses for growers.
The milling problem is reflected in a worsening TCTS ratio in the past three years. The average TCTS had worsened from 10 in 2006/2007 to 13.5 for the 2009, 14.3 in 2010 and 13.5 in the 2011 seasons. This means that at least 40% of the cane delivered to the mills is wasted.
Loss sustained by cane farmers from milling inefficiency in the past three years, is estimated at upwards of $300 million. This massive loss when viewed against sharply falling cane prices in recent years, underscores the plight of the cane farmer today.
In just over a decade cane prices have fallen from a record (pre-devaluation) $82 per tonne in 1999 to the lowest ever payment of $49 (devalued dollar) per tonne for the 2010 season ($40 per tonne in real terms when seen in terms of the pre-devalued dollar).
In the past three years alone, the price of cane has fallen drastically – from $62 per tonne in 2008 to $56 in 2009 and $49 for the 2010 seasons.
Mr Chaudhry said it was costing growers about $55 a tonne for the cultivation, harvesting (including cost of accommodation, food and refreshments for harvesting gangs) and transportation of cane to mills. Land rent and industry related loan repayments bring total cost up to $60 a tonne.
How are they expected to survive with costs so high and the dwindling price they are getting for their cane? Some 40% of cane sent to the mills is wasted because of the mal performance of the mills.
They are, understandably, demoralized and have lost confidence in the industry. They want to see significant changes implemented before they can regain their lost confidence and interest.
Growers are making the following demands:
1. A minimum cane price of $80 per tonne
2. FSC to compensate growers proportionately if the TCTS
goes above 10:1
3. All pending applications for the $10,000 farming assistance scheme to be processed and payments made
4. Government to pay premium to NLTB for renewal of leases and the grant of new leases. This Cabinet decision of 2008 was never implemented
5. Despite government subsidy, the cost of fertilizer is still too high; the subsidy needs to be increased if growers are to improve crop yields; farmers also complained about the quality of fertilizer supplied
6. Drainage must be improved if cane yield is to increase – drains have become clogged and silted over the years
7. Full compliance with the Sugar Master Award – a number of provisions of the Master Award are not being followed
8. Growers expressed no confidence in the management and Board of the Fiji Sugar Corporation and the Sugar Ministry – they want the current office holders replaced with people who are well versed with the industry, competent and well qualified
9. Full restoration of trade union rights and a stop to all union bashing
10. Growers Councillors must be reinstated as the Council is still being funded by a levy on the growers; otherwise the levy should be removed;
11. The reinstatement of all industry institutions unlawfully dismantled in 2009
12. Government to return to the Sugar Cane Growers Fund $14.7m which it unlawfully converted from loan to equity in the SPF Ltd, a company which was insolvent at the time
13. Road Levy to be scrapped; Growers went to know what is happening to the Road Levy when the condition of roads continue to deteriorate markedly; many of the roads in the cane belt are impassable
14. The numerous overseas junkets being undertaken by industry officials must stop; this money could be better utilized to revive the industry
These demands will be forwarded to the Office of the Prime Minister and the Minister for Sugar.
………………………………………………………………….
And the FSC reply
It’s time to move on: FSC
Fiji’s sugar industry is on the road to recovery and past failures will not hinder this progress.
This comment by FSC chair Abdul Khan is in response to calls made by a former politician that the current Board and Management should resign for the unsuccessful mill upgrade program.
Khan says people are entitled to their own opinions and they have very little comment on such statements.
He says the mill upgrade program was a failure but they are working on rectifying it.
“We doing everything possible and together with the assistance of this government and working with the Indian government, we trying to put that right and we will put it right.”
The mills are being prepared as this year’s crushing season is about to begin.
Bad for Business
Of all the damage that 5 years of being governed by our self-appointed PM, JV Bainimarama, none is more serious than the damage done to business. Investment is at an all time low because business lacks the confidence to either borrow or invest their own money when they have never been sure that their investments are protected by the rule of law.
Laws are invented on a daily basis. In the name of reform, legally established rights are abolished by decree. News Limited’s ownership of The Fiji Times was abolished at the stroke of the President’s pen on a Sayed-Khaiyum decree. Air Pacific’s joint venture with Qantas, which dragged Air Pacific back from the brink of bankruptcy was likewise dissolved by decree.
These and many other high-handed actions have destroyed the confidence of all but Chinese companies, who feel that the Bainimarama Government is beholden to their government for aid.
The result can be seen in what’s called the excess liquidity of our banks. They all have money sitting in depositors accounts which cannot be lent because there are not enough businesses willing to take extra debt to invest in Frank’s Fiji.
The Sayed-Khaiyum answer to this problem is to force Banks to lend, whether they want to or not. At another stroke of the pen, Banks in Fiji are going to be forced to lend 6 percent of their deposits to projects in agriculture and renewable energy, whether they have sound, secure projects or not. Bank of the South Pacific alone will be forced to lend $48 million this year. Next year, they’ll have to find more projects.
It sounds just like the old National Bank of Fiji post 1987 coup. Friends with dodgy projects line up for their share of the easy money. They know it’s a loan, and they’ll pay it back if they can, but….
Forcing banks to lend money like this is not the answer to the lack of business confidence; it will only make things much worse.
The real answer is restoration of the rule of law.
