Heaping burning coals

Australian aid to Fiji next year will for the first time exceed $100 million. The Councillor in charge of Australian aid, Joanne Choe, said the increase will deliver on the Australian Government’s promise to double the size of AusAID’s bilateral budget to Fiji over two years. The money will be used to help the poorest children to attend school more regularly and work to see more babies growing safely through their early years. Australia will also help to promote food security and increase incomes for poor families. Best of all, however, we don’t have to pay back this money. It’s not a loan, like all the so-called aid from Malaysia, India and China. In doing this Australia is heaping burning coals on the head of the dictator, repaying his arrogance with concern for the poor and the sick.

Fiji Times May 21, 2013 $105m record aid

The restless ranks

Land Force Battalion Commanding Officer (CO), Lieutenant-Colonel Amani Suliano, lectured the troops last week on the stories that are sweeping through the ranks of the RFMF, which is no surprise because they’re the hot topic around yaqona bowls all over the country. According to Suliano the constitution protects ownership of iTaukei land, even though it doesn’t mention it once. The RFMF chaplain, Major Joseva Tikonatabua, reminded the soldiers they could only carry out the directive given by their Commanding Officer if they let God lead them. Misusing the name of God shows how desperate the regime has become and how much it fears the other ranks of RFMF learning the truth.

Fiji Sun May 18, 2013 Strong as ever

First Family First Class Travel

The freedom blogs have let out the secret that Bernadette Bainimarama went along for the ride to France to pick up the new Airbus. We know this hurts because one of the first comments came from a regime stooge saying “4.5 you are not helping anyone in making this kind of assumptions because you have not supported your assumptions with facts and are trying to touch on peoples emotion.” The anonymous poster tries to pose as an independent party by saying “we all agree that we want an end to all this military rule” but says “give us the facts and not something extracted out of thin air”. But this story wasn’t from thin air. It was from Bernadette B’s Facebook posting. Other genuine bloggers put their finger on the real issue: why wasn’t Makereta Matemosi, the designer of the Masi motif now used on the aircraft, invited to make the flight?

No interviews in the torture investigation

Police Chief of operations, Rusiate Tudravu, has admitted that the police investigating the Torture Video, showing prisoners being beaten in March, have interviewed no-one and have no suspects. Some of the people involved have already been named, a police vehicle has been identified and the victim is well known, but has not been interviewed. What Tudravu and his boss Naivalurua have to recognise is that this will not go away.

Fiji Times May 20, 2013 Beating probe still on

Cleaning up after Tikoitoga

The new chairman of FRU, the Bainimarama nominee, Filimoni Waqabaca, has ordered a forensic audit to discover what happened to produce the $600,000 loss suffered by FRU last year. Waqabaca is the man trusted to cover up the secret multiple salary payments to Bainimarama and Khaiyum, so we can be sure he will make sure that the mishandling of money by Tikoitoga, the former Chairman, will be covered up. Over-spending is the standard operating procedure for any RFMF officer, but Bainimarama will not want this to be confirmed.

Fiji Village: 20/05/2013 FRU to bring in accounting firm for forensic audit

The disclosure double standard

Fiji’s Social Democratic Liberal Party (SODELPA) has protested the provisions of the Political Parties Decree requiring party office holders to declare their assets, including the assets of their adult children who are not party members and don’t want to declare their assets. Meanwhile, Bainimarama who has said he won’t officially declare his party until 2014, can keep secret all the details of his family’s assets – or, at least, give him plenty of time to hide it all!

Fiji Live, May 19, 2013 SODELPA to discusss asset disclosure

Giving Tick the flick

The Fiji Sun is using the symbol of the Tick for its corrupt reports of village support for Bainimarama after receiving government funded projects. Will this be the Bainimarama party symbol? FDN thinks the Tick is really a Kutu Sebe and the support that the Fiji Sun reported for Bainimarama is like the morning mist – when the sun shines it will be gone. A posting on Coup 4.5 blog gives us the proof.

“I refer to your article in the Fiji Sun today, 15/5 attributed to Jolame Namalo, purported spokesperson for the village of Nakorovou Rewa supporting Bainimarama and calling on Roko Tui Dreketi to quit politics.
This needs to be corrected. The truth is Jolame Namalo is a supporter of the new SODELPA for which he signed its registration as number 878 under registration number 0143-369-00300. Eighty-six other villagers of Nakorovou signed with him the registration of this new party including his close family members.
Again he knows full well that a number of villagers supported the Marama Roko Tui Dreketi political ambition and joined her delegation that presented her petition on the draft constitution to Government.
Therefore his and so-called village support for Prime Minister Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama and his Government is selfishly motivated, simply for development sake.
Jolame should be reminded that Government will provide development assistance to all Fijians irrespective of political persuasion in an honest and transparent manner depending on need and not to mislead Government as Jolame think.”

Khaiyum anti-tobacco crusade is just a cash grab

Unbelievably, a government that can’t find staff for a maternity ward can find staff to chase smokers in order to collect a $200 fine from each of them. Smoking is bad for people’s health, but that’s not why the anti-smoking gets the priority from this regime. It’s so they can collect $200 fines from those unlucky enough to get caught. We all know this is pure Khaiyum. He is worse for our health than smoking and, for bad smells, he’s worse than a week old ash can.

Fiji Times May 16, 2013 Fine for 195 smokers

Sad misuse of trust

The Fiji Sun is continuing its outrageous campaign in cooperation with the Ministry of Information to link provision of Government services to the Interim Government. The Fiji Sun quotes the chief of Naseuvou village, Ratu Leone Codro, as welcoming the Bainimarama regime because it has wiped out corruption. The truth is that the Bainimarama regime civil servants had spent money in his village, which is located a long way up the Waidina river, in order to stage a display of support. If Ratu Leone thinks this is wiping out corruption his understanding of the word is limited.

Fiji Sun May 16, 2013 PM’s loyalty is a tick

FSC waiting on Tate and Lyle

Tate and Lyle have been buying our sugar since colonial days. Their interest in our sugar led them to send some experts to try to help our mucked-up mills to work better. Since getting the inside story on our mills it seems they’ve given up relying on FSC and are looking elsewhere for raw sugar. FSC’s Malau bulk storage in Labasa still has 19,000 tonnes of sugar crushed last year waiting for Tate and Lyle to get a ship to take it away before the new harvest commences. It looks like Tate and Lyle have found more reliable suppliers. With Bainimarama as our sugar minister no-one should be surprised by this.

Fiji Times May 16, 2013 No problems with storage