The Real Survivor Fiji - A Restricted Press

The Real Survivor Fiji - A Restricted Press

Each by each, Fiji’s democratic institutions are suffering a gradual assault.

Basic freedoms and human rights are being over-run by the all to powerful and illegal acts of an out-of-control Commodore dictator.

The next freedom to suffer is the freedom of the press to operate unhindered.

Now Commodore Frank will try to catch Jell-O by attempting to shut down a website ... an offshore website!!

Excerpts from AAP via Fairfax Digital’s, The Age –

Fiji's coup leader clamps down on media
Australian Associated Press (AAP) - March 8, 2007 - 7:14PM

Fiji's coup leader has warned journalists the military will haul them in for questioning if they are deemed to have filed "irresponsible" reports.

The warning came after the general manager of the Fiji Daily Post and the news director of Fiji Television were detained separately over reports the military objected to.

The Fiji Television report detailed the death of a man after he was allegedly detained and assaulted by soldiers during a drug raid on his village in the east of Vanua Levu, Fiji's second largest island.

Fiji Television has since retracted the story and apologised after the military insisted that soldiers were not involved.

Last week, Fiji Daily Post general manager Mesake Koroi was detained twice for what the military called "anti-military" articles and editorials, the Fijilive online news service reported.

Also on Thursday, the military said it was trying to establish the identities of journalists behind a weblog launched to expose alleged human rights abuses since Commodore Frank Bainimarama's December 5 coup.

Bainimarama, who has appointed himself interim prime minister, told Fijilive that he supported media freedom.

"... it lends credibility not only to the interim government but also to the military, the force behind this interim government and we want it," Fijilive quoted him as saying.

But he issued a warning to journalists, saying there would be consequences for those who made up stories.
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Fiji Military spokesman Neumi Leweni confirmed efforts were underway to establish exactly who was producing material posted on the intelligentsiya weblog, established by journalists to document alleged rights abuses following the December coup.

The site was launched in January and has used it to publish allegations against the military regime, including several deaths it says resulted from bashings by soldiers.

The accounts have angered the military, which says it has not been given the chance to respond to the claims.
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A statement posted on the blog on Thursday said the development was worrying.

But it added: "Should anything happen to Intelligentsiya, it would only serve to canonise the blogsite if the authors were captured and taken up for `re-education'."

"There is no shortage of Intelly Agents.

"We'll keep you posted ... and we continue to stand firm, fearlessly."

Webmasters, a Fijian website company, said the domain indicated the website was based overseas.
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UPDATE 3-09-2007:

This from fijivillage.com -

Games up for Intelligentsiya
Army tracks cyber critics
Thursday March 08, 2007

The Fiji Military says it has identified a top educational institution in Suva that is being used as a base to run a controversial website that has been branded by the army as a 'pushover' against the interim regime.

Military spokesman, Major Neumi Leweni confirmed that they have identified a group of people operating from the institution.

"We have made major progress in our efforts to apprehend these people who have been reporting negative things about the military and we have been tracking them for quite some time now," he said.

Major Leweni says that the website recently made defamatory remarks against military and is portraying a negative image of the Interim Government.

"This time they have gone too far and we will be making arrests soon because we know who they are," he added.
Reference & Additional Comments Here>>

Additional Comment Update:

Bainimarama has a go at reporters
NewstalkZB - 11/03/2007 8:32:02

First it was the politicians, now Frank Bainimara is threatening to have a go at Fiji's journalists.

The country's self-appointed Prime Minister says reporters who write what he believes to be false or malicious stories will be taken in for questioning.

He says unbalanced and provocative reporting could create unnecessary fear, anxiety and reaction.

The commodore is unhappy at reports on websites claiming as many as four people have died after being taken into custody by the Fiji military since last year's coup.

He says freedom of the press is not limitless.
Reference Here>>

The Real Survivor Fiji – Military, And The Human Toll

Japanese tourists from left Nanako Ota, Megumi Fukaya and Matko Yamazaki enjoy their stay in Nadi yesterday. Tourism in Fiji is far from normal, warns stakeholders. Image Credit: Fiji Times Limited

The Real Survivor Fiji – Military, And The Human Toll

Let’s see, what are the positives of the coup? Increased military checkpoints equal reduced crime – that’s good for tourism, right?

The large tourist developments that congregate around the airport are isolated from the rest of the civilian life activity – that hides some of the ugly side of running a military rule country, right?

Most of the touring world located in Europe and North America haven’t plugged into the political issues that are stifling the island nation – so ignorance is bliss, right?

Well in a country the military has taken over since December 5th, things are grinding to a halt and it doesn’t look good for future either. The human toll under the present set of circumstances is increasing and it doesn’t look like it will get any better soon. After all, the innocent citizens of Fiji will not even be able to have a say (vote) until 2010 if the Commodore is to continue to have his way.

Excerpts from the New Zealand’s National Business Review -

Commodore country
By Nevile Gibson, Editor-In-Cheif – National Business Review (NZ) 1-Mar-2007

The holiday conundrum: Fiji Island resorts allow you to get away from the everyday environment of work, household duties, telephones, television, even newspapers.

Yet since the December 5 coup, Fiji’s resort holiday business has nosedived. And personal experience over the past weekend indicates nothing has changed for the holidaymaker.
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Patrols concentrate on gatherings of young people, who are leading suspects for street crime, burglaries and drug abuse. A new crime in the statistics, threats and swearing at military officers, has boosted the number of arrests to 1200 from Dec 5 to February 15.
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Monday’s editions of both papers this week led with the story of the death of a 19-year-old, who had been assaulted by soldiers and police a month ago when taken into custody. The Times reported this was the second such death and the story is attracting international attention.

The Times also reports an unnamed organisation has documented 200 cases of official human rights abuse while the Fiji Human Rights Commission has 20.

No doubt some heavy-handed treatment is being handed out but the media reporting, particularly in the just-mentioned report, shows a heartening degree of robustness.

Fiji has a five-star holiday industry grafted on to a third world economy.
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The main source of tourists is Australia and New Zealand, where news of the coup has been widely reported and where the governments have imposed travel bans.

But elsewhere in the world, I was told, the news has not filtered through, mainly because little of note has occurred and perhaps there is a greater tolerance of these tourists to hot country politics.
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But the industry is far from healthy and it will fall well short of its aim this year to exceed $F1 billion in turnover. Hotels Association president Dixon Seeto was quoted at the weekend as saying, “We have to face the reality here that things are not normal.”
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The effects on employment are palpable, as full time workers were still on reduced hours and casual staff are jobless.
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A costly coup

While the day-to-day impact of the coup is largely invisible to visitors, the economic impact is already considerable, if not as bad as previous ones.
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Latest Fiji Reserve Bank forecasts show negative economic growth of 2-4 per cent in 2007, mainly from the decline in tourism. RBF governor Savenaca Narube also confirmed in his latest statement that the key industries of sugar, fishing, forestry, agriculture and mining were also faring badly.

Government budgets are being shrunk and each day brings news of sackings from the public sector. But the finance minister, Mahendra Chaudry, who was himself overthrown as PM in a previous coup, is using the crisis to create a new future for Fiji based on an open economy.

At the weekend, he revealed a programme to remove all state business monopolies, notably in aviation, electricity, telecommunications and television. The companies affected are Telecom Fiji, Fiji Electricity Authority, Fiji Television and Air Pacific.

Quoting from the Rogernomics textbook, he promised a better deal for consumers from greater competition and choice. This is radical stuff for a nation in the Pacific, where land ownership remains largely communal and therefore is unlikely to attract the kind of investment or productivity that can take agricultural output to its full potential.
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