As usual, reportage of the recent mutiny has been very muddled, even in Fiji, and it is perhaps not surprising that many in the media have labelled the mutineers "Speight supporters". In Fiji, however, things are seldom as simple as that.

This particular incident appears to have been a reaction to Commodore Bainimarama's decision to disband the now-infamous Counter Revolution Warfare unit that Rabuka set up in 1987, and members of which, led by Ligairi, were prominent in the May 2000 Coup. The mutineers were apparently all from this unit, and sought to have the decision reversed.

There can be little doubt that Bainimarama's decision related directly to the role of members of this unit in the recent disastrous events, and reportedly there were also among the mutineers men who had recently been released from prison, and whom the military, rather than slapping in the brig, had actually commended for "looking after the hostages"!! To that extent, the mutiny is certainly direcly related at several levels to the Coup. Speight central role as principal footsoldier for outside instigators in that event could, by a stretch of the imagination, be a basis for seeing all lawless actions that have occurred in its aftermath as "Speight support".

But the far more alarming truth is that this incident highlights an attitude that has now gained alarming levels of currency among many young Fijians, both inside and outside the military, that when something occurs that you don't like, you reach for weapons, take hostages as bargaining chips, and don't shrink from engaging in ultimate levels of violence.

The current crop of seeds of this attitude were sown by Rabuka in 1987. They lay dormant just below the surface, and burst into vigorous growth in May this year. The ultimate hypocrisy is seeing him solemnly parading around as a "negotiator" first in the Solomons and now in the shambles that he made of his own country. Ironically, the other night, in this self-appointed role he found himself pinned down in cross-fire at the Barracks, where his irrelevance was made manifest at the very moment he was declaring himself ready to again assume the mantle of political authority if called upon. It is true that one of the characteristics of the postmodern age is people re-inventing themselves, but unfortunately for Sitiveni, over-writing simply won't erase history, and he has no "delete" or "uninstall" buttons to press.

All of this places even greater importance on the treason trial, and on the trials that must ultimately come out of the present mutiny. If the courts choose the expedient path of leniency, it will be a green light for all of these basically very stupid but dangerous elements in Fiji society. Pity help them then.

5 November 2000

Apologists for the 1987 Fiji Coup were keen to establish the inappropriateness of democracy as an institution in traditional societies (see Dean & Rabuka's No Other Way and Ravuvu's The Facade of Democracy, and as a postscript, Ravuvu's later comments: http://www.usp.ac.fj/journ/nius/docs/nov00/3125.html).

In fact, the collapse of democratic process relates not to the inappropriateness of democracy and the rule of law as a model in such societies, but rather to the poverty of leadership, and the inappropriate behaviour of those who have been charged with implementing it. (Postscript 30/11/00: Peter Larmour has recently suggested that this is also not able to be empirically connected to economic performance: http://peb.anu.edu.au/pdf/15-2larmour.pdf). As a result, a widespread loss of respect for authority at all levels has been growing since Independence in 1970. While as academics we can (with some justification) ponder the roots of these problems in colonialism, in practical terms that is a rather fruitless pursuit 30 years on. That's a long time in which to forge a mutually-tolerant multi-ethnic community with sufficient social consciousness to all be willing to subscribe to some set of rules, wherever derived from.

That this has so dismally failed must be laid at the door of all of the leaders of the land of all ethnic groups. A depressingly large proportion of these can be seen to have pursued personal advancement so singlemindedly that they have not even thought about addressing the pressing need for the socio-political education of their natural constituents during what has been a period of unprecedented change and uncertainty. Indeed, they have generally done little to inform themselves on relevant issues, high among which should have been the deeply-held values, aspirations and fears of the various groups in Fiji's total community. Rather, most have continued thinking in terms of racial stereotypes. These were certainly at least in some degree a product of Colonial divide-and-rule policies, but rather than being rejected, they have been cultivated into far more frightening manifestations since Independence.

As for Fijian "custom", that has for a very long time in Fiji been associated with the preservation of privilege. Perhaps it always was. But once, there was at least some semblance of reciprocity from the élites downward. During the decade before the 1987 Coup I was regularly the uncomfortable listener, in kava-circles around the Group, to voluble expressions of mounting dissatisfaction with what was described as the self-serving attitudes of chiefs.

This was directed in the first instance at those who lived in the larger urban centres, drawing their income from their village entitlements, while offering neither hands-on leadership nor a forceful "voice in court". This group included Fijian politicians, drawn almost exclusively from chiefly ranks, but also a significant number of others who voluntarily chose urban life for its seductions. (One might look at 18th Century France for relevant precedents and outcomes).But this sort of dissatisfaction becomes a social infection, and came to afflict even those chiefs who continued to live in their villages and were genuinely attempting to lead their people. More than once I have had such chiefs wistfully remark that once if they gave an order, such as when the village was dirty, telling the young men to clean it up, their orders would be followed wihout question. Today the young men would want to fight them instead!

One result of this disillusionment with their traditional leaders was the large swing of Fijian voters toward the first issue-based, rather than race-based, political grouping in Fiji in 1987. The rapid response of the displaced élite was to find a willing footsoldier in a position of power within the military, and send him off on a counter-revolutionary mission while they remained free to express horror at the overthrow of democracy. Managing to do nothing, however, to deflect that overthrow (these issues have been fully explored by Rory Ewins in his books Colour, Class and Custom - http://www.speedysnail.com/pacific/fiji_coup/index.html and Changing Their Minds: http://www.speedysnail.com/pacific/changing.html). Indeed, for more than a decade they formalised their relationship with the coup-perpetrators through a power-sharing arrangement, during which the exploits of some, and of those with whom they were in cahoots, became almost breathtaking. These subtleties remained sadly obscure to most Western observers and virtually all of the Western press, but what was going on was crystal clear to most Fiji citizens of all ethnicities.

The resulting disenchantment led once more to the election of another issue-based government. But since it had a similar propensity to the Bavadra government's to shine lights into festering dark corners, it provoked the same sort of response from the denizens of those corners. This time, those sponsoring the reaction have been not the most powerful traditional élite, but the nouveau-riche élite and some "wannabes" who have never quite made it into the ranks of power and ill-gotten gains, and saw an opportunity to remedy that deficiency. In fact one of the interesting by-plays of the recent coup, as I commented at the time, was the very equivocal attitude of virtually everyone, particularly the coup-leaders, toward the Great Council of Chiefs.

Just as telling was the division, indecision and ineptitude with which the GCC met the crisis. But in the end, in the total vacuum in Fiji's leadership today, it was the only constituted authority that still held any sway at all, so it was left to this group to set up the interim government, bowing to the abrogation of due process that had resulted from the Coup, and the President's confused dismissal of the legal government. It is not only Fiji's Indian community that is dissatisfied with this state of affairs, and the Qarase government, in my view, would have to rank as the most precarious since Independence, even with the backing of the military (fraught, as we keep seeing, with the same crises of leadership).

The "custom" that seems to be implicated in these various acts is, I submit, a chimera. Anger about the current state of affairs seeks two things. First, a target, in the case of Fijians always readily deflected away from reality by triggering their paranoia about Machiavellindian plots to take away their land. And second, a dream, supplied by totally mythological, slightly out-of-focus, shimmering images of a golden age of Fijian hegemony in their own land, when all was well with the world. The truth, of a country fractured into myriad little groups at total enmity and almost constant war with one another, has no place in this fiction. Myths do not need truth, just belief.

But behind the rhetorical smokescreen of race and tradition, the present generation of malcontents in Fiji have learned, very well, the lessons of the only leaders most of them have known throughout their lifetimes. Those are: shift the blame for your problems onto others, seek your own advantage under any pretext and by any means that present themselves, and the devil take the hindmost.

Are there ways out of this disastrous state of affairs? My personal answer would be something along the following lines: For any society to survive, at least the overwhelming majority of its members must accept an obligation to respect the "self-evident truths" as Thomas Jefferson called them, "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." A commitment to those things requires give and take, with an individual's or group's wish for personal gratification or advantage being tempered by concern for the good of the society as a whole. It is to facilitate social living that customs and laws have been devised by societies, and when there appears to be a conflict between the customs and laws that are operating, the only way out of the maze is to go back to first principles.

Jefferson's first principles appear more promising than those of greed and self-interest described above, but the right of all of their fellow citizens to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness has certainly not seemed to be self-evident to a large number of Fijians over recent months. If they can't restore that focus, they have little hope for a future, not only with Indians and other Fiji citizens, but with each other within the broad Fijian ethnic grouping.

Rod Ewins © November 2000. This note is copyright. Apart from those uses permitted under theCopyright Act 1968 (as amended), no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission from the author.