Time in Heaven

09 Saturday Nov 2013

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ClockA man from Fiji recently died and went to Heaven. As he stood in front of the Pearly Gates, he saw a huge wall of clocks behind him. He asked, “What are all those clocks?”

St. Peter answered, “Those are Lie-Clocks. Everyone who has ever been on earth has a Lie-Clock. Every time you lie, the hands on your clock move.”

… “Oh”, said the man. “Whose clock is that?”

“That’s Mother Teresa’s”, replied St. Peter. “The hands have never moved, indicating that she never told a lie.”

“Incredible”, said the man. “And whose clock is that one?”

St. Peter responded, “That’s Abraham Lincoln’s clock. The hands have moved twice, telling us that Abraham told only two lies in his entire life.”

“Where can I see Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum’s clock?” asked the man.

St Peter replied, “We’re using it as a ceiling fan.”

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Smart PM, Smart Budget

08 Friday Nov 2013

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Cabinet ministers;

Your Excellencies;

Members of the Diplomatic Corps;

Distinguished Guests;

My fellow Fijians:

It is my task today as your Prime Minister and Minister for Finance to present to you the 2014 budget.

Next year will go down in our history as the year that Fiji first embraced genuine parliamentary democracy and set a new constitutional course towards a brighter future for every Fijian. It will mark the culmination of my Government’s efforts to put in place changes that will yield long-term benefits for Fiji and all Fijians.

We have a new Constitution to guide us, one that will allow Fiji to prosper as a united nation.

For the first time, Fijians have a Constitution that protects a wide range of civil, political and socio-economic rights.

For the first time, Fijians have a Constitution that demands accountability and transparency from Government officials, which builds strong institutions, and enshrines principles that are at the heart of all the world’s great liberal democracies.

For the first time, our nation has a Constitution that establishes a common and equal citizenry, without denying anyone’s individuality or culture.

The Constitution recognises and protects the indigenous peoples of Fiji and their unique customary practices, culture, tradition, language and communal ownership of land.

At the same time, it also protects the rights of all other Fijians, including the rights of tenants and lease holders.

The provision of rights, ladies and gentlemen, is not a zero sum game as was professed previously and is unfortunately preached by some even today. We all can enjoy equal rights and also at times specific rights, but without having to take them away from others.

In these seven years of my Government, we have worked methodically to try to resolve some of our long-standing problems with lasting solutions.

Some of these problems we inherited from our colonial past and we ignored them for far too long. Some of these problems were created by post-independence political leaders who cared more for short-term political gain than for the long-term benefit of the nation, or who simply lacked vision, acumen or the necessary concern for the Fijian people.

I am proud to say that we have not shied away from making decisions necessary to guarantee a bright future for our children and grandchildren. Not all these decisions were politically popular at the time, but they were important to modernise Fiji for the long term and to create a society in which there is more opportunity for everyone.

I am satisfied as I look back at what we have accomplished. Each year we have tackled new problems, and you and I can see the results.

We have made government services more readily available to more people than ever before. We have reformed social welfare to give more help to the neediest while creating opportunities for them. We have established partnerships with the private sector and are reforming state owned enterprises.  We have revitalised the sugar industry, created a sustainable mahogany industry, and made our ports efficient. We have embarked on an ambitious program to correct the deplorable condition of our roads.  We have begun reforming the civil service to make it more professional, accountable, and results-oriented. Continue reading →

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One Religion Is Enough

07 Thursday Nov 2013

Posted by in Articles & Reports

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John HowardJohn Howard: One Religion Is Enough
Date: 06/11/13
The Honourable John Howard, former Prime Minister of Australia
2013 Annual GWPF Lecture
London 5 November 2013
I thank Nigel Lawson and his colleagues for their invitation to be here to-night. When he asked me to deliver this lecture Lord Lawson said that I could talk about what I chose. I think that was not meant quite as literally as it might seem. I am sure he had in mind that I might share with you my views on the contemporary state of the debate on global warming, especially from an Australian perspective. That has special relevance; Australia has a new PM, and integral to his successful campaign was sustained opposition to a carbon tax.
 
Tony Abbott now has the great responsibility and honour of being PM of Australia because a little under four years ago he challenged what seemed to be a political consensus on global warming; won the leadership of his party by one vote; had it expressly confirm a change in its policy on the issue, and then confronted the incumbent government on global warming, with quite dramatic results, to which I will return shortly.
 
I chose the lecture’s title largely in reaction to the sanctimonious tone employed by so many of those who advocate quite substantial, and costly, responses to what they see as irrefutable evidence that the world’s climate faces catastrophe, against people who do not share their view.  To them the cause has become a substitute religion.
 
Increasingly offensive language is used. The most egregious example has been the term “denier”. We are all aware of the particular meaning that word has acquired in contemporary parlance. It has been employed in this debate with some malice aforethought.
 
An overriding feature of the debate is the constant attempt to intimidate policy makers, in some cases successfully, with the mantras of “follow the science” and “the science is truly settled”. The purpose is to create the impression that there is really no room for argument; this is not really a public policy issue; it is one on which the experts have spoken, and we would all be quite daft to do other than follow the prescriptions, it is asserted, which flow automatically from the scientific findings.
 
Writing recently in Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, Dr Richard S. Lindzen, Emeritus Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said of those with political agendas who found it useful to employ science, “This immediately involves a distortion of science at a very basic level: namely science becomes a source of authority rather than a mode of inquiry. The real utility of science stems from the latter; the political utility stems from the former.” Continue reading →

PM wants a Smarter TLTB

05 Tuesday Nov 2013

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VFBLand should be utilized so that landowners reap the benefits and grow the economy.
Prime Minister and Chairman of TLTB Commodore Voreqe Bainimarama made the comments to participants of TLTB’s Annual Strategic Corporation Planning workshop on how TLTB can focus better on its core role as the trustee for all iTaukei landowners.
Commodore Bainimarama said TLTB needs to change its approach to leasing of land, and to the management of tenants and potential tenants and the landowners.
He said TLTB must position itself in the context of the new constitution to ensure that iTaukei land can no longer be converted and sold as freehold land.
He also highlighted the owners of customary land and customary fishing ground are entitled to receive a fair share of the royalty with respect to any minerals extracted from their customary land and fishing ground.
He said individual members of registered landowning units receive equal distribution of shares of all income generated from iTaukei land.
He said all mataqali members must have equal access and benefit from the mataqali land lease.
He said no law must diminish those rights and interests and also lessees and tenants have the right not to have their leases and tenancies illegally terminated.

Maligning the “old politicians”

01 Friday Nov 2013

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PointerMaligning the “old politicians”
Professor Wadan Narsey
November  2013

Since 2006, it has become a popular pastime for every Tom, Dick, and Harry to malign the “bad old politicians” of Fiji, and this trend will no doubt become a frenzy as “new politicians” offer themselves.

Many who write thus to the media are perhaps too young or ignorant to know what the “old politicians” did or did not do, compared to the new politicians.

But one does not expect the same song from Sir James Ah Koy, himself an “old politician” who personally benefited from the political largesse of several “old politicians” and Prime Ministers of Fiji (and received a knighthood from PNG “old politicians”).

Of course, such a message about “bad old politicians” is useful propaganda for a government which strangely contains a couple of “old politicians” (like Bole and Kubuabola), yet still claims it is the “first” government to do anything worthwhile for Fiji.

Nevertheless, it is the solemn responsibility of the older generation to set the record straight about what the old politicians did or did not do, compared to what the new politicians are doing.

It is also useful for future voters  to examine the political record of “old politicians” like Ah Koy, who was once a Minister of Finance in Rabuka’s Government, and who is offering himself up again as a “new” politician.

Ah Koy as “new politician”?
Some political historians might scratch their heads at how Ah Koy once entered Parliament as a Chinese “General” voter, then later managed to get elected as an indigenous “Fijian” MP for Kadavu, then rediscovered his Chinese roots to become Ambassador to China, and is now offering himself as a “born-again” new politician, ready to serve in Commodore Bainimarama’s Party-to-be.

Economic historians with nothing better to do, may scratch their heads as to how and why Ah Koy was appointed in the first place as Minister of Finance in Rabuka’s SVT Government, replacing a performing Mr Vunibobo.

But all economic historians (and future voters) must examine Ah Koy’s performance as Minister of Finance, and especially his disastrous decision to create the ATH telecommunication super monopoly, in order to sell Government’s shares to Fiji National Provident Fund (FNPF) at the inflated price of $253 million, thereby “coincidentally” covering the cost of the National Bank of Fiji (NBF) disaster.   Continue reading →