The seeds of the mayhem wrought on Fiji by George Speight were sown 127 years
ago when the colorful king
of the time, Ratu Seru Cakobau, virtually sold the islands to Queen Victoria.
Cakobau was a conniving spendthrift from the microscopic island of Bau, off
the east coast of the main
island, Viti Levu. He was the first Fijian to realise power came from the barrel
of a gun. One musket
shot, and his rivals headed for the hills.
There is a saying in Fiji that roughly translates as: "Well, that's Bauan
politics for you." It takes in
double-crossing, backstabbing, speaking with a forked tongue, posturing and
outright lying.
It is as true of George Speight as of Ratu Cokabau. Like Speight, Cakobau had
a problem with money. He
ran up huge debts to an American named John B. Williams. To cover them, Cakobau
made an offer to the
first British consul, W.T.Pritchard, to cede Fiji to Britain if it would cover
his IOU to Williams.
The deal did not go through at first, but on October 10, 1874, Britain took
over. Long afterwards, the
Bauans and their fellow clans that make up one of Fiji's three confederacies
continued to exert influence
beyond their geographical and numerical strength.
Ratu Sir George Cakobau, a descendant of Ratu Seru, was Fiji's first governor-general
at independence in
1970. The first prime minister was Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara. He also hails from
a tiny island, Lakeba, one
of a string of specks on the map that ends closer to Tonga than Fiji. Mara carries
Tongan blood, and this
is at the heart of why he is so loathed by Speight and his backers.
The Bauans and their kinsmen from the mainland part of the Kubuna confederacy,
which takes in Speight's
home province of Tailevu, consider themselves the original, pure Fijians.
Speight's power play is as much a coup against the present indigenous establishment,
embodied by Mara, as
it is against the first ethnic Indian Fijian Prime Minister, Mahendra Chaudhry.
The Kubuna have other
reasons to hate Mara. Since independence, Kubuna power has waned, thanks to
the wily Mara extending his
influence by the tried and true methods of European royalty: a combination of
strategic marriages and
political alliances.
The latter involved courting the Indian vote. Mara's wife, Ro Lady Lala Mara,
is the highest chief of the
third confederacy, Burebasaga, which takes in some of the western half of the
main island. Between them
they can claim the loyalty of two-thirds of the country, the basis of Mara's
assertion that he was the
nation's supreme authority.
That is why Uzis and M16s - the 20th-century muskets - were Speight's only
chance to get real political
influence back in the hands of the Kubuna. Since independence, Mara's Tovata
confederacy has held the
whip hand. Mara was prime minister for the first 17 years of independence. Sir
George Cakobau's
replacement as governor-general was Ratu Sir Penaia Ganilau, also from Tovata.
When Mara's hold on parliamentary power slipped, leading to the 1987 Labor
government of Timoci Bavadra,
another Tovata son, Sitiveni Rabuka, stepped in with a military coup.
For the past decade there has been a power vacuum among the Kubuna. They have
no universally recognised
supreme chief. Seniority has fallen to Adi Litia Cakobau, who is deputy leader
of the Great Council of
Chiefs, the peak traditional authority for indigenous Fijians.
When the council met after Speight first moved in, Adi Litia shocked her fellow
chiefs with the ferocity
of her attack on Mara. It is on her say so, according to astute observers, that
many of the wholesome
family cheer squads arrived to fill the parliamentary compound after Speight
and his gang stormed
parliament on May 19. The symbolism of hymn-singing villagers around Speight,
carried around the world by
television, was his best propaganda tool in selling himself as the man of the
people. But Speight's
backers are not exclusively from his own confederacy. His defiance of the established
order has captured
the imagination of the commoners locked out of the chiefly system. This feeling
of betrayal by the senior
chiefs stretches from academic circles, through elements of the army, to village
camp fires. They believe
the comfortable chiefs playing political games have lost touch with the soul
of the indigenous.
It is the sentiment behind the recurring phrase you hear from indigenous Fijians:
we agree with Speight's
aims, not the means. This sentiment may be shared by up to half the indigenous
people.
In an attempt to undermine Speight's popular support, the military government
moved this week to try to
break the impasse between Mara and Speight, by nominating as its preferred prime
minister Ratu Epeli
Nailatikau. Nailatikau is Mara's son-in-law, but more significantly, he is a
descendant of Ratu Seru
Cokabau. Speight's chorus now faced the awkward choice of one extended family
over another. George and
Adi Litia on one side, Epeli Nailatikau and the head of the armed forces, Frank
Bainimarama, himself a
Tailevu man, on the other. Speight was furious when the Nailatikau nomination
leaked.
The talks stalled, and Bainimarama backed off swearing in Nailatikau or any
of the military's planned
interim government.
Speight was well aware of the value of the Nailatikau name and connections.
He had offered Epeli's
younger brother a post in his "Taukei civilian government", but he
declined.
But George still held a powerful ace, Nailatikau's wife, Adi Koila - Mara's
daughter. As a minister in
the Chaudhry government she was in Parliament when he struck, and has been held
prisoner there ever
since.
By yesterday, Speight had secured almost everything he had asked for from day
one: scrapping the 1997
constitution, Mara's resignation as president, an amnesty for his gang of seven
that first took the
Chaudhry government hostage.
Now he is working on the last one, the big one: a leading role for his backers
in the interim government
that will draw up a new constitution.
Speight wants a framework that guarantees indigenous political dominance once
and for all. And someone to
rely on to deliver the business patronage he enjoyed before Chaudhry broke up
the party last year. In the
marathon talks between Bainimarama's and Speight's negotiators this week, the
military has insisted on
the hostages being released and arms held at the compound turned over before
a final settlement. It has
proposed its own interim government to draw up the new constitution. Speight
wanted Bainimarama to pass a
decree that installed Ratu Jope Seniloli as president, with the right to appoint
his own cabinet. And
where is Ratu Seniloli from? You guessed it, Bau.
Despite the "major breakthrough" of Thursday night, this appears
to be such a sticking point that it has
been referred to the Great Council of Chiefs to decide. They must chose between
a commoner with
grass-roots support and their authority as guardians of the nation.
Who has the numbers there? The chiefs have had a delegation negotiating with
Speight all week in parallel
with Bainimarama's senior officers. One of the chiefs' delegation is Adi Litia
Cakobau.
Also ever present in the background is Sitiveni Rabuka, chairman of the council
of chiefs. Before the
coup, he was a golfing buddy of Speight. Rabuka has found himself a spot on
Bainimarama's military
government council of advisers.
On the first day of Speight's coup, Rabuka volunteered himself as mediator
between Speight and Mara. He
was at Government House on Monday, the day Mara resigned.No wonder insiders
are tipping that when the
dust settles, Rabuka will be the ultimate winner.
But Speight had two words of Rabuka yesterday: "He's finished."
This story was found at: http://www.theage.com.au/news/20000603/A34662-2000Jun2.html
This text may have been edited to protect the writer.
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