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MATELITA RAGOGO is a second-year Diploma in Pacific Journalism student at USP and also a leading reporter on The Fiji Times. She was in the parliamentary press gallery on the day of the coup on May 19. Here, in The Sunday Times, she profiles life for the hostages after 23 days.
IN MOST parts of the world, hostages are either released or shot.
There is no other way to say this but should a hostage or hostages be shot
in our Fiji Islands Parliament, it would be the ultimate loss of self-respect
for a nation which once prided itself in boasting that it was the way the world
should be.
Employers, workers, unions, farmers - everyone's come up with gripes about
the political upheaval.
But it is the hostages who are the ones to bear the brunt of anger and frustration
- regardless of their gender, race and colour.
Ordinary Fiji citizens are getting on with their lives, and except for the
forced school break, those who still have their jobs continue to go to work.
Others who were out on the reef fishing on Friday, May 19, for their Sunday
family lunch, continue to go out fishing.
The market still bustles with activity on Saturday mornings and for Suva residents,
confidence is returning as more and more
people come back to their raped, pillaged and partly razed capital.
On the political front, yesterday afternoon it appeared as though coup leader
George Speight and the Western chiefs had decided that the Vice-President and
Tui Vuda, Ratu Josefa Iloilo, should be the President and the "Taukei civilian
government's" initial choice for President, Ratu Jope Seniloli, be the
Vice-President. But the military had rejected this proposal, adamant they knew
what they were doing.
In the meantime, Speight's trump card is the 31 hostages in the parliamentary
complex who enter their 23rd day of captivity
today. Of the 31 hostages, 20 are Fiji Labour Party members, seven from the
Party of National Unity, two from the General Voters Party and the one independent
member of the deposed Lower House. Of these, only two have been allowed to see
their relatives. Senator Ro Teimumu kepa was taken to see her neice, former
Transport and Tourism Minister Adi Koila Nailatikau, after the first round of
talks between Speight's group and the Great Council of Chiefs committee of which
Ro Teimumu is a member, two weeks ago. On the Friday evening, chairman of the
Rotuma Council Visanti Makrava was allowed a moment with former Assistant Agriculture
Minister Marieta Rigamoto.
Three doctors visit both groups. There is a large amount of medication in the
complex, manned by the Red Cross which supplied mattresses for the hostages.
Most relatives of parliamentarians contacted yesterday refused to speak to
The Sunday Times, fearing a backlash on their
spouse, uncle, aunt, son and daughter being held at gunpoint.
The day for the Fijian, Rotuman and General Voter hostages begins at 5am with
a devotion conducted by Rev Eloni Goneyali. The hostages are then allowed 20
minutes on the lawn of the parliamentary complex facing Draiba Primary School.
The three women have set up camp in the press gallery where each has some privacy.
The men, on the other hand, have staked out their own space around the parliamentary
chambers. There is a second devotion in the evening. The hostages do not have
access to newspapers, television or radio, They are allowed to read books brought
in by relatives and approved by their captors. The Fijian members have their
shower in the Speaker's chambers.
In the other camp, the Indian members line the wall of the government conference
room. Information on the crisis filters in slowly - through doctors and sometimes
security officers.
One positive outcome of the situation, however, is that families of hostages,
in needing reassurances and sharing their worries with people who actually know
how it feels, have become closer.
This may not be entirely true for former Assistant Minister in the Prime Minister's
Office, Adi Ema Tagicakibau who, according to relatives, instead of a hug was
greeted by an irate husband on her release to attend her elder sister's funeral.
Apparently Mr Tagicakibau screamed at her, in his opinion, the stupidity of
not resigning when she was given a chance.
While Adi Ema stuck to her principles, her husband and children, according to
the former, were going nuts with worry.
The families speak to each other daily and for some, prayers have proved most
comforting. One relative said relatives of all hostages were worried but it
was important that they did not show it - the encouraging, happy face of one
lifts the spirits of others, the relative said.
"We are in Fiji and the question is not whether our loved ones will return
but rather when will this all end," the relative said.
Food is served promptly, as is tea. The hostages eat meals like fish in lovo
with dalo, pork, other meats and equally delicious
meals prepared by parliamentary kitchen staff.
Playing cards has become a favourite pastime.
Word is that it is hostages with young children who are the ones finding their
enforced confinement the most unbearable. Pregnant wives are doubly affected
- with another life inside them. And a warning from counsellors who have been
visiting hostages to all the families is: Do not expect the same person who
left home for work on May 19!
And, like the hostages, for Fiji it is a waiting game, only unlike the rest
of us, the hostages face death in the face of every
minute of the day. And as the scholar Jacob Bronowski said: "Every animal
leaves traces of what it was; man alone leaves traces of what he created."
We wait the outcome of the monstrosity which erupted 23 days ago and which
has plunged Fiji down an abyss we thought we would never return to.
© USP Journalism Programme
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