OUTCOME OF SODELPA’S INTERNAL POWER STRUGGLE WILL BE INFLUENCED BY COURT RULING

IF SODELPA AS A PARTY AND ITS OFFICIALS WIN IT WOULD CONSOLIDATE THEIR HOLD ON POWER If the challengers, who took the party to court over governance issues, win there would be a changing of the guard in the leadership hierarchy

The next two and a half months will be an interesting time for SODELPA. At the end of this period it will hold its annual general meeting in Suva probably towards the end of June.

How that meeting will play out depends on a Civil High Court ruling in

Suva by Judge, Justice Vishwa Sharma on April 21.

A dissident group led by the president of the party’s Suva Constituency Watisoni Nata has taken the party and it’s officials to court over governance issues relating to the AGM at Yaroi Village in Savusavu in June last year.

If Justice Sharma rules in favour of the defendants, then it will be business as usual for the party.

By now processes would have begun to prepare for the AGM. Under the party’s constitution this should begin four months prior to the AGM.

It starts with correspondence from party headquarters asking for expressions of interest on any pertinent issues from motions to the nomination of candidates for the election of officers.

Everyone was therefore hoping that a ruling would be available by the end of February or early March if that provision of the constitution was to be complied with.

The question is whether it is still constitutional to go ahead with the process or they have to wait for next year.

Dutt

If the current officials have already started the process and they win the case, then it’s business as usual.

If the dissident group wins then it may have to wait for next year to implement changes.

It would no doubt want a change in leadership after the disappointment of losing the 2018 General Election an election it believed the party would have won if it played its cards right. Instead of following the original plan of promoting constituency candidates, some senior party officials used a different strategy that in the end led to a number of constituency candidates losing their seats in Parliament. The dissidents contended that if these candidates had won, SODELPA would have won the election.

If the dissidents have their way Opposition leader and acting party leader, Sitiveni Rabuka, would make way for a new party leader. Under the party constitution, when the party loses an election, the party leader automatically loses his or her role as it happened to Ro Teimumu Kepa after the 2014 election.

The question that has been asked within the party is: why is Mr Rabuka still holding on to the role.

His backers in the party want him to continue to the 2022 election after the party gained five extra seats in Parliament in the 2018 election.

But their opponents say he is in a caretaker role and is warming the seat for a new leader.

Whether this issue will be dealt with this year remains to be seen.

But there is a firm belief in the party that if it can sort out the issues that have split the party it could win the next election.

That’s a tough challenge and the problem will not go away soon.

The next AGM that is likely to be in Suva will expose the extent of the split.

The current officials including president Ro Filipe Tuisawau were elected primarily with the votes from Vanua Levu.

In Suva, the dissidents have a bigger support base and numerically they have the advantage.

Tomorrow: Who could

Rabuka as party leader? replace

Mr