‘We accept the result’

FIJIFIRST general secretary Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says the party has accepted the result of the 2022 General Election but it has not been defeated.

This, despite the party not winning an outright majority of more than 27 seats in the 55-seat Parliament to claim victory.

“We have accepted the result,” he said at a press conference yesterday.

“What defeat? You should actually be asking PAPI (the People’s Alliance) that.

“They’ve won only 21 seats, we won 26 seats on our own.

“They’re going to get 26 seats with NFP (National Federation Party), NFP won only five seats.

“So what’s there to concede defeat about.

“You should be asking that to (Sitiveni) Rabuka (PA leader).”

The FijiFirst party won 32 out of 50 seats in 2014, 27 out of 51 seats in the 2018 polls and failed to win an outright majority in this year’s general election – managing 26 out of the 55 seats.

He said a Prime Minister would be elected on the floor of Parliament if no party attained 50 per cent of the votes in a General Election.

He said according to the Constitution, if there was no one political party with a clear majority after the Writ was returned, then Section 93 applied where there will be up to three rounds of voting for the PM if no one person get 28 votes.

“Names are nominated and then people vote on a paper, secret ballot. Then once the votes are counted and the person is elected, the votes are then destroyed to maintain secrecy.”

If by the third vote a Prime Minister was not appointed, the Writ would be reissued and another election would take place.