Citizenship v belonging
THE last article on this topic highlighted the need for both communities in Fiji to be tutored on the sensitive issue of citizenship and belonging.
This is because, as witnessed on social media, discussions tend to become increasingly contentious and alarmingly parochial.
The inclination is towards castigation rather than inclusion.
Readers will also have noted that the name of this series has been changed to: Citizenship v Belonging as opposed to the earlier Citizenship and Belonging.
There are reasons for this. The main one being that while the earlier series tried to unbundle and explain the various socio-cultural and political issues involved, it skirted shining the spotlight on behavioural differences. We need to highlight and discuss differences in thinking and behavior in order to understand and (hopefully) appreciate where the challenge to bring about true belonging really lies. A social media participant caught this quite succinctly in a tongue-in-cheek comment saying, “now that we are all Fijian, why don’t you start behaving Fijian?”
Indeed, therein lies one huge point of contention – that of differences in behaviour. But of course, humans do not just act/ behave, we think and act/behave – this is what is supposed to differentiate us from animals. Furthermore, the manner in which we think dictates how we act. And the manner in which we think is a product of our upbringing. Different people behave differently because they think differently. And they think differently because they have different upbringings.
The Indo-Fijian behaves differently from the Fijian because s/ he has a different upbringing. To be more precise, how we think is largely a product of our culture and surroundings. The two communities in Fiji are in essence the product of two different cultures; that is why they think and behave differently. I will discuss later how a common popular culture evolves in multi-cultural settings over time. This was alluded to in the earlier series last year. This time, I will go into it in detail, but in a later article. Here, we go back to differences in behavior.
Reactions in sports
This is seen very clearly in sports. I have been a rugby fan right from my childhood days when I was a child in Vuna Village on the chiefly island of Taveuni. I say, “chiefly island”, because that is where the seat of the Tui Cakau is perched. And the Tui Cakau is one of the three paramount chiefs of Fiji. In my village, the two most popular sports were rugby and boxing. At school we played soccer. Thus, I was immersed in all three sports. All of them were my favourites, but I gravitated towards boxing and rugby to the extent that I even donned gloves in the haloed boxing ring.
Rugby, however, had the country enthralled in the 1970s. In June 1974, we let a historic win against the mighty All Blacks slip through our fingers at Buckhurst Park losing 13-14. Earlier Josaia Visei of Vuda had been named in the World 15 squad. He was an electrifying running fullback and the rugby gurus in London had noticed his talent. Most importantly for us, he was a son of Fiji – a Fijian. Later, other Fijian internationals would be named in World 15s squads, but this was the era of rarities. There was more to come.
In 1977, we won the Hong Kong 7s for the first time as Captain Ilaitia Tuisese hoisted the trophy. Later in 1977, the British Lions accepted an invitation to come to Fiji after a grueling tour of New Zealand. The star-studded side clearly under-estimated us and were tamed at Buckhurst Park after Nadi flanker Vuata
Narisia took a slip pass from his captain Pio Bosco Tikoisuva and spectacularly dived for a try and a mighty 25-21 victory. The Lions have never faced us again. That was not the end of our highachieving exploits of that decade. We won again in Hong Kong in 1978 against tremendous odds as once again Captain Ilaitia Tuisese towered over the team with the coveted trophy.
The 1970s is also considered widely to have been the heyday of Fiji boxing. The heavyweight division was rocking with Sunia Cama, Filimoni Naliva, Vuniivi Nadumu, Marika Naivalu, Jeke Naqelevuki and the formidable Leweni Waqa still in the mix. Rampaging visitors like Luke Veikoso and Fossie Schmidt helped intensify competition to unprecedented levels. In fact, that level of competition has never again been reached in the heavyweight division in Fiji. Joe Bugner was the Commonwealth Champion at the time and Sunia Cama was ranked among the top 10 as took on imposing opponents against overwhelming odds.
In the lower divisions, Sakaraia Ve was steadily climbing up the ranks after the 1975 South Pacific Games in Guam. In between November 1975 and August 1978,Ve wrested the welterweight and middleweight titles from dominant reigning champions – Balwant Singh and Jone Mataitini. He cleaned out local competition and overwhelmed six international opponents before challenging Canadian Clyde Gray for the Commonwealth Welterweight Title. The bout at the Laucala Bay Hangar was extremely competitive until Ve had mouth guard problems and the fight had to be called off in round 8. A return bout in Lautoka in December of the same year (1978) yielded the same result.
Fiji’s dreams of a Commonwealth title, however, were not totally empty. Our very own Alipate
Korovou, who had been plying his trade in Australia, came to Fiji to challenge Samoan Monty Betham for the Commonwealth Middleweight Crown. In March 1978, after a mighty rumble at the PWD Canteen in Walu Bay, Korovou became the first (and only) Fijian pugilist to wear a Commonwealth Belt. He KO’d Betham in round 12 and went on to take on world-ranked Ugandan Ayub Kalule in Copenhagen, Denmark. In this eliminator for the world middleweight title, a gallant Korovou lost by TKO14. Shortly afterwards, after one more fight he retired having flown the Fiji flag on the world stage.
This is just a snapshot of achievements in boxing and rugby, there were many more highlights in that decade. What is of importance to this series is that these achievements did not hold the same meaning for the IndoFijian portion of Fiji’s population.
They were focused on soccer and there were major achievements there as well. In 1977, we beat Australia at Buckhurst Park as goalkeeper, Vula Wate surpassed expectations and played like an acrobat while Jimmy Okete nudged in the winner for a euphoric 1-0 victory.
The rest of the sports focus amongst the bulk of the Indo-Fijians was on Inter-District Soccer as it was the only tournament at the time.
Right there we have an ethnic alignment even though most of the soccer stars were Fijian, the supporters of the sport were Indo-Fijians.
On the other hand, rugby and to a lesser extent boxing were predominantly considered to be Fijian sports.
It was rare to see Indo-Fijians at rugby matches in the 1970s and 1980s. I remember vividly how people used to say “qori okoya” as I made my way through to get a seat. They recognised my uncle (Hemant Appanna) and I because we appeared to be the only IndoFijians gunning for rugby at that time. Now, we have many more Indo-Fijian rugby fans (especially 7s rugby) and it really provides a wonderful source of information for this series.
It is the Indo-Fijian rugby fans’ reactions and responses to rugby that reveals huge differences when compared to Fijian fans. It is no secret that we are having a dismal run in the ongoing sevens rugby series. We have encountered and successfully overcome the same on numerous occasions in the past. What is interesting to note is that Indo-Fijian reactions contrast markedly when compared to Fijian responses. Here is one example that has been randomly selected from social media: “Send Ben Gollings home straight away; Suspend all players and get a new team altogether; and Stop this nonsense man.”
On the other hand, Fijian reactions have been more measured.
There is patience and a focus on deliberations. I recall at the Wellington 7s in 2010, two Kiwi spectators that we were sitting beside commented that the Fiji team had some “interesting fans”.
This was in reaction to four Indo-Fijian youths sitting in front of us. When I queried, they explained that the type of cheering was different.
I didn’t really understand what they meant until I came to watch the Joseph Kwadjo v Joy Ali showdown at the Vodafone Arena in November 2011. Joy’s fans were clearly jeering, not cheering and the scales fell off my eyes.
I will elaborate on this next week.