Fiji’s diplomatic efforts

IT is wonderful to read about the strong stand Deputy Prime Minister Kamikamica and his team is taking on fishing subsidies at the WTO meeting. It is refreshing to see Fiji is taking up genuine leadership role on behalf of the Pacific, against the usual big players including UAE, US and the wealthy nations poaching our waters using the strength of their financial prowess.

This is a welcome change from the usual garbled and confusing messages being given by the PM, Tarakinikini and other ministers such as Biman Prasad and Charan Jeath Singh on a host of issues.

The recent stand on Palestinian-Israel conflict and Fiji being one of the only two countries in the world to come out openly supporting Israel’s massacre of innocent civilians, sends such an embarrassing signal on our ethical/moral values.

Minister for Finance Hon Biman Prasad continues to make motherhood statements on issues such as climate change at meetings such as the recent one with IMF. He is reported to lament on the usual small share of climate finance the Pacific is able to access. Nowhere did he share how his country, Fiji fared. The truth is Fiji lags behind other Pacific states in terms of the climate finance it has been able to access. The current Government has had no more success than the past government in accessing the huge opportunities there is to leverage climate finance.

And the reason for this is that until such time as bias, croynism and favouritism persist in recruiting the right expertise to undertake this, I believe Fiji will continue to be shortchanged. Agencies such as IMF, which are only interested in enhancing their lending portfolio, seem to be driving the agendas which sadly our ill advised ministers seem to be falling for.

In their most recent of the many trips ministers Biman Prasad and Charan Singh made to India, they continued to recycle the usual calls with little indication of any new initiatives. For example, Mr Singh talked about Fiji joining the International

Solar alliance, conveniently forgetting that Fiji has been part of this ever since the inception of the ISA. So there was nothing new about this. Even the complex to train so-called “barefoot” solar engineers has been languishing in Labasa for the past 10 years!

It will be interesting to do an analysis of the benefit of such frequent visits to a country such as India which itself is dependent on international aid to deal with the poverty and other issues confronting its two billion people!

Another example of ineffective and abuse of taxpayers’ funds was the recent Fijian delegation to the UNFCCC COP in Dubai. Fiji had one of the highest number of delegates including the PM, many ministers, parliamentarians, ambassadors etc. We gather a certain ambassador was appointed head of delegation at the 11th hour, clearly with no time to prepare for this important meeting.

Is it a wonder that precious little was heard of Fiji’s performance in Dubai, compared with the current delegation to the WTO.

At the UNFCCC, Fiji was hardly visible on any issue. The PM and minsters made fiveminute speeches at events and after watching Dubai 7s seemed to have disappeared. Not a single minister was there during the final hours when strong leadership and solidarity among Pacific nations was necessary to get over the hurdle on important matters such as fossil fuel subsidy etc.

There is a lot of parallels between the current WTO negotiations where Fiji is being inspirational compared with most other meetings which are turning out to be junkets for ministers and their teams, at the cost of taxpayers.

There is a need for more rigorous assessment of the benefits and outcomes of such expensive globe trotting ventures.

ALTAUF CHAND

Minto, NSW, Australia

Farmers’ protest

THE Indian farmers protesting on the Haryana Punjab border disappeared overnight when informed that they will be charged under UAPA (unlawful activities prevention act).

The farmer’s had brought JCB’s and forklifts to remove barricades put by the Haryana State Police.

This action is equipollent to waging war against the state.

Intelligence reports stated that not all of these protesters were farmers, but political activists of Opposition parties. RAKESH CHAND SHARMA

Nadi