Clarification Before Wesley Travels: Court
The editor-in-chief of the Fiji Times newspaper, Fred Wesley, has a different name appearing in his passport.
The High Court in Suva yesterday sought an affidavit from Wesley’s counsel to state that the passport belonged to Wesley and the name on the passport was his, before he travels abroad.
Wesley’s first name on his passport is Freddy, the court heard.
Wesley was granted bail variation to travel to Sydney, Australia, to attend a workshop on the media industry next week.
However, the Suva High Court Judge Justice Thushara Rajasinghe said that defence had made no mention of the different name of Wesley in his passport which could hinder the Court from writing to the Immigration on his granting of bail variation.
He has told Faizal Haniff to file an affidavit to mention that Fred Wesley is the same person with the name as is on the passport.
Wesley had been allowed to travel on or after September 2 and must return to the country before September 9.
Immediately after returning, Wesley will have to surrender his travel documents back to the High Court Registry
Wesley faces a charge of sedition along with Fiji Times publisher Hank Arts, Nai Lalakai editor Anare Ravula and an article writer to the Nai Lalakai.
It is alleged that Wesley on April 27, 2016 in his capacity as the editor-inchief of the Nai Lalakai newspaper did ‘aid and abet’ Arts to publish an article which contained a statement which was a seditious publication.
In addition, Mr Haniff had submitted that his client also intended to attend the Newspaper of the Year Awards 2017 which was scheduled to be held on September 6 and Advertising and Marketing Awards 2017 on September 7.