Bainimarama’s high-stakes game
Author: Stewart Firth, ANU
Fiji’s prime minister and military commander Frank Bainimarama has given his first extended interview to the Australian media since his dramatic seizure of complete power a few weeks ago.
On April 10, following a court ruling that his 2006 military coup was illegal, he abrogated the constitution, dismissed Fiji’s entire judiciary, declared a state of emergency, ordered soldiers into Fiji’s media newsrooms as censors, and said there would be no elections until September 2014.
Pictured in The Australian newspaper with a bowl of the traditional Fijian drink kava, and surrounded by his grandchildren, Bainimarama is engaged in a public relations exercise. He has called for an immediate face-to-face meeting with the prime ministers of Australia and New Zealand, Kevin Rudd and John Key, who, he says, do not understand what he is doing for his country. They are highly unlikely to accept his invitation.