Fiji coup leader warns against dissent

Times Online
December 06, 2006
Fiji coup leader warns against dissentAdam Fresco and agencies
Fiji’s new military ruler declared a state of emergency today and warned he was prepared to use quick and decisive force to quell any dissent.
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The day after seizing power in Fiji’s fourth coup in 19 years, Commodore Frank Bainimarama used self-appointed powers to swear in a caretaker prime minister and remove the police chief who had defied his orders.
Armed troops surrounded the parliament and interrupted senators as they debated a motion condemning the toppling of Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase.
"We have reasonable grounds to believe that the life of the state is being threatened," Mr Bainimarama said as he proclaimed a state of emergency and dissolved parliament.
"Should we be pushed to use force, let me state that we will do so very quickly," he told reporters, adding that "Qarase and his cronies are not coming back".
Mr Bainimarama’s coup, which has drawn outrage abroad, came after a year-long power struggle with the mild-mannered Mr Qarase, whom he accuses of corruption and being too soft on those behind Fiji’s last coup in 2000.
Mr Bainimarama said the planned appointment of a caretaker government "is now put on hold" because the Great Council of Chiefs, the influential group of tribal leaders who appoint the president, said they had cancelled a scheduled meeting next week amid growing opposition to the coup.
Military doctor Jona Baravilala Senilagakali, a Methodist lay preacher and political novice, was sworn in as caretaker prime minister at military headquarters.
"I work for the army. I’m obliged to do whatever my commander tells me to do," Mr Baravilala told reporters. He gave no timetable for fresh elections.
The deposed prime minister, who was taken by soldiers before sunrise and flown back to his home island in Fiji’s remote east, remained defiant and said he was still the country’s only legal ruler as he called for Fijians to stage non-violent demonstrations.
"I am still the legal prime minister of the country," Mr Qarase told the Legend radio network today from his home village on the outlying Lau group of islands. "There is no way the interim prime minister is going to be a legal prime minister, absolutely no way."
The capital, Suva, remained generally quiet as Mr Bainimarama, in an address broadcast nationally, said he had declared a state of emergency because intelligence indicated some people were planning civil disruption.
"For those who do not agree with what we are doing, we respect your opinion, but do not interfere with the process that is currently under way," he said. "There is no point in debating the legality or otherwise of our actions. Qarase and his cronies are not coming back."
He said the military wanted a peaceful transition to an interim administration and eventually elections that would restore democracy.
"But should we be forced to use force, let me state that we will do so very quickly," he said.