FROM OUR ARCHIVES

From Matangi Tonga Magazine Vol. 15, no. 2, June 2000.

Interview by Pesi Fonua

Crown Prince Tupouto‘a comments on the unrest in Fiji, a personal view and not the official view of the Tonga government.

Peis Fonua, Matangi Tonga - Looking at the impacts it may have on Tonga would you like to comment on this ethnic uprising taking place in our closest neighbour, Fiji?

HRH Crown Prince Tupouto‘a — It seems to me that the whole approach to life in the Pacific Islands forever sails very closely to what we refer to as ethnicity, which is the way anthropologists and paternalistic aid donors forgive our basic racism.

It would appear that from Pohnpei to Bora Bora, as long as racism is practised against white men, the native peoples of the South Pacific are always said to be finding their identities or asserting their traditional values, or whatever euphemism is current at the time. Should a white man ever accuse a South Pacific Islander of racism, he would immediately be set upon by the liberal press and intellectual community and pilloried as being himself racist. Many countries have racially-based land laws and, in Tonga’s case, actually enshrined for so long that they have been hallowed by time and have undeservedly assumed the quality of religious and cultural truth.

At the same time, there exists a global trend whereby there is a general breakdown of the old class society. The Lower Classes no longer see any reason why they should continue, as did their forbears, to imitate the Upper Classes in manners, dress, food, drink etc. Actually, I think it is an admirable trend. However, by discarding Upper Class behaviour as their role model, the Lower Classes have unwittingly also discarded the restraint and mildness of manner, which traditionally identified a person from the Upper Classes. Hence, emotional outbursts in public have become acceptable. An example of this in England was the public weeping as the Princess of Wales’s cortege passed by in London. Englishmen and women called out her name in a show of public anguish. This would have been unheard of 25 years ago. I attended Sir Winston Churchill’s funeral, and I remember how sombre and silent the city was. There was a greater turn out lining the route to St. Paul’s Cathedral, but the crowds showed their respect by standing quietly in the drizzle.

Another example nearer home was the racially motivated and cowardly violence, which young jobless, and dare I say it, hopeless Tongans, visited on our Chinese owned shops last year; an act of such barbarity that it shamed and disgusted me and every other Tongan of my generation. Worse, because the culprits were not rounded up and mightily thumped by the Police as they richly deserved to be. Perhaps it is the effect of watching too much Oprah Winfrey.

But in such a climate of trendy racism, we should not at all be surprised that common thugs, such as Speight and his fellow traitors, are able to justify treason with blatant racism, just because a bunch of hopeless drunkards in the Greater Council of Chiefs have seen fit publicly to sympathise with their treason, and to give only qualified support to Ratu Mara, the rightful Ruler of Fiji.

If Australia proceeds with trade sanctions against Fiij, is it wise for the South Pacific Forum countries and Tonga to support Australia and to also endorse trade sanctions against Fiji?

I fail to see how immediately impoverishing the Fijian people could, at a stroke, restore the legally elected Government and shame Speight into releasing the hostages. The genius of this Australian policy, which must have taken at least three seconds to construct, fails to reveal itself. We should remember though, that British Petroleum, which has contracted to import the diesel upon which we are wholly dependent for the generation of power, ships Tonga’s oil from Suva and not directly from Melbourne. Any trade embargo imposed upon Fiji, which interrupts oil supplies shall have an immediate and serious effect on Tonga. It would be nothing short of insanity for the Tongan Government even to contemplate sanctions against Fiji. Anyway, if memory serves me correctly, that is what New Zealand tried to do after the 1987 coup and dismally failed to have any effect on Fiji at all. In fact, Stevie Rabuka staged a second coup d’etat just for good measure. So much for New Zealand diplomacy, though it should be noted with pleasure that this time round, New Zealand has adopted by far the most sensible and practical position out of all the countries, which have taken a position; so there is something to be said for women Prime Ministers after all!

Is it possible for the signing of the new EU convention that was planned to be signed in Suva on July 8 to be moved to Nuku’alofa?

Not a chance. Too few hotel rooms. We would have trouble hosting a TV show let alone a conference like the EU-ACP Plenary. Besides, how can you suggest we rob our officials of yet another chance for foreign travel?

A policeman has been shot dead in Suva by rebel supporters. As a former Minister of Defence, do you think that a political solution to the coup attempt should still be the priority, or a military solution is warranted at this stage?

As a former army officer I am reminded of the very sage advice handed down to us through the ages from the Chinese Strategist and military thinker Sun Tzu : “the crudest form of warfare is fighting”. In other words, there should be no restrictions on the methods one may use. Threats, guile, subterfuge, half-truth, outright falsehoods, assassinations, blackmail, bribery, diplomacy etc. Machiavelli, a much-maligned writer, advises his mythical Prince that all and any may be employed for the benefit of his fief as long as he first obtains the consensus of the people he rules.

You have by now heard that martial law has been declared in Fiji. What is “martial law”?

Do you know what martial law means? I do not. We all understand it to mean ruling by decree but I feel that most people think of it as somehow administering the country by replacing civilian law by its military equivalent. Nothing can be further from the truth.

In military law, the rules of evidence, habeas corpus, laws protecting persons and property are identical with civilian law. The suspension of habeas corpus is a civilian act provided for in most rules governing the conditions, which shall exist after a declaration of a state of emergency. It is normally a measure initiated and approved by a civilian parliament.

But to refer to the questionable process of replacing a duly constituted civilian Government with Army Officers of unproved ability, who then exercise dictatorial powers without a mandate from the electorate, but apparently on the strength of love of country, as “martial” law, not only maligns military jurisprudence but also, in most cases, sows the seeds of further instability.  

Both civilian and military law share the same court of final appeal. Military personnel are not immune from civilian law, nor does military law, under any circumstances, take precedence over civilian law. On the contrary, all military personnel are subject first to the laws of the land, and in addition, also to military law, which regulates their behaviour primarily on purely military matters. I have yet to hear of a universal definition of “martial law”.

It has no legal definition.

It is important to see these differences in the light of the Fijian developments, because I take exception to the commonly held view that military law is somehow less just than civilian law. As one of the few people in this country who has been a Convening Officer for a Court Martial, I can assure you that the rules of procedure and demands made by a military court upon the prosecution to provide the defence with a written summary of evidence, convince me that where an innocent man finds the weight of evidence is against him, his best chance for acquittal is a trial by Court Martial.

The best chance for a guilty one to go free is to make his insincere submissions in front of that fairy tale symbol of democratic justice, the good old civilian trial by jury.