It was an eventful Fiji Law Society annual convention at the posh five stars Sheraton Resort in Nadi, over the weekend of 21-22 July, 2007. Why at such an expensive location? With poverty rife in Fiji, the legal profession still gets between $250 - $600 per hour. Therefore, this presented a legitimate means to write off a leisurely weekend as business expense. While that is good for those "millionaire lawyers", this was the reason why miserably paid government lawyers and those in statutory authorities could not attend due to the hefty $1000 registration charge. This was in reply to the lament of the top guns of the society on the absence of government lawyers in the convention.

I was amused to hear the statement of one of the unions going on proposed national strike. The Fiji nurses Association Secretary believes that the nationwide strike would be a message to the interim administration that the plight of workers needs to be heard and looked into.

Perhaps the trade union movement in Fiji will care to tell us who hears and looks into the plight and pathetic pay, exploitation and abuse of bulk of Fiji's non unionized workforce and poor people in the informal sector, who do not have full year's job, let alone having a union...

Every man and his dog, and their leaders in New Zealand, Australia, USA, United Kingdom, EU and other corners of the Pacific and the world are crying for elections in Fiji.

It appears that these gurus and proponents of democracy simply believe that democracy measured by elections is panacea and the solution to all the problems in Fiji.

...If the Fiji Methodist Church, especially since 1987, had placed more importance in its core functions rather than politics then perhaps Fijian Christians would have been happier people...

...If KPI or key performance indicator of any religion was to see how spiritually inspired its flock were, and generally reflected in lack of criminal activities, family breakup and reflection of its religious values in its leadership, then the Methodist Church would be at the end of the queue...

Commodore Bainimarama’s announcement last week that the Interim Government plans to set up a new anti-corruption agency within a year reveals what he presumably intends to be the next phase of the military’s “clean-up campaign”. With respect, however, I question whether it is appropriate to establish a new government agency in the middle of what should be an unprecedented exercise in cost-cutting and down-sizing Fiji’s public service.

The end can’t justify the means...

The events of 2000 are testimony to the fact that whatever the end is; it can not be used as a justification of the illegal means taken. The Republic of the Fiji Military Forces knows this and so do the ministers in the current interim government.

So Fiji is in clean up mode....okay. It has begun, we can't change that, so lets really clean it up....once and for all!

...Being a musician and producer, I find it hard to come to terms with the fact that nothing has been done about our music industry. Joe Mar is the chairman of the Fiji Audio Visual Commission (FAVC) and quite frankly, he/they have done nothing for local artists. One of the more important roles of the FAVC is to assist and encourage local musicians and producers, but since its inception, nothing has been done...

May I comment on the concept of affirmative action policy and the plan by the unelected Interim Government to abolish it, given their public statements over the years against it.

...Affirmative action as a vision for Fiji has been around a long time, but it was not processed into a customised results-oriented system until the SDL Party legislated for it with the 50/50 by 20/20 development plan under the Social Justice Act 2001...

COUPS do not only involve the usurping of power and consolidation of new forms of authority at the visible political level. There are also behind-the-scene activities and behavioral dispositions which result from the archaic social atmosphere created by the coup.

What normally captures the attention of the media and the public are the dramatic extra-legal changes and reconfiguration of the old order at the politico-public realm. However, what happens at the socio-cultural and private realms are often hidden and are usually transmitted through rumours...

Is democracy a foreign flower? True democracy does not exist, at least in the real world.

It is a utopian concept which western democracies strive for but never quite get to. Many progressive democracies of the world acknowledge the illusive and very often contradictory nature of democracy where unbridled freedom and liberty have led to some of the worst atrocities of human rights abuse in the world such as that in Guantanamo and the Iraqi War.