Fijian Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama was yesterday on the verge of winning a historic vote to become Fiji’s first elected leader in eight years, as international observers gave the ballot a stamp of approval.
With 70 percent of the vote counted following Wednesday’s election, the Bainimarama-led Fiji First Party had 60.1 percent, while its nearest rival, the Social Democratic Liberal Party (SODELPA), was on 26.7 percent.
“This was a credible election,” said a statement from a 92-member panel drawn from 13 countries around the world as well as the EU. “While counting is ongoing and the results are yet to be finalized, we assess that the outcome is on track to broadly represent the will of the Fijian voters.”
The election was conducted “in an atmosphere of calm, with an absence of electoral misconduct or evident intimidation,” the statement added.
Australia and New Zealand, who led global condemnation of Bainimarama following the 2006 coup, described the ballot as a “significant event.”
“All early indications are that the conditions were in place for the people of Fiji to exercise their right to vote freely,” New Zealand Foreign Minister Murray McCully said.
“[Canberra] looks forward to working with the new Fiji Government when it is formed,” Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said.
Although Bainimarama was accused of human rights abuses and Fiji was subjected to international sanctions after he seized control, Australian National University political analyst Brij Lal said the outcome was no surprise.
“He had all the advantages of incumbency, name recognition, a public profile, media on his side, campaigning on the public purse, and a desire on the part of the voters for stability, which he promised,” Lal told reporters.
However, despite the country returning to democracy, the military maintain a strong presence and opposition parties canceled an election review planned during the day after soldiers turned up.
SODELPA and other opposition parties were due to meet yesterday at a Suva hotel to discuss their response to the Fiji First Party’s overwhelming lead.
“This meeting cannot go ahead because there are two military personnel in the hotel,” Fiji political analyst Wadan Narsey told reporters.
Bainimarama had repeatedly delayed a return to democracy while he reworked Fiji’s constitution, developed the economy and made himself popular with the ethnic-Indian minority by focusing on their concerns.
Election supervisor Mohammed Saneem said there was a high turnout as voters walked, drove and even rode on horseback to about 1,000 polling stations across the 300 islands.
The four coups that occurred between 1987 and 2006 were largely due to tensions between indigenous Fijians and ethnic Indians and when Bainimarama seized power he vowed to end the racial divisions.
His authoritarian regime brought stability, but in the process tore up the Constitution, sacked the judiciary and tightened media censorship, prompting Fiji’s suspension from the Commonwealth and the Pacific Islands Forum.
The restrictions he imposed have been relaxed and Australia and New Zealand lifted sanctions earlier this year to encourage the return to democracy, although Amnesty International still has concerns about abuses its says were perpetrated by Bainimarama.
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