9th anniversary of 2000 coup - mayhem in Suva

Fiji's 3rd coup on May 19, 2000, witnessed a complete breakdown of law and order.

Many shops in Suva were looted and burnt down, mostly by nationalist elements who staged a march just before the takeover of Parliament.

The police - led by the then Commissioner Isikia Savua - only mobilised into action several hours after the mayhem.

Savua’s inaction is till today being viewed suspiciously. More so, when his brother Josefa Savua later marched into Parliament with more than 20 territorial soldiers and Isikia Savua condoned his brother’s act by saying he was an adult and could think for himself.

Apart from the looting and burning in Suva city, farmers of Muaniweni and Dawasamu were terrorized, their crops and livestock destroyed or stolen to be taken to Parliament to feed a few thousand coup supporters gathered there.

Muaniweni residents fond themselves as refugees at Girmit Centre in Lautoka for more than a year after being promised overseas resettlement by supporters of the Fiji Human Rights Commission boss Shaista Shameem.

A refugee camp was also created at Valelawa on the outskirts of Labasa for cane farmers by the Fiji Labour Party and National Farmers Union. They were also promised overseas resettlement.

No one (except farmer Chandrika Prasad who successfully took legal action against the abrogation of the Constitution by army commander Frank Bainimarama) was re-settled abroad by those who lured them into refugee camps with such promises.