By Ratu Meli Vesikula, member of NCBBF
All children are legitimate – but the parents may be the ?

Is the draft charter a bastard child generated by the Labour Party? (Fiji Daily Post 4/08)  The answer is a large NO.
Mahendra Chaudhry certainly had a  hand in its design, but before he was asked for his opinion there were possible around two hundred people who worked with the nine working groups  that did much of the spade work that set the framework for the draft Peoples Charter.   These people volunteered their time and services as they care about the future of Fiji.   Many are professional people working in civil society, business, NGOs, churches, trade unions, councils, educational institutions and government. 

If Nanise Volau, the writer of the provocative article,  cares to check The State of the Nation Report (SNE) she will find in Appendix 3 a six page list of the names of the people on the various working groups.  A number of these people will be Labor party supporters, most of them are not. But that is not the point. The people in these working groups would be appalled to hear that their  only opinions worth hearing  are their political ones.  They   met on a number of occasions,  read and discussed relevant documents  on the topics and sought other opinions on important area of Good Governance, Growing the Economy, Poverty Reduction Social Justice, Education, Health and Housing.   The list could go on.

These different working groups spent considerable time meeting and putting together reports of their findings. Theses were presented to the forty five NCBBF members who together decided the final State of the Nation  and the Economy report (SNE) with its recommendations. It was their job to look at the information, discuss, digest it and decide if they wanted to accept or amend it. In fact that is what actually happened.

Nanise also needs to know, although it was very public news at the time, that the NCBBF visited over a thousand venues and villages around the country and asked for opinions on issues that are dealt with in the SNE report and the draft  Peoples Charter.

Then guess what- the ideas from  the people  were incorporate into  the draft of the working charter.   

Mr. Chaudhry was one of many people who have helped to develop the draft Peoples Charter and we thank him and many others for  their contribution.  But to say that the draft was  mainly his or  that of the Labor party is be like the puppet  Pinocchio who tells lies and then wonders why  his nose grows longer?

Need I remind the reader that there were  around 200 people in the working groups and many thousands more people around the country who all gave their contribution to the ideas embedded in  the draft charter. 

And now we come to today.  We are asking citizens to read  the draft people charter, talk about it with friends and relatives  and to  attend meetings and ask questions.

Of  course , the NCBBF would like a hundred per cent positive response to the Draft people  Charter and “Yes” we would like you to sign the survey form.  But, it is your choice. And why do we ask you to give your name and address? We are suspicious of fraud.

Every day so many of us are  asked for our name and address for some reason or other.  Is it such a big thing? I think not. But the future  of our country is  important.

If we are not prepared to stand up and be counted, by saying “I am and I believe” then perhaps we will have to wait a long time before Fiji will  stand up too. At the moment it is on its knees.

Since 1987 we have increased the number of people living in poverty by 1% a year until now there are four out of every ten of us living below or near the poverty line? Many of us live in squatter settlements in appalling conditions.

Some of us are too poor to pay school fees and we take our children out of primary school.  Those lucky secondary schoolchildren who work hard and complete their schooling, find that that only half of them can get a paid job. There are sixteen thousand school leavers each year. What do the other eight thousand young people do? They try their best to cope with their life, but there are temptations - drugs to deal with the boredom and frustration, and of course, crime is always around the corner.

One idea in the draft Peoples Charter is to give anyone over the age of 18 the right to vote. That would give another 30,000 young people the chance to politically decide who will lead them towards jobs and a secure future.

We need a better life, and the sooner we all stand up and  be counted for what we believe, the better our future, we have to change, Twenty one years have passed since 1987. Successive governments have failed to produce any real wealth for our people, but they have used over two thirds of our money every year just to run the government.  It should be under 50%. No wonder there is a shortage of funds for development.

Ask yourself who has been in power for the last 21 years  and who spent your money?

What a dismal twenty one years it has been for Fiji. . We are of age now – it’s time to  act like mature adults.