Fiji PM Bainimarama’s party trails in early results from national election

SYDNEY - Early counting in Fiji’s national election on Wednesday showed Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama’s party trailing the opposition in provisional results from the Pacific island nation’s elections office.

Voter turnout in the third democratic election since Mr Bainimarama came to power in a 2006 coup was less than 60 per cent, which analysts said was the lowest in a decade.

His Fiji First party had attracted 24.19 per cent of the votes as at 10.30pm (6.30pm, Singapore time), behind the People’s Alliance Party with 43.16 per cent, provisional results showed, with around 500 of 2,071 polling stations counted.

The elections office said result updates were “temporarily on hold” shortly before 11pm, and later said its election results app, used by the public, had errors.

Mr Bainimarama is in a tight race against another former coup leader and one-time prime minister, Mr Sitiveni Rabuka, whose People’s Alliance Party has formed a coalition with Fiji’s oldest political party, the National Federation Party.

Fiji has a proportional representation system, where there is a single constituency.

Before the app was taken down, it showed People’s Alliance candidate Peceli Vosanibola attracting the most votes, ahead of Mr Bainimarama and Mr Rabuka.

However, the Supervisor of Elections told the media that this was an error because Mr Vosanibola had recorded only 63 votes in its results system.

Fiji’s Attorney-General and Fiji First general-secretary Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum wrote on Facebook: “Vote tallying isn’t a sprint – It’s a marathon. The only numbers that matter are the final results.”

Mr Bainimarama has a high international profile for climate change advocacy and has been chairman of the Pacific Islands Forum, the regional diplomatic bloc, as it sought this year to manage rising security tensions between the United States and China.

Dr Shailendra Singh, a political commentator and associate professor of Pacific journalism at the University of South Pacific in Fiji, said the voter turnout was the lowest since Fiji’s Constitution was reformed in 2013. The rising cost of living and the economy were major issues for voters, he said.

Mr Bainimarama’s Fiji First supporters campaigned on stability and progress, while the opposition said national debt was too high and questioned the state of democracy, he said.

“Critics of Fiji First feel that this one party has been in power for too long and maybe it is time for a change,” Dr Singh said.

Concerns expressed by opposition parties and civil society groups about media self-censorship caused by a punitive media law continued at this election, he said.

“The nature of democracy has been under question for some time – not all democracies are perfect and Fiji is trying; this is part of Fiji’s journey of moving to a more democratic system,” Dr Singh said.

Fiji’s government has rejected criticism by opposition parties about the media law.

The build-up to the vote has been marked by a strict media blackout, preventing local journalists from covering any aspect of the election for 48 hours before voting day and until polls close.

A multinational observer group led by Australia, India and Indonesia includes 90 election observers, who are also monitoring the national vote counting centre.

Fiji has a population of some 900,000 and is heavily reliant on its tourism industry – which was badly damaged by the Covid-19 pandemic. REUTERS, AFP