Fiji is hopefully returning to democracy in September, and in an effort to protect itself, the dictatorship has riddled their new constitution with irrevocable clauses preventing any prosecution of them for their crimes. Their plan is clearly that if they don't fix the election, they'll at least be able to enjoy their retirement and keep their ill-gotten wealth. Fortunately, the major opposition party is having none of it:
Fiji's Sodelpa Party is planning a review of the constitution if it is elected to power in September.
The party's leader Ro Teimumu Kepa says the starting point will be to ask the Supreme Court for an advisory opinion on the status in law of Fiji's 1997 constitution.
That document was abrogated in 2009 by the Fiji regime which brought in a new constitution last year.
Sodelpa is also planning to get rid of decrees and policies which it describes as oppressive and vindictive.
I think its difficult to imagine an independent judiciary finding that the whims of a man with a gun have legal and constitutional effect. They might try and find that the point is moot after so much time, but the fact that someone is bothering to ask them shows that it is not. It would create a hell of a mess, but that is preferable to accepting that dictatorship is in any way legal - or letting those responsible escape justice.
