Fiji oficials concerned over venue for treason hearing
Officials in Fiji were arguing today over where to hold a hearing on treason charges against coup leader George Speight amid concerns it could trigger fresh violence in the South Pacific nation.
Fiji’s chief magistrate is insisting that a preliminary hearing against Speight be held in the capital, Suva, instead of at the prison where he is being held.
But public prosecutor Josaia Naigulevu and the Fiji army said for security reasons the inquiry should be held at Nukulau, a small island in Suva lagoon that was transformed into a jail to hold Speight and 14 of his supporters after they were arrested following last year’s nationalist coup.
Speight led a gang of armed men who stormed the Fijian parliament on May 19 and toppled the government of then Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry.
Speight said he wanted to rein in ethnic Indians, who form a large and powerful minority in Fiji. Chaudhry was Fiji’s first prime minister of ethnic Indian descent.
Since July, chief magistrate Salesi Temo and prosecution and defence lawyers have taken a navy boat to Nukulau every two weeks to formally extend the pre-trial detention of Speight and his 14 associates.
But now Temo has written to Supreme Court registrar Musuka Tabete complaining that the Nukulau location for remand hearings was illegal and that as ‘‘things are returning to normal’’ the hearing, to begin in June, should be conducted in his Suva court.
Temo in his letter said he saw no further need for the army to cordon off the court either.
‘‘Why don’t we just have policeman guarding the place?’’ he wrote.
At previous hearings in Suva, soldiers put a security ring around the court building.
Authorities fear a repeat of the orgy of violence triggered by Speight’s coup in which Fijian nationalists looted and torched Indian-owned businesses in downtown Suva.
The inquiry opening in June will last ‘‘several months’’ according to the prosecutor’s office and will hear from 244 prosecution witness.
At the end of it Temo will decide whether there is enough evidence to warrant sending Speight for trial by the High Court. If convicted of treason, Speight faces the death sentence.
