austraLasia #1780
Fiji summer camp goes ahead

SUVA: 11th December 2006 --  After a meeting last Friday with Salesians and Don Bosco Youth Group members responsible for the summer activities in Fiji's troubled capital, a decision was made to go ahead for the 11-15 December Don Bosco Camp at Deuba on the Coral Coast, in the likelihood that the army would not impose a threatened curfew over the weekend - which they did not.  As a result, some 60 youngsters, many of them from the poorest areas on the outskirts of the capital, and with a further 20 adults including Salesians, youth leaders and mothers, have begun their five day camp with great enthusiasm.  The Rector in Suva, Fr Bellarmine, described the scene in the capital as relatively calm but 'anxiety and fear are there, even though life moves on normally for ordinary people'.
    Just one week ago, Army commander Commodore Frank Bainimarama announced the army was taking over government, Fiji's fourth coup in 20 years. It followed the then prime minister Laisenia Qarase's introduction of two bills into parliament, one offering pardon to conspirators in the 2000 coup which Bainimarama had helped put down, the other handing lucrative coastal land ownership to indigenous Fijians. Bainimarama declared he had assumed presidential powers, dismissed the government, then declared a state of emergency.  It was this latter action that threatened a halt to the proposed camp as it could have also meant the imposing of a curfew in and around the city.  Instead the army rounded up all government members and members of the public who had spoken out after the coup, claiming the right to silence anyone who was inciting violence.
    The Archbishop of Suva, Petero Mataca has indirectly spoken out against the coup by publicly criticising the Fiji Assembly of Christian Churches which issued a statement without consulting him, a statement which he claims is politically biased and theologically wrong, since it did not condemn the illegal and unconstitutional removal of the government nor affirm the need for democracy and the rule of law. He also said that any statement on these events should bind the churches to compassion and justice.
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