An Analysis of Provincial, Urban and Ethnic Loyalties in Fiji's 2014 Election
2015; Routledge; Volume: 50; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/00223344.2015.1013598
ISSN1469-9605
Autores Tópico(s)New Zealand Economic and Social Studies
ResumoABSTRACTFor the eight years prior to the September 2014 election in Fiji, no data were available that could enable observers to gauge the extent of support for the Bainimarama government. During that period, a range of conflicting claims emerged about shifting political loyalties within Fiji, largely based on anecdotal evidence. This paper makes use of the micro-level September 2014 election results to enquire about rural/urban, ethnic, class and provincial bases of support for the major parties. It finds that backing for the main opposition party was concentrated in areas with small populations, high levels of out-migration and relatively low voter turnout. Conversely support for the incumbent government was strongest on the more densely populated main island of Viti Levu, particularly in the fastest growing western part of that island.Key words: Fijielectoral systemsvoting patternschiefsBainimaramaPacific Islands AcknowledgementsI am indebted to Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi, Tupou Draunidalo and Stewart Firth for comments on earlier versions of this paper presented at the Australian National University and at Victoria University of Wellington, to Jennifer Sheehan of CartoGIS at the Australian National University for assistance in producing the map, and to Laite Fraenkel for work on assembling the 2014 electoral database.Notes1 The claims and counterclaims were examined in Jon Fraenkel, ‘Fiji: Melanesia in review, 2008’, Contemporary Pacific, 21:2 (2009), 340.2 See Fiji Sun, 2 Mar. 2014. For a critique of the Lowy poll, see Jon Fraenkel, ‘Fiji: Melanesia in review, 2011: Fiji’, Contemporary Pacific, 24:2 (2012), 382–83.3 These data are publicly available; see ‘2014 election results’, Fijian Elections Office, http://www.electionsfiji.gov.fj/2014-election-results/ (accessed 9 Jan. 2014). I am indebted to Supervisor of Elections Mohammed Saneem and Electoral Commissioner Father David Arms for supplying additional materials covering registered voters by polling station and for responding to various queries about the administration of the election.4 Election defeats for the mainstream Indigenous parties were reversed by coups in 1987 and 2000 rather than by their contesting the next election from a position of opposition. The necessary qualification is with regards to the elections of the 1990s, when Sitiveni Rabuka's governing Soqosoqo ni Vakavulewa ni Taukei party was challenged by several parties linked to eastern chief, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara.5 This entails some potential distortion if rural voters cast ballots inside town boundaries, but the likely effect is small. The locations of polling stations were established by drawing on town/city boundaries used in the censuses of population, which include ‘peri-urban’ areas among the urban population. This methodology also entails inclusion of some unincorporated towns – such as Nabouwalu, Seaqaqa and Deuba – which are barely distinguishable from adjacent rural areas. Conversely urban and peri-urban settlements have in some cases expanded beyond the city boundaries. Since the vast bulk of the urban population is unambiguously ‘urban’, drawing alternative town boundaries is unlikely to greatly alter the urban/rural party vote shares shown here.6 Fiji Labour Party, National Federation Party and Social Democratic Liberal Party, ‘General election 2014: interim report on irregularities by the members of the participating political parties … ’, 22 Sep. 2014.7 Data convey party shares of aggregate ballots, including both communal and ‘national’ constituency contests.8 The paper is intended to accompany broader analytical articles on the 2014 election: Brij V. Lal, ‘In Frank Bainimarama's shadow: Fiji, elections and the future’, Journal of Pacific History, 49:4 (2014), 457–68; Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi, ‘The Fijian elections of 2014: returning to democracy?’, Journal of Pacific History, this issue; Eric Larson, ‘Fiji's 2014 parliamentary election’, Electoral Studies, 36 (2014), 235–39; Jon Fraenkel, ‘The remorseless power of incumbency in Fiji's September 2014 election’, Round Table (forthcoming).9 Constitution of the Republic of Fiji (2013), sec. 55.1.10 Fijian Elections Office estimates, cited in Fiji Times, 17 June 2014.11 Volker Boege, Aisake Casimira, Manfred Ernst and Felicity Szesnat, Voices of the People: perceptions and preconditions for democratic development in Fiji (Suva 2013), 39.12 Citizenship of Fiji Decree 2009 (Republic of Fiji), sec. 14.13 For some analysis of the impact of the rural bias in districting in the 1999 election, see Jon Fraenkel, ‘The triumph of the non-idealist intellectuals? An investigation of Fiji's 1999 election results’, Australian Journal of Politics and History, 46:1 (2000), 86–109.14 Calculated from Fiji Islands Bureau of Statistics, ‘Census2007 results: population size, growth, structure and distribution’, 15 Oct. 2008, 1.15 Boege et al., Voices of the People, 39. See also Fiji Times, 9 Aug. 2014.16 Steven Ratuva, cited in Fiji Sun, 23 May 2013.17 MacWilliam has identified the Bainimarama government as engaged in a struggle with an opposition that represents the ‘the rural past’; SODELPA is identified with ‘chiefly dominance, rural candidates and political direction' but also as representing ‘the rentiers and buccaneers of itaukei commerce’. Scott MacWilliam, ‘Militarised democracy and Fiji's 2014 election’, paper presented at the State, Society and Governance seminar series, Australian National University, 28 Oct. 2014, 9, 15, 17. For similar verdicts regarding the rural basis of SODELPA, see Ron Duncan, Hilarian Codippily, Emele Duituturaga and Raijieli Bulatale, ‘Binding constraints to economic growth in the Pacific Islands: some comparative insights’, Pacific Islands Development Program, Pacific Islands Brief 1 (2012), 5; Raijiele Bulatale and Ron Duncan, ‘Binding constraints to economic growth in Fiji’, in ‘Identifying binding constraints in the Pacific Island economies’, ed. Ron Duncan and Hilarian Codippily, East-West Center, Working Paper 18 (2014), 49–55.18 These other urban areas were, however, included in the urban/rural figures shown in Table 1.19 For provincial vote shares by province including urban areas, see Table 2 below.20 See Fraenkel ‘Fiji: Melanesia in review, 2008’, 347.21 See Fiji Times, 28 Aug. 2014.22 See Fiji Sun, 11 May 2013.23 Prime Minister Bainimarama, ‘Speech at the opening of the Nakadi/Tauli Access Road’, media release, 8 July 2014.24 Fiji One News, television program, Fiji TV (Fiji), 11 May 2010; Fiji Sun, 2 Apr. 2014; ‘Former politicians show support to FijiFirst party’, FBC News, 5 July 2014, http://www.fbc.com.fj/fiji/21139/former-politicians-show-support-to-fijifirst-party (accessed 26 Jan. 2015).25 Fiji Times, 16 May 2014.26 Fraenkel ‘Fiji: Melanesia in review, 2008’, 340, 346–48. The ‘People's charter’ was the outcome of the deliberations of the National Council for Building a Better Fiji in 2008.27 Prime Minister Bainimarama, ‘Speech at the commissioning of Dreketi grid extension’, media release, 16 Jan. 2014.28 ‘Tui Macuata backs new beginning’, FijiLive, 6 May 2014, http://fijilive.com/news/2014/05/tui-macuata-backs-new-beginning/57501.Fijilive (accessed 23 Jan. 2015); Fiji Sun, 27 Aug. 2014.29 See Apolosi Bose and Jon Fraenkel, ‘Whatever happened to Western separatism?’, in Jon Fraenkel and Stewart Firth, From Election to Coup in Fiji: the 2006 campaign and its aftermath (Canberra 2007), 225–42.30 ‘18 more chiefs support Bainimarama's Party’, FijiLive, 19 May 2014, http://fijilive.com/news/2014/05/18-more-chiefs-endorse-proposed-party-pm/57694.Fijilive (accessed 14 Jan. 2015).31 Fiji Times, 29 Mar. 2007; ‘People of Fiji's Tavua province to discuss complaints against Tui Tavua’, Radio New Zealand International, 28 Mar. 2007, http://www.radionz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/168778/people-of-fiji%27s-tavua-province-to-discuss-complaints-against-tui-tavua (accessed 23 Jan. 2015).32 Fiji Times, 31 May 2014.33 See the review in Fraenkel, ‘The triumph of the non-idealist intellectuals?, 86–109.34 A subplot in the 1999 election was the rivalry between President Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara and Prime Minister Rabuka. Mara's daughter was elected in Lau Province for the Veitokani ni Lewenivanua Vakarisito party, which allied itself to the FLP. Although the FLP obtained only 1.9% of the Indigenous first preference vote, it acquired 14 seats drawing on preference votes from parties largely reliant on Indigenous Fijian votes.35 One exception was the 1999 election, as a result of party control over transfers of above-the-line ballots, which wrongly convinced some observers that there had been high levels of interethnic voting. For an analysis see Fraenkel, ‘The triumph of the non-idealist intellectuals?’, 96–102.36 Vijay Naidu, Fiji: the challenges and opportunities of diversity (London 2013), 31.37 For the purposes of this comparison, we leave aside Rotuma, where the population of both iTaukei and Fiji Indians is small.38 At the national level, Fiji Indian backing for FijiFirst was likely to have been around 76–82%, i.e. around the same level as Fiji Indian support for the FLP in 2006. On that assumption, and depending on registration and turnout levels, roughly 40% (±5%) of Indigenous Fijians are likely to have backed FijiFirst. Again with variations dependent on turnout levels, 50–53% of Indigenous Fijians are likely to have backed SODELPA.39 Further examination of the ‘semi-authoritarian’ aspects of the 2014 election is provided in Fraenkel, ‘The remorseless power of incumbency’.40 Paulo Baleinakorodawa, Kevin Barr and Semiti Qalowasa, ‘Time of uncertainty, opportunity’, Fiji Times, 19 Dec. 2006; MacWilliam, ‘Militarised democracy’.41 See Matthew Dornan, ‘Fiji's 2012 budget: a good budget in difficult times’, Devpolicy Blog, http://devpolicy.org/fiji-budget-2012-an-overview20111208/ (accessed 16 Jan. 2015).42 For an account of the location and character of squatter settlements, see Manoranjan Mohanty, ‘Squatters, vulnerability and adaptability of urban poor in a small island developing state: the context of Fiji Islands’, paper presented at the IGU 2006 Conference, Brisbane, 7 July 2006.43 For the Tamavua Village area, the 56.6% figure averages ballots cast at the polling venues at Tamavua Primary School, Tamavua Village Hall and the Tamavua-i-Wai Methodist church hall but not the Fiji School of Nursing complex, the Latter-day Saints college or the Seventh-day Adventist church hall.44 For the locations of squatter settlements in Lautoka, see ‘Squatters to be moved’, Fiji Times, 27 Jan. 2013; ‘Squatters up by 5pc’, Fiji Times, 30 June 2012.45 Vijay Naidu, ‘The Namara (Tiri) squatter settlement in Labasa: an in-depth study’, USP School of Government, Development and International Affairs, Working Paper 1 (2014).46 I am indebted to Prof. Naidu for clarification on this point. Vijay Naidu, pers. comm., 16 Dec. 2014.47 I am indebted to electoral commissioner Father David Arms for this observation.
Referência(s)