A Silenced Majority

A CHILLING message this month from Mr Rich ard Naidu, former spokesman for the deposed In dian-dominated Government in Fiji. Speaking from Auckland following his expulsion from Fiji, Mr Naidu warned that the ousted coalition members would soon begin “testing” the Fijian Army’s authority and that protests against the new, military-backed Government would become more strident.

In the understandable jubilation that has met Fiji’s re turn to a civilian Government, sight has been lost of the fact that the majority of Fiji’s population has been disen franchised: except for that of the sole Indian, Mrs Na rayan, Minister for Indian Affairs, in the Cabinet, Indian voices have been silenced.

Qualified, experienced people such as Dr Bavadra, who has proven himself prepared to put sectional Indian interests second to those of the nation as a whole have been frozen out of any discussions on the new constitu tion or on the transition from a military to a civilian Government.

Such shortsightedness does not augur well for the fu ture of the Indians who, no doubt, will be expected to con tinue to play their part in the public service, business sector and the sugar industry.

So far, the Indians of Fiji have behaved with restraint in the face of relentless, sometimes brutal, provocation from some indigenous Fijians. Mr Naidu’s warning is all the more worrying for that. He himself was subjected to mob violence by a band of Taukei thugs. It is hoped that he does not have a similar form of rough justice in mind when he warns of the “stridency” to come. □