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Plans by Fiji's ousted Prime Minister to make “significant changes” to race-based policies if re-elected may have come too late.
“It is too late for him,” said Bainimarama.
“If he had listened to the military then, we wouldn’t be where we are today. He would still be in power. We would have been moving forward at 100 miles per hour.”
Bainimarama blames Qarase for the country’s woes and the 2006 coup.
“The whole lot of problems we faced from the international community and unemployment in the country is all a result of Qarase not listening in the first place,” he said.
The military council chose Qarase, a banker, to head the interim Government following the 2000 civilian coup. And the military believes that Qarase has sided with the nationalist perpetrators of the 2000 insurrection, by implementing race-biased policies in the name of indigenous Fijian rights.
Qarase has explained that the affirmative action programmes are constitutional and has vowed to review them if he returns as Prime Minister.
“We will ensure the programs are within the Constitution and applied with properly advised criteria,” he said.
But, Bainimarama is not budging.
“It’s too late. Two to three months ago the Cabinet removed the affirmative action programme and all the other raced-based policies.
"We will make sure that with the Peoples Charter it remains removed."
