A bit from our old home island Fiji (we lived there from 2002 – 2005) … and how the very idea of democracy and free speech is going down the drain there …
I was first informed by a long time reader about some rumors, that certain blogs, opposing the december coup in Fiji and trying to indicate who was behind it and who is now riding the gravy train.
Some of the blogs in question are: Hide.n.ceek (they already moved away from blogspot.com in anticipation that all blogspot blogs might get blocked), resistfrankscoup and fijishamelist.
Can you imagine? A Fijian businessman who they thought had something to do with these blogs was taken, put in prison over night for questioning. (And 2 days later he was taken again … but only for a few hours this time)
So, now Fiji is right there with China, Thailand, Egypt … and since it is obvious that they have no idea what they are dealing with (the newspaper keeps calling the blogs ‘blog spots’ … anyone can tell me what a blog spot is ??? ) they might just totally turn of the internet connection for all Fiji … yeah …
[update] new article in the Fijitimes … they say they closed access to one site .. from OUTSIDE fiji (does that make any sense?) … but anyways .. I am still able to access that site … again .. brains at work here.
My personal stance? I am fairly apolitical there … The last government surely needed some help .. and this new interim gov is just not what it could have been … they are looking at new elections in 36 months … that is 3 years of non-democracy … which I (and pretty much all other countries in the world) find unacceptable. Why 3 years … get an election up and running pronto! Let the people decide … no 3 year free ride.
In case you still have no idea where Fiji is, this is where Britney Spears went for her honeymoon.
[update] resistfrankscoup has now relocated to here
[update]And the Fijitimes is still using the term ‘blog spots’ .. and they pulled in someone else over night … oh, and they found a new term to overuse: hate speech .. sigh .. and again today
[...] The Sydney Morning Herald has a story here. Here’s a related blog post with a good roundup of what’s been going on in recent days. [...]
Hope it gets better on lovely Fiji.
All they need is love as we had on “beatus island”. They never realized we were there.