Author: Report - Agencies.
Publication: The Free Press Journal
Date: July 19, 2003
Fiji's indigenous government must
be reshaped to include ethni9c Indian MPs from ousted leader Mahendra
Chaudhry's Labour Party, the racially divided South Pacific nation's Supreme
Court ruled on Friday, ,report agencies.
Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase,
who has ruled out holding snap elections, said he would abide by
the unanimous ruling of five Supreme Court judges that he must offer Labour
MP's cabinet posts. Chaudhry said he expected a phone call from Qarase
soon. "It is a question now of whether leaders are prepared to swallow
their ego and work in the national interest, or much less persist with
their own agendas," Chaudhry told reporters.
There was no immediate public reaction
after the decision, which was delivered amid tight security in the capital
Suva. Police appealed for the calm to continue.
"The security forces are pleading
with the general public ton receive the decision calmly. Let the
courts and the politicians do their job," Police Commissioner Andrew Hughes
said.