The editorial team of the Fiji Political Review.
Vanua
Parliament has given the Great Council of Chiefs new duties to report. Yet those duties are conditional, and Bill No. 32 would soon require the chiefs' own senators to approve any change. The case for completing the paper trail is strongest now.
Policy Watch
Fiji's Great Council of Chiefs now has a statute of its own, and Bill No. 32 would entrench it in a new Constitution. Together, the two measures shift real power to the chiefs while leaving gaps that will be harder to close after 2028.
Who Holds Power
From founding FRIEND Fiji in 2001 to running the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Protection. A profile of Sashi Kiran, one of five women in Parliament.
Constitutional Review Commission
Ten months in 1996. Five weeks in 2026. The CRC Report will be tabled on 22 September. The referendum could be held by mid-December. FPR examines what Fiji's own constitutional practice used to require.
Who Holds Power
Deputy Prime Minister. Chartered accountant. Founding People's Alliance figure. Nine months on the backbench, and now back at Cabinet with Public Enterprises added to his brief.
Republished
Five Pacific leaders absent, China furious over Taiwan's inclusion. The 55th Pacific Islands Forum in Palau. Republished from The Conversation.
Who Holds Power
Ioane Naivalurua controls policing and communications as Fiji heads to the 2026 election. Former Police Commissioner. Former Independent. Now inside Cabinet.
Who Holds Power
Siromi Turaga holds two of the most consequential levers of Fiji's 2026 election: Acting Attorney-General and the minister responsible for the vote itself.
Editorial
Three voices from May 2000. Teaiwa and Lal wrote in real time as Speight held Parliament. Chaudhry spoke on 17 May, two days before it happened. Twenty-six years on, none of it has aged out.
Who Holds Power
Minister for Finance. People's Alliance. Sworn in October 2025 after Biman Prasad resigned on FICAC charges. His first budget as Minister is due 26 June 2026. The numbers are stable. The room to move is not.
Who Holds Power
Deputy Prime Minister. Minister for Tourism and Civil Aviation. SODELPA's kingmaker in 2022. One million visitors. $2.54 billion. A profile of the coalition's most senior SODELPA figure.
Podcast
FPR launches two new audio formats: On the Record, our interview podcast, and Pacific Dispatch, our audio essay series. Episode 1 of each is out now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
FPR Tools
A documented chronology of drug seizures, trafficking operations, and institutional integrity events in Fiji and the Pacific, 2000 to present. Every entry is sourced. Unverified entries are flagged. The tracker covers 23 events across six categories, from Operation Logrunner's 357 kg heroin warehouse in 2000 to the January
Briefing
Pacific democracy scholarship has leaned on constitutions, election results, and historical narrative. Very little tracks what institutions actually do over time. The Monitor is our attempt to close that gap.
Policy Watch
The Ministry of Environment and Climate Change said no. After a 1,500-page EIA, submissions and petitions, TNG Fiji's proposed 900,000-tonne waste-to-energy plant at Vuda has been rejected. TNG has until 3 July to appeal.
Policy Watch
The government has allocated funds for a referendum without a legal framework. The Finance Minister confirms the budget is in place. The Supervisor of Elections confirms she cannot act on it.
Who Holds Power
Minister for Public Works, Transport & Meteorological Services. Deputy Leader, People's Alliance. His portfolio received the largest single budget allocation in 2025–26 — $800 million. A profile of one of the coalition's most senior figures.
Briefing
Fiji's municipal councils have been run by government appointees for 21 years. No elections. No accountability to residents. FPR examines what that costs, and what it would take to change it.
Briefing
Fiji's 147th Girmit commemoration smoothed indenture into a palatable migration story. The antidote lies in the work of Professor Brij Lal, a historian who insisted on truth before comfort, and paid for it with exile.
Election Watch
Whether Fiji's first local government elections in twenty-one years will proceed in September may be the most consequential democratic question the coalition faces this year.
Parliamentary Watch
Cabinet has approved the Vuvale Union. Parliament has not. Under section 51 of the 2013 Constitution, that is a constitutional problem.
Australian Budget 2026-27
Fiji's bilateral aid allocation is frozen at $64 million while Australia announces a new era in the relationship. The numbers tell a different story to the rhetoric.
Election Watch
Fiji's 2026 election could be called as early as August — or as late as February 2027. The government has not announced when. What it decides will reveal whether constitutional reform comes before or after the polls.
Parliamentary Watch
Fiji's Parliament unanimously ratified the Pacific Resilience Facility on 29 April — the first significant cross-party vote of the current term. Three observations on what it means, including the $333 million gap between current pledges and the PRF's capitalisation target.
Briefing
Fiji's Constitutional Review Commission has four months to deliver its final report. Three questions the Fiji Political Review will be tracking.