Inoke Kubuabola

Ratu Inoke Kubuabola (2012)

Ratu Inoke Kubuabola (born June 16, 1948 in Cakaudrove ) is a diplomat and politician from Fiji .

biography

Opposition leader and coup of May 2000

Kubuabola was initially active in local politics and lastly from 1991 to 2001 chairman of the Cakaudrove Provincial Council in the Northern Division . In 1994 Kubuabola tried in vain to replace Sitiveni Rabuka as party leader of the Fijian People's Party (Soqosoqo ni Vakavulewa ni Taukei) after sexual relations with a journalist for the "Fiji Times" against the then Prime Minister became known. He also accused the Prime Minister of having conducted coalition talks without the participation of the Grand Council of Chiefs (Bose Levu Vakaturaga) when forming a government.

In the parliamentary elections in May 1999, he was re-elected to the House of Representatives, where he represented the constituency of Cakaudrove West Fijian . However, his party suffered a defeat in these elections and he succeeded the previous Prime Minister Rabuka as chairman of the FPP. Since, due to the Fiji constitution, each party with more than eight seats in the House of Representatives, the election winner and chairman of the Fiji Labor Party (FLP), Mahendra Chaudhry , started coalition negotiations with the FPP, but Kubuabola decided to go ahead because of too great a difference of opinion on the FLP into the opposition .

Kubuabola was then between 1999 and 2000 opposition leader (Leader of the opposition). Because of this function, he was able to propose eight of the 32 members of the Senate in accordance with the constitution . However, there was renewed controversy between him and Prime Minister Chaudhry after he submitted proposals exclusively from candidates of the opposition. The Prime Minister then interjected that, according to Chapter 6 of the Constitution, the opposition leader's proposals must be proportional to the proportion of the parties' seats in the House of Representatives. Kubuabola replied that, in his view, this proportional distribution was based on the seats of the opposition parties, but not on those of the governing parties.

A solution to this constitutional conflict could not be found, however, since the coup d'état of May 19, 2000 under George Speight and Army Chief Frank Bainimarama led to the removal of Prime Minister Chaudhry as well as him as opposition leader. After the restoration of democracy in September 2001, there were repeated disputes between the government and the opposition up to 2004, which were also due to the fact that politicians of Indian origin were not included in the formation of the government, and there were lawsuits in courts to clarify the constitutional situation.

On July 3, 2000, he was appointed Minister of Information and Communication by the new Interim Prime Minister, Laisenia Qarase , and held this post until September 10, 2001. In this capacity, he prohibited Fiji TV from broadcasting a report on former Prime Minister Chaudhry. In the House of Representatives elections, he suffered a defeat against his own nephew Ratu Naiqama Lalabalavu and lost his seat in parliament. Shortly thereafter, he also resigned as chairman of the Cakaudrove Province Council and was replaced in this position by Sitiveni Rabuka.

Diplomat and Foreign Minister

In 2002 he was appointed High Commissioner in Papua New Guinea by Prime Minister Qarase . In late 2005, he attempted to resolve a problem with Fijian security forces, some of whom were accused of being mercenaries operating illegally from the island of Bougainville . This problem affected the government of Fiji, especially as the incident strained relations between the two states.

He was then appointed ambassador to Japan on May 4, 2006 and was also accredited as ambassador to South Korea .

On July 24, 2009 he was finally appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs, International Cooperation and Civil Aviation in his interim government by Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama .

His brother Ratu Jone Kubuabola was governor of the Reserve Bank and finance minister in the government of Prime Minister Qarase, which was overthrown in 2006.

Web links

• Information in rulers.org

Individual evidence

1. ↑ RABUKA AND THE REPORTER
2. ^ Jon Fraenkel, Stewart Firth: From Election to Coup in Fiji: The 2006 Campaign and Its Aftermath . Ed .: Jon Fraenkel. IPS Publications, Suva, Fiji 2007, ISBN 978-982-01-0808-0 , pp. 208 (English, limited preview in Google Book Search).
3. ^ Minister warns TV station against featuring deposed prime minister
4. ↑ Fiji TV to feature deposed prime minister despite warning from government
5. ↑ Fiji Missions Overseas ( Memento of the original from March 30, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
6. ^ ^{A b} New Foreign Minister of the Republic of the Fiji Islands . Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Malaysia. Retrieved May 24, 2013.