Update: 8:27PM THE Fiji Human Rights Commission accepts that the President Ratu Josefa Iloilo had no option but to annul the Constitution and appoint himself Head of State.
In a press statement, the Commission's chairperson Dr Shaista Shameem expressed "great sadness" over the Constitution's abrogation but said "the Commission understands that His Excellency felt that the Court of Appeal decision in the Qarase case left him... with no option but to abrogate the Constitution".
She said the Appeal Court's ruling was "unenforceable" and she blamed this on the Attorney-General's lawyers who handled the appeal.
"...the Court of Appeal could not have reached any other decision" because the State lawyers "alarmingly jettisoned the main legal strategy they had employed in the High Court," said Dr Shameem.
She added that despite the Constitution being abolished, the Bill of Rights remained the prime protector of human rights in Fiji.
