Friends, I am sharing the podium tonight with a professor who – like me – became a politician.
When our PAP/NFP/SODELPA Coalition Government took office on Christmas Eve last year, we inherited some serious economic and social challenges. First and foremost the Government was seriously underfunded.
Government assets and facilities were falling apart for lack of maintenance, our hospitals were in their worst state for generations. Worse, with a sky-high debt to GDP ratio of about 90 per cent we were financially hamstrung.
There was no money. If we could not find the money to fund the government, we could not provide the basic support that the economy needed to grow.
Our people were tired of living in fear and suffering the whims of an unaccountable government that just did whatever it wanted, without regard to the law, without regard to the rights of others. Only the government could be right and everybody else was wrong.
From 2006 we had eight years of military government. Then from 2014 we had another eight years where we pretended to have a democratic government, with a stagemanaged Parliament masking a two-man dictatorship.
The independent news media faced daily threats. Anyone who criticised the government faced arrest or prosecution. It is hard to believe that only nine months ago, this was Fiji’s daily reality.
Politically, we are a different country now. But economically and socially, we will continue to struggle for a while. Too many people find that their incomes cannot match rising prices.
We are still some distance from delivering good health and education outcomes. Yes, there are still potholes in the roads and problems with our power and water. These are issues that will take us longer to fix.
But we in this Government are determined to address these problems. Most importantly we want to do this differently. We want to work with everyone, in consultation with others, with respect to differing views and with an openness to alternative ideas.
We know that we in Government do not have all the answers. Some of our economic policies have meant difficult choices for us. We know that increasing VAT will impose hardship on our people.
And yet without the revenue from increased VAT, we cannot maintain basic services on which our poorest people depend. Our poorest people cannot put their children in private schools or visit private hospitals.
They cannot pay full cost for basic services such as water and power. And without money, we in the Government cannot maintain these services to any acceptable standard – the standard all our people deserve, regardless of their economic status.
And yes, we will be criticised for the choices we make. But that is OK. We are not afraid of criticism.
We know that as a new government there are things we can learn. We know there are new ways of working that others can teach us.
Dialogue and debate
And this is why we need public dialogue and debate. And this is why we need our smartest people to put their ideas into the public arena, so others can gain knowledge and contribute their own ideas and perspectives to the debate.
Every view is important. Every exchange is an opportunity to learn. We want people to understand that public policy is their property and that they can make a difference to how their government works for them.
Professor Wadan Narsey’s books, which we are launching today, are a record of some of the most important contributions in the last 30 years to Fiji’s public debate.
Prof Narsey, raised in Toorak, is a sportsman, musician and politician – but first and foremost an academic who has studied in universities in New Zealand, West Indies and finally, for his PhD, in the UK. He taught at the University of the South Pacific for more than 30 years.
It is common knowledge now that he did not have a happy parting from USP. The former government applied financial pressure on USP to force him out. This is something we should remember — just one more example of the intolerance and pettiness Fiji lived under during the tenure of the former government.
Prof Narsey was also a Member of Parliament and Shadow Finance Minister for NFP between 1996 and 1999.
This was the period with better memories — when the historic 1997 Constitution was unanimously approved by Parliament because of an equally historic partnership between the Prime Minister then and now, Mr Rabuka, and the former Leader of the NFP the late Mr Jai Ram Reddy.
I pay my respects to both these gentlemen. Prof Narsey also worked in the region as a consultant for donor governments, regional organisations and NGOs like ECREA and FWRM and he brings a wealth of knowledge to his writings, all usually backed by solid statistics. And this point, too, is important.
Public decision-makers are entrusted with public money. Their decisions should be based on evidence and data, not what suits their own political survival.
And contributions to the public debate are the strongest when they are based on well-presented evidence. All university professors write, and many publish books. But no university professor in Fiji’s history has contributed so much to public debate as Prof Narsey.
For me, this is a very important point. And for this, too, we should thank The Fiji Times, which by publishing Prof Narsey’s articles, has stayed true to the principles of a free and independent news media.
It has continued to publish diverse and often dissenting views, despite all the legal and financial pressures they have been put under from the previous government.
Few academic writers have the skill to reduce complicated issues to their essentials and present them in short articles for newspapers, as Prof Narsey has done for decades.
The late Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi put it the best, and I quote Ratu Joni’s wise words: Wadan is one who believes that social, political, economic, religious, cultural and other issues which affect everyone need to be placed in the public domain in a form we can all understand. Whether in discussing the constitution, the electoral system, the merits of globalisation, the damaging effects of monopoly, rugby, education, employment opportunities, the role of the military, deregulation or corruption, Wadan brings to the subject clarity and fresh perspectives. … He expresses his fondness and affection for this country by inviting us to consider options that would ease globalisation while retaining some measure of ourselves.
Simply put, it is about how we can make the difficult choices that are best for us. While some of it speaks to the great and powerful, it is largely directed at people of Fiji of all communities. Those law-abiding, hardworking folk of all communities who quietly struggle and make sacrifices in the hope of a better Fiji for their children. His works are meant to promote reflection, discussion and debate.
Economic growth
Prof Narsey’s books show that he also believes, as we in the Government do, that economic growth must be a large part of the answer to our problems. Growing the cake so that everyone’s share can grow — not just in proportion but in size.
There is no point in selfishly fighting for a bigger share of a shrinking cake. This is why the title of Volume 1 is The Challenges of Growing the Fiji Economy.
Volume 2 is titled A Fair Go For all Fiji. In it he explains how for decades the workers of Fiji, women, pensioners, and yes, our environment, have been left behind and what needs to be done to serve their interests better.
Prof Narsey believes, as we in the Coalition Government also do, that the economy cannot grow if we have political instability and social conflict, if we do not respect democracy, the rule of law and constitutions, if we do not respect media freedom: Volume 3 is therefore titled Our Struggles for Democracy in Fiji: Rule of Law and Media Freedom.
He even delves into the work of psychologists like Prof Zimbardo who tried to explain why “good people do evil” as so many wellintentioned people did after the 2006 coup, when they believed in the rhetoric of those who violently overthrew the democratically elected government.
Wadan Narsey, a distinguished Prof of Economics, believes with great humility that economics alone cannot answer the great questions of development: what is it that constitutes a “decent society”.
Volume 4 therefore looks at all the major social challenges that Fiji faces: in education at all levels (including USP), health, social ills like violence against women and children, which our great women’s leaders like Shamima Ali (FWCC) and Nalini Singh (FWRM) daily do battle on.
Prof Wadan pays tributes to great and small people all in Fiji should learn from, many now departed: Ratu Joni Madraiwiwi, Savenaca Siwatibau, Amelia Rokotuivuna, Jai Ram Reddy, our dedicated Marist Brothers, and many others.
There are many themes in these writings which remind us that Prof Narsey’s vision for Fiji was far ahead of its time.
For example he has written about industries such as improving markets for agriculture, the SME tourism hotel chain, retirement homes, the outsourcing industry and value adding from timber.
These are industries we are pursing and promoting today. He advocated for participation by Pacific Nations in Super Rugby 20 year ago.
This is now coming to fruition now with the Drua and Fijiana. He also advocated for increased labour mobility in the Pacific.
This too is now happening, with significant increases in remittance income – even if it now presents us new challenges in retaining scarce skills.
He has long advocated for a united Pacific Community. This is at the top of my agenda also, as we urge visa free travel to Australia and New Zealand as part of greater economic integration with those countries.
Prof Narsey has written widely on entrepreneurship, including successful indigenous Fijian businesses.
His books include profiles on successful Fiji entrepreneurs such as the late David Gilmour of Fiji Water, the late Mere Samisoni, Yee Wah Sing, Mark Halabe and the Chauhan family. Debt and democracy But it was not all good news.
For years, Prof Narsey has warned governments and policymakers about the dangers of poor quality public spending and economic management, and government debt. This, too, has come to fruition.
It is one of our most serious economic problems now and it will persist for many years into the future as we struggle to reduce it to manageable levels.
Prof Narsey has always made the economic argument for compassionate and fair treatment for working people, the rights of women, pensioners and the environment. These are among our challenges today.
Finally, I want to talk about Prof Narsey’s writings on democracy and rule of law.
We in Fiji have learned many painful lessons over the years about what goes wrong when we lose these. These are values and principles which underpin everything – a strong economy, fair and equal treatment for all, and a harmonious society.
And this means, as Prof Narsey has reminded us for so long, that we cannot compromise on these things. Governments must learn that they are not right all of the time and that they do not have to win all of the time.
Friends, I could say much more – and the trouble with professors and politicians is that they usually do!
But this is Prof Narsey’s night and it is time that we heard from him. The good news is that I know Prof Narsey will keep writing, keep dissenting, and keep planting new ideas into the public debate. This is one of the many legacies and gifts he has made to us. And long may he continue to do so.
• PROF BIMAN PRASAD is the Minister of Finance, National Planning and Statistics. This is an edited version of his speech on Thursday, October 5 at the launch of Professor Wadan Narsey’s four-book compendium of his writings on Fiji issues.
