Legal action over Fiji assault in custody

Transcript

A man who claims four Fiji military intelligence officers abused and threatened to kill him while he was in custody is planning on taking legal action against the government.

The former teacher and song writer, Josefa Bilitaki, was held overnight in a police cell for allegedly sending annoying text messages to the Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama.

The Director of Public Prosecutions has found there is insufficient evidence to take further action on his claim.

But Mr Bilitaki's lawyer, Semesa Karavaki, told Mary Baines they will keep fighting the case.

SEMESA KARAVAKI:  The DPP had finally decided that they cannot, they do not, have evidence to file any criminal charge against them. So Bilitaki is considering his other options, actions against those wrong, and that's why he came to see me.

MARY BAINES: So what are his legal options? I understand there are a number of decrees which make it very difficult for people to take action against the government in Fiji.

SK: Yes, that is right. Although we have had the elections already these decrees are very restrictive, they are still in place. One of those is the decree that restricts legal action to be taken against the government, involving actions taken by government officials. These are the things we are looking at at the moment. If we have a leeway into that, you know, we can proceed from that then we can proceed to take actions against the government. Because of the conduct of the officials in this matter.

MB: Ok. So have you have decided what course of action you're going to take?

SK: Yes. Although, if those decrees are in place, we will still go ahead. Because it is not the norm in any democracy to have these kinds of prohibition. We will still go ahead with that and see how far we can go. That will highlight you know the kind of restrictions that we have, legal restrictions, we have in this country. Even though if there are restrictions in place, we will not rest. If we have to take it further to higher authorities we will do that. This is not what we expect you know to be the kind of things that we go through in this country. We will not be prevented by any of those things to stop in going ahead in doing what we are to do.

MB: When do you think you will take the case up against the government?

SK: There are other things I have to look at at the moment before I can confirm that, and you know in due time we can move ahead and do what we need to do.

MB: Is there legal precedent in Fiji for people taking the government to court on these kind of issues, like beating in police custody?

SK: Yes, this has always been in the past before the military coup before they put into place these decrees. There would be a lot of action filed by lawyers against the government because of conduct of government officials, even the assault conducted by police and other disciplinary courses. It only started when the decrees were put in place that we were restricted you know from filing legal action against the government. But that was always what we would do in the past, when there was no restriction put in place.