4 Mar 2014

Fiji parliament to relocate

7:26 am on 4 March 2014

The Fiji government is returning the country's parliament to its original site near the centre of Suva.

The legislature, due to resume sitting for the first time in eight years after an election planned for September, will return to the colonial style Government Buildings.

In 1987 the building was stormed by the then Fiji army colonel Sitiveni Rabuka beginning the first of the four coups the country experienced over the subsequent 19 years.

In the early 1990s a new complex that dramatically reflected Fiji culture was built at Veiuto near the Domain in Suva.

Our correspondent in Suva, Ricardo Morris, says the government has explained it wants to improve public access to parliament.

"There is no doubt that it will be easier for members of the public to just walk in off the road and listen to proceedings because already the site of the Magistrates, the High Court and all of the other courts in Suva so it is already quite a busy and popular location."

Ricardo Morris in Suva.