Fiji's Catholic bishop to be laid to rest today

Transcript

Fiji's late Catholic bishop Petero Mataca will be laid to rest today in a funeral that has already drawn many admirers to the capital to pay their respects.

Ordained in 1959, he became Fiji's first i-Taukei auxiliary bishop in 1974 and two years later was promoted to Archbishop.

He died in Suva last week after a battle with cancer, and will be buried in the crypt of the Sacred Heart Cathedral in Suva.

Alex Perrottet reports.

Archbishop Peter Loy Chong, who is Petero Mataca's successor, and took over as head of Fiji's catholics last year, says the late archbishop was at times slow in his consideration of decisions, and would test their patience, but that showed he was a responsible leader.

ARCHBISHOP LOY CHONG: He will definitely go down as one of the historical figures in this country. One because he served as the local bishop for 38 years, and he's a quiet person, he does things in a quiet way. He does not react immediately, he's a reflective person.

His time as bishop was not without controversy. Living through four coups, he tiptoed along the delicate separation between church and state, but did co-chair Frank Bainimarama's National Council for Building a Better Fiji, which produced the People's Charter in 2008. Archbishop Loy Chong says that inevitably meant he would be open to criticism.

ARCHBISHOP LOY CHONG: He really thought he had what it takes to help government, but you know, you'd expect that anybody who supports government would be considered as supporting an illegal government so that kind of move opened himself to that critique.

Before the 2006 coup, Archbishop Mataca had criticised Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase for misleading church leaders in his efforts to get them to support his reconciliation bill for the perpetrators of the 2000 coup. He said at the time that the coup culture could only be solved by truth and reconciliation, and the overthrow of a democratically elected government was a serious crime. But at the time of the coup, he refused to sign a statement by the Assembly of Christian Churches and the Fiji Council of Churches that said the military actions were "manifestations of darkness and evil." The General Secretary of the Methodist Church, Reverend Tevita Banivanua, says the late bishop was a promoter of peace, and offered an olive branch when the Methodists were under fire for their relationship with the past SDL government.

REVEREND TEVITA BANIVANUA: He came with his priests to our office and we talked about a few things and his priests sat with our other ministers and they talked themselves and we created a very fine atmosphere of working together. I really admire the way he went about doing his work.

A battle with cancer meant he never realised his final wish to return to the village of Vuaki and spend his time fishing. A funeral mass will be held today in Suva, with Archbishop Peter Loy Chong presiding, before the man, considered a pillar of the Catholic Church in Fiji, becomes the first bishop to be buried in the Cathedral's crypt.