A Pacific analyst says the failure of two recent no confidence motions in the Vanuatu government does not emphasise the need for constitutional reform.
One motion was withdrawn and another ruled invalid due to their lack of support in the 52 seat parliament.
Proposed constitutional amendments would change the rules for filing no confidence motions that have defeated five Vanuatu prime ministers over the last 20 years.
Earlier this month, however, the leader of the opposition, Ishmael Kalsakau, withdrew from the committee considering the amendments citing a lack of public consultation.
While this has been previously been a tactic of delaying legislation, the analyst, Dr Tess Newton-Cain told Ben Robinson Drawbridge Mr Kalsakau's concern has basis.
Vanuatu parliament building in the capital Port Vila.
Photo: RNZI/ Walter Zweifel
Transcript
Tess Newton-Cain: The fact that they would require a referendum and the fact that Vanuatu has never had a referendum before means that public consultation is even more important because part of that consultation would have to around voter education as to what a referendum is and how it works differently from normal elections and why these particular legislative amendments require a referendum. So the fact that the process is different from normal would, in my opinion, mean that you would need more consultation not less.
Ben Robinson Drawbridge: The proposed amendments also include changes to the way political parties contest the elections and it's been suggested that perhaps this may mean smaller parties are unable to stand. Do you think the oppostion is worried about their own members and their own position in parliament if these changes went through?
TNC: All of the parties in Vanuatu, with the exception of one, over the last few election cycles, we've seen their numbers of MPs decrease rather than increase. That's partly a product of a lot of fracturing of parties. A lot of the parties in Vanuatu are splinter groups from previous parties. Obviously this has led to a certain amount of instability. It means that we constantly have coalition governments and we're not the only country that's dealing with that. It would be a matter of concern for the opposition, but there are certainly parties who are represented in government who would be equally caught by provisions of that nature.
BRD: Given that we've seen two failed no confidence motions in the last two or three weeks does that demonstrate to you the need for these reforms?
TNC: The reforms go further than simply limiting or changing the ways in which a motion of no confidence can be put forward and certainly I don't think there is any appetite for removing that lever. It's part of the democratic process. They were an attempt to capitalise on what is an apparent concern among certain backbenchers that they are not being sufficiently included in government decision making. It would certainly appear that some of that concern, if not all of it, but some of it certainly is valid. One thing that we saw differently over the last month, is that on both occasion when the motion was lodged, previously parliament has come to a stop and everybody has gone off to camps to have secret conversations. That didn't happen this time. The business of parliament continued which meant that the budget was passed and other quite important pieces of legislation were passed. That should be seen as being a positive development of what's happened in the last month. Parliament has actually managed to get quite a lot of important things done, including most importantly passing the budget.
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