Updated: 8:13am – You must keep yourselves informed, you must carry important messages to every Fijian you represent, you must speak up, you must always speak the truth and always reject the lies.”
Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama made this statement when he opened the Tailevu Provincial Council meeting.
He said it was in this spirit of talanoa, his Government was at Nakelo.
“We are here to learn from the lessons and experiences you’ve gained and we are here to deliver for you and your people.”
Mr Bainimarama called on the members of the council to encourage all those in their communities to register to vote in the forthcoming General Election.
As someone who hails from Tailevu, he reminded them he was not only the Prime Minister of Tailevu but: “I am the Prime Minister of Fiji and I am a Prime Minister for every Fijian.”
“The Government is concerned with what happens here, and with what happens in the rest of the provinces.
“The Government is focussed on how all the regions of the country work together, as one nation, one people united towards one common goal.
“I am working to build a Fiji where all of you in Tailevu and all of our fellow Fijians across the country have an equal shot in our growing economy.
“A Fiji where your province does not determine your destiny, but where we all can make our contribution to our national life and development, and all benefit equally from our shared success,” Mr Bainimarama said.
This is a lesson in leadership and according to Mr Bainimarama. “The Opposition are so concerned with their own community politics and with getting their slice of the national cake that they lose sight of how to grow that cake big enough so that every Fijian can get their fair share.” He warned that delegates should be careful when they listened to these same politicians in the months ahead.
“We all know how they will behave. They’ll come with many of the same doomsday predictions we heard in 2014.
“They had predicted about the loss of the iTaukei land, about the bad health of our Fijian industries. Predictions he said that never happened.
“They’ll come with the same lies again. Those lies may come from some new faces, but they are lies all the same; lies designed to cause fear, designed to divide us and designed to hold us back from the greatness a united Fiji can achieve.”
-Fiji Sun
Featured image: Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama with Roko Tui Kiuva Ratu Orisi Kalau during the opening of the Tailevu Provincial Council meeting at Nakelo in Tailevu on April 26, 2018. Photo: Ronald Kumar
