Ganilau was an outspoken but moderate chief and politician, who opposed the divisive and inflammatory statements of political leaders. He was an idealist in many respects with a vision for a united, multicultural Fiji. Perhaps his greatest error as a politician lay in his underestimation of the strength and persistence of ethnic politics in Fiji. In opposition,
Laisenia Qarase, advocated for policies to benefit indigenous Fijians, who are the majority population compared to the ethnic Indian minority.
Reconciliation, Tolerance, and Unity Bill Ganilau spoke against the plans of the Qarase government to establish a
Reconciliation and Unity Commission, with the power to grant amnesty to perpetrators of the 2000 coup and compensation to its victims. Ganilau first aired his opposition to the bill on 4 May 2005, saying that it was an unwarranted interference in the judicial process and represented a naïve and uncaring attitude to people who had suffered as a result of the coup. On 18 May he went further, saying that he saw
"nothing reconciliatory about the bill" and that
"To use the word reconciliation is a gross violation of the rights of everyone in this nation." On 16 June, Ganilau continued his attack on the legislation. He said that there was a widespread belief in Fiji that it was designed to provide for the freeing of coup perpetrators, a belief supported by the
Tui Vaturova, Ratu Ilisoni Rokotuibua who said early in June that it would allow members of the
Counter Revolutionary Warfare Unit, who had been jailed for
mutiny, to be released. Having built up such expectations, Ganilau said, the government had better be prepared for a strong backlash if they are not fulfilled. He criticised Qarase for expecting the people, as ordinary mortals, to do as only God could do by legislating forgiveness and freeing people from the consequences of their actions. On 23 June, Ganilau accused the Prime Minister of having committed a
"monumental deception" by asking church leaders to support the legislation without honestly explaining its real purpose to them. He was reacting to revelations from
Roman Catholic Archbishop Petero Mataca and other church leaders that at a meeting with the Prime Minister on 2 May, they had been told of the reconciliation and compensation provisions of the legislation, but not about its amnesty provisions.
"It does not say much about the credibility of the Prime Minister for him to be saying publicly that the Christian churches support the bill after these deliberate acts of deception." Ganilau said. He called on churches to join with other religions to put together an alternative blueprint to the government's reconciliation proposals.
Law and order, moral values Speaking at the
Crime Prevention/Reconciliation Sports Day in
Flagstaff on 4 June 2005, Ganilau called on the older generation to instill basic moral values in their children.
"Increasing lawlessness and criminal activity can be interpreted as discourteous behaviour and lack of respect for other people and their property. So what we need to do if we want to salvage the situation is to go back to the basics," he said. The same day, he strongly criticised the country's leadership, saying that they were taking Fiji in the wrong direction,
"spreading their gospel of fear and hate and not doing anything to help the ordinary people put bread on their table for their families." He warned against retaliation, however:
"I believe we must not fight fire with fire, we will be burnt." The only way extremist ethno-nationalists could be stopped from destroying the nation, he said, was to deny them the opportunity to control the destiny of the nation. This was seen as an oblique reference to the ethno-nationalists in Qarase's cabinet. He also called on people to respect one another, saying that it was the only way for lasting unity and reconciliation. At the 80th birthday celebration of
Satya Sai Baba at
Lautoka's Girmit Centre on 23 November 2005, Ganilau called for more religious programs to promote morality in private and public life. Most politicians were selfish and lacked moral values, he claimed. Teaching young people good values at home and at school would be "useless" if adults and political leaders were doing what children were taught not to do, he declared. He said that the country had strayed from spiritual values and had lost its way, with bribery, extortion, misuse of public funds, abuse of office, and racism having become common place at all levels of government. He claimed that the number of beggars and unschooled children was increasing while politicians were engaged in "egotistical pursuits." In the same address, Ganilau also declared that all religions have the same essential teaching about the unity of divinity and the cultivation of universal love, and condemned those he considered responsible for creating "confusion" and "chaos" by "fragmenting divinity".
"How often have we seen the bigotry of the religious fanaticisms and intolerance that have occurred in Fiji?" he asked.
"Temples have been desecrated, places of worship are destroyed, all in the prejudice view that one religion is the true one and others are not." Ethnic relations Ganilau was a guest speaker at the
Lautoka conference of the
Fiji Labour Party, with which his own party subsequently formed a
coalition to contest the
general election scheduled for 2006, on 30 July 2005. Calling for changes in the attitudes of
indigenous Fijians to allow everyone born in Fiji to be classified as "Fijian," he said that the country could not afford to remain fragmented and polarised on racial lines, and that racially based measures enacted by the present government were shortening the fuse on a time bomb.
"Government seems unaware that the more race-based measures it tries to put in place the faster that time bomb burns to detonation point," Ganilau said. He said that until
Fiji Islanders got out of their ethnic boxes and embraced
multiculturalism, Fiji's future as a nation would not be secure. He expressed disbelief that after a century and a quarter of sharing the land, the level of cultural interaction between the major racial groups was so low. Speaking at the launch in
Rakiraki of his own party's campaign for the 2006 election on 6 August 2005, Ganilau said that the future of the nation's children would not be secure unless the people freed themselves from what he called
"the comfort zone of our race." He said it was important to break down the imaginary ethnic wall separating the people.
"We should not allow ourselves, individually or our ethnic communities to become easy tools for politics of race that will continue to segregate us mentally and emotionally," he said. He strongly criticised recent moves to form
an ethnic Fijian electoral block, saying that would be divisive and would never lead to national unity. He accused "unscrupulous politicians" of promoting racially divided visions for Fiji. He continued his attack on racially divisive politics with a number of speeches and interviews in the last week of August. He condemned
Senator Apisai Tora for saying that indigenous Fijians would not accept a non-indigenous Prime Minister, and charged the government with fostering ethnic tensions to distract the public from its own "non-performance". He also accused the government of handling its relations with Opposition parties in a
"crude and amateurish way" which prevented any cross-party agreement on
land reform, necessary for obtaining the two-thirds parliamentary majority for amending the
Constitution. This would create a mess for the next government to clean up after the
2006 election, Ganilau said on 27 August.
Chiefs and the political order On 4 September, Ganilau strongly criticised Prime Minister Qarase for comments made at the
Commonwealth Parliamentary Association in
Nadi on 29 August. Qarase had said that while Fiji "accepted" western-style democracy, it was an alien concept and certain aspects of it clashed with
Fijian traditions, in which
chiefs were at the apex by virtue of their birth and rank. Ganilau ridiculed Qarase's speech, saying that Fiji's political and judicial institutions were firmly rooted in western democracy and that the Fijian people should not be "misled" by the Prime Minister's claims that democracy was alien to the country.
"Mr Qarase should answer whether he wants the western system of governance which allows him to be Prime Minister, or the Fijian tradition which requires the chiefs to rule by virtue of their birthright and rank. Otherwise, he is just being hypocritical to save face," Ganilau said. Ganilau spoke out on 16 September to dismiss claims that most of Fiji's problems were being caused by the "disrespect" of Indo-Fijians and other non-indigenous communities towards the country's chiefs. Making a
parliamentary submission on controversial Unity Bill,
Masi Kaumaitotoya had declared that the jailing of chiefs on coup-related offences was a clear sign of disrespect, and that indigenous Fijians were being taken advantage of by others. In response, Ganilau said as the former
Chairman of the Great Council of Chiefs that he believed that the chiefs were well respected by all communities. He also called on his fellow chiefs to play a greater role in promoting national unity by serving all citizens in their district or confederacy, regardless of race. Chiefs who had participated in the 2000 coup should not get preferential treatment, he added.
The AIDS crisis There was a spike in AIDS cases in Fiji, jumping from only 10 cases in the year 2000 to 111 in 2003, with indigenous Fijians making up 80% of cases. Ganilau signed an agreement with the UN AIDS Pacific in 2004, and planned follow up meetings to determine how to combat the spread of the virus. Fiji's Great Council of Chiefs hosted a week-long workshop called 'Accelerating Action Against Aids in the Pacific' that was also sponsored by UNAIDS. Speaking at the Pan Pacific HIV/AIDS Conference in
Auckland, New Zealand in late October 2005, Ganilau called for strong leadership to confront HIV/AIDS, saying that it was a global war which threatened the very future of Pacific Islands nations.
"We can only ignore this battle at the cost of being regarded by future generations of Pacific Islanders as lacking the will, the foresight, the understanding to tackle this issue, which threatens our very future," he told the delegates.
Criticism of affirmative action Launching the
Lautoka branch of his party on 24 November 2005, Ganilau said that
affirmative action in favour of indigenous Fijians had not benefited ordinary Fijians, but had served only to facilitate the survival of the government in power and acted as a cover-up for the lack of effective policies. Instead of affirmative action, he said, the government should do more to assist Fijian landowners to develop their land commercially, and to improve educational and economic opportunities for ordinary people.
The politicisation of the military In an interview with Australian
ABC Television's
Asia Pacific Focus programme on 27 November 2005, Ganilau regretted the way the military had become politicised since the
1987 coups. People including former failed politicians with no military training whatsoever were rewarded for their political support of Rabuka by being commissioned as officers. These included senior NCOs who were promoted beyond their competence to commissioned rank thus leaving a yawning gap at the NCO level that resulted in a loss of capability. The high standards of professionalism of the Fijian military was seriously compromised. Its reputation as an apolitical professional military organisation was in tatters. It would take several years, he said, before the military could regain its professional standards and the respect it previously enjoyed from the community. ==2006 election==