Documents alleged to be part of the Commission of Inquiry (COI) report into the appointment of FICAC Commissioner Barbara Malimali claim that a number of Government officials involved in her appointment knew Ms Malimali was the subject of complaints to FICAC.
The documents claim that “everyone including the SG (Solicitor-General Ropate Greene), CR (Chief Registrar Tomasi Bainivalu), and the CJ (Chief Justice Salesi Temo) denied any knowledge of the FICAC Malimali complaint and investigation.
However, they say, “the evidence shows that they all knew, or ought to have known”.
“The SG knew about the investigation, including that it was for an abuse of office allegation,” the documents say.
“The CR and SG also knew that Ms Forwood (social media activist Alexandra Forwood, who allegedly complained about Ms Malimali) had lodged complaints against both of them at FICAC.”
This, the documents say, posed a “conflict of interest” because both the CR and the SG “had an interest in getting Ms Malimali into the FICAC Commissioner position, in the hope that she would “shut down their cases”.
The documents say that the two men should not have been involved in the appointment process.
They also question the pace of the Judicial Services Commission’s process, suggesting that had it not been rushed, concerns regarding Ms Malimali’s appointment and ongoing investigations could have been uncovered.
“Overall, the entire appointment process was not conducted with integrity, fairness or transparency,” the documents say.
They further note that “with the exception of the attempts of the PM and the President, no one questioned whether it was acceptable for a suspect in a case to be appointed as head of the very institution that was investigating her for abuse of office.”
At the time of publication, none of the named individuals had commented publicly on the allegations.
The authenticity of the leaked report has not been independently verified.
