THE Commonwealth Secretariat is delighted that Fiji is again a full and active member of the Commonwealth and it believes the relationship would continue to grow in the years to come.

Reflecting on the journey that Fiji had been through since the 2006 coup and the subsequent suspension, Simon Gimson, the secretariat’s director political division, said every Commonwealth country had its own history.

“Every country has its own national circumstances and its own national journey,” Mr Gimson said.

“Fiji has had its own journey concluding in recent years and we fully respect that and we fully embrace it as being part of Fiji’s narrative and being part of Fiji’s life story.

“And similarly every other Commonwealth country in the world has its own story and we don’t seek to preach and we don’t seek to be preached at.

“What we do seek to do is to exchange benefits.”

Mr Gimson made the comments in an interview during the opening of the Pacific Electoral Networks meeting in Nadi.

He said although the secretariat was not invited to observe the 2014 elections in Fiji, they were honoured to be invited to be part of the meeting where they would have a lot to contribute.

“We weren’t present in Fiji during its last elections as observers. There was a multi-lateral observer group, but the Commonwealth wasn’t invited to observe and didn’t have a view on that because it’s up to the country having the elections to invite us, and if they don’t, then we respect that.

“But in the case of election observations, we’ve been doing this now for several decades and we’ve done 130 since 1990.”