GOVERNMENTS frequently use commissions of inquiry as tactical instruments to deflect immediate political heat and delay difficult decisions during intense media storms, says former Tonga Chief Justice and Fiji High Court judge Michael Scott.
Addressing the Fiji Law Society Annual Convention in Nadi last week, Mr Scott said that inquiries were often announced not out of a genuine imperative to solve national crises, but as a convenient strategy to neutralise negative headlines by assigning controversial matters to a formal panel; authorities effectively park the issue out of the public eye.
Mr Scott said that by the time an inquiry eventually concludes and publishes its findings, public outrage has typically waned.
This delay allows administration officials to sidestep accountability, rendering the inquiry process a political delay tactic rather than a genuine tool for administrative reform and transparency.
“Sometimes, secondly, commissions of inquiry are resorted to by governments not because there’s really a major matter of national importance, but because there’s been a bit of a political furore that’s built up,” he said.
“They think, ‘Oh, what on earth can we do, let’s kick it down the road to have a commission of inquiry, and then perhaps by the time that commission has reported, everybody will have forgotten about it’.”
