FijiFirst member of Parliament (MP) Faiyaz Koya says Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka has gone “completely against Parliament” when he showed support for Japan’s plans to discharge treated wastewater from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station into the Pacific Ocean.
He said a motion made by Deputy Prime Minister Manoa Kamikamica in Parliament to support the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) leaders desire to secure the Pacific Ocean and protect its resources was unanimously agreed to by all MPs in a Parliament sitting on April 5, 2023.
While delivering his motion, Mr Kamikamica said the Pacific Ocean should not be seen as an easy and convenient dumping ground for unwanted and dangerous material and waste that other bigger nations produce and would not be used in the ecosystem.
Nine MPs from both sides of the House spoke on and unanimously supported the motion.
“That motion was fervently and passionately supported by the whole of Parliament, so Parliament agreed to condemn this particular issue with respect to the release of nuclear wastewater into the Pacific Ocean,” Mr Koya said.
“It should be of grave concern that the institutional integrity is once again being questioned, that the honourable Prime Minister has unilaterally decided that he’s going to go completely against what was decided in Parliament.
“You have a Parliament that’s represented by 55 MPs, unanimously agreed that we should condemn this and the Prime Minister on his own goes and does this.
“I’m not sure who advised this.”
He said the Government had made a number of commitments and obligations over the years on climate change, environment and the protection of our oceans and the Treaty of Rarotonga was one such obligation.
He said the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) report should not be taken as the “gospel truth” and that Mr Rabuka’s failure to engage civil society organisations (CSOs) with regards to the matter contradicted what Government said it stood for.
“The current Government has spoken about civil society engagements, honourable Biman Prasad spoke about civil engagement with respect to a lot of things that they were actually going to do, and in your own newspaper today (yesterday), civil society has actually condemned what the honourable Prime Minister has done.
“We actually support what the civil society has done, that you can’t just decide this, this requires civil society engagement, where is it now? Has the Prime Minister forgotten that he’s committed to civil society engagement?”
Speaking to The Fiji Times on Monday, Mr Rabuka said that he stood by his decision even if he was blamed for it.
