A MEMBER of the Fiji Medical Association (FMA) has called for significant updates to the Constitution (Amendment) Bill 2026, emphasising the need to include specific protections for online safety and explicit rights for senior citizens.
Speaking at the public consultations held at the Nadi Civic Centre on October 17, Dr Ahmed Shakeel Shariff stated that while he welcomed the retention of Fijian national identity and secular state principles, several crucial areas required urgent constitutional modernisation.
Dr Shariff highlighted that digital protections must be explicitly defined within the nation’s supreme law rather than left under broad rights interpretations.
“So I’d also like to add certain points that for your reconsideration and for your team’s reconsideration and that is the addition of online safety as part of the rights and not just as an interpretation,” he said.
“There’s cyber bullying, there’s the online defamation and we are quite behind. In today’s era that needs to be properly documented and understood.”
He also urged the committee to introduce a dedicated section outlining constitutional protections for elderly Fijians to guarantee their care and dignity.
“Our older people need to have certain rights.
“Every older person has the right to live with dignity, independence, security, freedom from abuse, neglect, abandonment and exploitation.”
In addition, Dr Shariff requested the removal of ambiguous terms regarding children’s rights, arguing that undefined phrases create loopholes.
He maintained that parents must be held to higher standards in providing nurtured environments for youth.
