Fiji chiefs back Mara

By P. S. Suryanarayana

JAKARTA, MAY 23. Fiji's Great Council of Chiefs today supported the President in his standoff with the self-styled leader of the ``civil coup''. But the elders of the majority indigenous people, acting as the final arbiters of the country's political future, stopped well short of propping up the besieged Prime Minister belonging to the minority ethnic Indian group.

Although no final decision was announced by the Great Council of Chiefs, which met near the capital, Suva, today, it became clear that the Prime Minister, Mr. Mahendra Pal Chaudhry, was being marginalised. As a result, a battle of wits began between the tribal elders and the ``coup'' leader, Mr. George Speight, who did not also free Mr. Chaudhry for yet another day.

The continued captivity of Mr. Chaudhry was frowned upon by the elders and his release insisted upon. Mr. Speight today freed two hostages on grounds of their deteriorating health in captivity. (An AP report from Suva said four captives had been released).

The Council, it was said, would resume its deliberations tomorrow to try and solve the crisis that was sparked by Mr. Speight's action last Friday of taking the Prime Minister and several of his colleagues hostage in the Parliament building.

Speaking on behalf of the Council, Gen. Sitiveni Rabuka, a former coup leader and an erstwhile Prime Minister, indicated that today's deliberations spanned the political-moral question of how to set right a suspected wrong.

Gen. Rabuka said the tribal chiefs ``do not approve of what Mr. Speight has done''. The elders could not bring themselves to support Mr. Speight, despite the signs of an emerging new groundswell of support among the majority population for his political agenda. In the event, the caucus of elders threw their lot with the President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, and endorsed his attempt to engage the rebels led by Mr. Speight to fashion a settlement.

While the elders were still grappling with ways to engage Mr. Speight, who called once again for a political order that ``enshrines indigenous supremacy'' in Fiji, the businessman- turned-rebel said he would be willing to ``depart'' from the scene, if the tribal chiefs were to ask him to do so and if such a demand were acceptable to the people behind him. On the prime issue of his ``coup'' agenda, Mr. Speight said the assertion of ``indigenous supremacy'' could be followed by the delineation of a ``defined role'' for ``the other ethnic groups of Fiji''.

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