Through Dr Lal's refreshingly clear and powerful prose and sharply observed stories, we enter the inner world of Indo-Fijian feeling and aspiration. One universal that emerges with particular clarity in the Indo-Fijian experience is the ceaseless struggle to find community in a changing world, balancing the beauty of ritual and tradition against the transcendent value of education and modern rationality. The volume poses the question of how people draw upon historical memory and immediate circumstances to create a social world, and how that world can be shared with others in multicultural society. The answer seems to lie somewhere between history and poetry, as in Dr Lal's 'factions.' Andrew Arno University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu
Professor Lal has been remarkably successful in combining scholarship with autobiography in Mr Tulsi's Store. In the essays which cover the author's childhood
"It is a milestone in subaltern studies, a biographical journey penned by a living relic of the indentured experience and a scholar whose thoroughly interdisciplinary approach is a good example for the anthropologist, the sociologist or the economist who wish to see the proper integration of their disciplines in a major historical work." Brinsley Samaroo, University of the West Indies, St Augustine Campus, Trinidad
"Professor Lal has made a most distinguished contribution to scholarship on Indian indentured labour in Fiji. His research is characterised by the use of new methodological approaches to the study of history, and by a comprehensive consideration of both quantitative and literary sources. In beautifully written articles, he has arrived at fresh and novel findings." Ralph Shlomowitz, Flinders University of South Australia
"Professor Lal has produced a body of work which makes him the premier scholar of the Indian diaspora. His meticulous research, the depth of scholarship, the empathy, and the elegance have earned him great respect among Indian diaspora scholars. The themes covered in this book are relevant to other overseas Indian communities; and they are handled with such mastery that his reputation is secured." Clem Seecharan, University of North London
"Brij Lal's Chalo Jahaji is an intensely personal journey through his life and that of the 60,000 Indians who became girmitiyas in Fiji. The intricate history is measured, but Lal reveals himself and his family in a way historians seldom do. This proud grandson of a girmitiya is equally a proud son of Fiji. Chalo Jahaji is Pacific history at its best: rigorous and critical, informative and involved." Clive Moore, University of Queensland
"A wonderfully rich, insightful and personally touching collection of essays by the Pacific region's most prolific and engaging historian. Brij Lal writes eloquently
A racially-weighted Constitution, promulgated by decree in 1990, divided the country and invited international condemnation, and the economy suffered from the collapse of institutions of good governance. In 1995, an independent Constitution Review Commision appointed by the Fijian parliament, recommended wide-ranging changes to the Constitution. Its report formed the basis of a new Constitution promulgated, after wide-ranging consultation and debate, in 1997. Two years later, Fiji held a general election under it. This collection of essays looks at the politics and dynamics of that momentous event, and the role of key individuals and institutions in producing an outcome that, a year later, plunged Fiji into its first major crisis of the twenty-first century. The essays look at some of the key political and development issues on the eve of the crisis, but the relevance to the current debates about the nature and meaning of politics in Fiji remains. All the contributors are recognised and longstanding specialists in their fields.
This collection of the writings and speeches of one of Fiji's greatest statesmen, the late Mr AD Patel, points to a different future which, if allowed to come to fruition, would have spared Fiji the fate it later encountered in its postcolonial journey. As a leader, Mr Patel was unmatchable in intellect and oratorical brilliance, glimpses of which we see in this volume. Dr Lal deserves to be congratulated for his patience and perseverance in completing this project. This book will find an honoured place among others on Fiji's complex and contested modern history.
"Dr Lal's book is more than an eloquent account of the political struggle of one of Fiji's outstanding leaders. It is a timely reminder that the process of constitutional change hangs in the balance, as it did at the time of Mr Patel's death. I hope his example will inspire future generations in Fiji to realise the vision articulated by a brilliant and courageous advocate of democracy, and a loyal son of Fiji." Late Adi Kuini Bavadra
To read this evocative book is to be thrust into a Fiji that has, for the moment, been snuffed out by military might: a Fiji of political parties, parliamentary politics, elections, manifestoes, campaigns, democractic defence of interests, party manoeuvres, and constitutional protection of rights and freedoms. It is a comprehensive and eloquent re-telling of the story of Fiji politics from independence in 1970 to 1999 through the perspective of Fiji's greatest living statesman, Jai Ram Reddy, by one of the world's most distinguished scholars of its history and politics.
A Time Bomb Lies Buried discusses the debates which took place in Suva and London as well as the politics and processes which led Fiji to independence in 1970 after 96 years of colonial rule. It provides an essential background to understanding the crises and convulsions which have haunted Fiji ever since in its search for a constitutional settlement for its multiethnic population.
This book aims to reflect on the experiential side of writing political lives in the Pacific region. The collection touches on aspects of the life writing art that are particularly pertinent to political figures: public perception and ideology; identifying important political successes and policy initiatives; grappling with issues like corruption and age-old political science questions about leadership and 'dirty hands'. These are general themes but they take on a particular significance in the Pacific context and so the contributions explore these themes in relation to patterns of colonisation and the memory of independence; issues elliptically captured by terms like 'culture' and 'tradition'; the nature of 'self' presented in Pacific life writing; and the tendency for many of these texts to be written by 'outsiders', or at least the increasingly contested nature of what that term means.
Elections can increase tension in ethnically divided societies, like Fiji. The way constituencies are drawn and votes counted can also affect the result. First-past-the post can deliver lopsided results, while proportional representation may give excessive influence to small, fringe parties. Fiji's Constitution Review Commission believed a system of alternative voting in ethnically mixed constituencies would encourage politicians, and parties, to take into account the interests of other ethnic groups. This book assesses their recommendations, looks at alternatives, and considers how they might work in Fiji.
How are Pacific lives imagined, written and read? How are they refracted through prisms of process? From legends about culture heroes to biographies of national leaders, from tales of ancestors to stories of contemporary men and women, from lives told of both the famous and the nameless, this collection of essays — by historians and anthropologists, Islanders and Island scholars — probes questions of personhood, identity, memory, and time across the sweep of the Pacific, as well as practical issues of research and writing.
May 19, 2000. Fiji's democratically elected multiracial government is hijacked by a group of armed gunmen led by George Speight, and held hostage for fifty days. Suva, the capital, is torched and looted as Speight's supporters gather on the lawns of the parliamentary complex, dancing, cooking food, celebrating the purported abrogation of the constitution that brought the People's Coalition government to power. The country is plunged into darkness yet again, enduring the pain of three coups in a period of just thirteen years. The process of healing and reconciliation, symbolised by the enactment of a new Constitution, unanimously approved by Parliament and blessed by the powerful Great Council of Chiefs, lies discarded, as winds of ethnic chauvinism sweep through the countryside, damaging the fragile fabric of multiculturalism that was carefully constructed by so many over many years. The economy is on the brink of collapse, investor confidence has vanished, and the best and the brightest are seeking succour on other shores. Fiji falls victim, yet again, to the prejudice and greed of a section of its people. This book gathers together a handful of memoirs of those tragic events in Fiji. They were written while the gun was still smoking; personal, anguished reactions of people from all walks of life, concerned about a country they all love but deeply distressed by the developments there. They are first reactions. They will in time become essential building blocks for a larger interpretive framework of academic analysis about origins, processes and impacts. Straight from the heart, these memoirs will be remembered as the people of Fiji and their friends elsewhere contemplate the wreckage and ruin brought about by that act of madness in the month of May 2000.
May 19, 2000. Fiji's democratically elected multiracial government is hijacked by a group of armed gunmen led by George Speight, and held hostage for fifty days. Suva, the capital, is torched and looted as Speight's supporters gather on the lawns of the parliamentary complex, dancing, cooking food, celebrating the purported abrogation of the constitution that brought the People's Coalition government to power. The country is plunged into darkness yet again, enduring the pain of three coups in a period of just thirteen years. The process of healing and reconciliation, symbolised by the enactment of a new Constitution, unanimously approved by Parliament and blessed by the powerful Great Council of Chiefs, lies discarded, as winds of ethnic chauvinism sweep through the countryside, damaging the fragile fabric of multiculturalism that was carefully constructed by so many over many years. The economy is on the brink of collapse, investor confidence has vanished, and the best and the brightest are seeking succour on other shores. Fiji falls victim, yet again, to the prejudice and greed of a section of its people. This book gathers together a handful of memoirs of those tragic events in Fiji. They were written while the gun was still smoking; personal, anguished reactions of people from all walks of life, concerned about a country they all love but deeply distressed by the developments there. They are first reactions. They will in time become essential building blocks for a larger interpretive framework of academic analysis about origins, processes and impacts. Straight from the heart, these memoirs will be remembered as the people of Fiji and their friends elsewhere contemplate the wreckage and ruin brought about by that act of madness in the month of May 2000.
