KEY POINTS:
For sanctions of any kind to be effective, they must have a meaningful impact. If they are trivial or ineffectual, an illegal regime has reason to see them as, at worst, a slap on the wrist, or, at best, something verging on recognition of its legitimacy. Such is even more the case when more hard-hitting sanctions could have been applied. A ban, for example, on Fiji playing in next February's Wellington sevens rugby tournament.
New Zealand has reacted to Commodore Frank Bainimarama's deposing of a democratically elected Government in Fiji by, among other things, banning Fijian sports teams and sportspeople from playing here - except where international sporting and legal obligations require otherwise. That exception provides an exemption for Fiji's sevens side, that country's most inspirational sporting team. The Government says it has no option when New Zealand is the host of an international sporting tournament which requires acceptance of international participants, and that a sevens ban would punish this country, not Fiji.
The first explanation amounts to a recourse to technicalities; the second is nonsensical. The Government was quite happy to refuse visas to the Zimbabwe cricket team last year, even though its tour was under the auspices of the International Cricket Council and flew in the face of contractual obligations stipulated by that body. It paid compensation to New Zealand Cricket, and could do the same now to the rugby union.
There are good reasons why this should happen. For all Helen Clark's exhortations to the Fijian people to make a stand against the coup, the only real voices of protest have come from the deposed Government, church leaders and some senior public servants. The Prime Minister may comfort herself that these objections mean things have not gone totally to plan for Commodore Bainimarama, but the fact remains that the military is firmly in control. The Fijian people, perhaps inured by this fourth coup or putsch in two decades, have taken a largely fatalistic approach. There have been no mass demonstrations, and no protest strikes or stopworks - events that might just have led the military forces to reassess their action.
It could be that a popular reaction will be stirred only if Fijians are deprived of something that is of great value to them. So far, in sporting terms at least, that has not happened. Fiji's sevens team was able to go about its winning ways even after the 2000 coup. The time has come for a gesture that will demonstrate to the Fijian people just how seriously the international community takes the ongoing flagrant abuses of democracy. There is no better target than the flag-bearing sevens team. Fijians, military and civilian alike, might come to recognise that matters have become utterly unacceptable to the outside world.
The Government does not have to look far to see that this approach works. Many of its leading lights were vigorously opposed to the 1981 Springbok tour. While they could not stop that tour, the disruptive activities of demonstrators brought home to many white South Africans the extent and ardour of the international opposition to apartheid. For the first time, they questioned the model and morality of their system of Government.
New Zealand can make a similar statement now to the people of a country that is rapidly acquiring an invidious reputation. The international community can do only so much to curb the undemocratic tendencies of Fiji's military forces. Part of the remedy lies in the attitude of the Fijian people. Removing their most prized sporting team from the international stage would be an appropriate wake-up call.
