'Criminal' on a warrior mission

By TONY WALL in Suva

Coup leader George Speight has been dismissed by many Fijians, including his own stepmother, as nothing but a criminal holding the country to ransom.

Speight, a supremely confident - some would say arrogant - part-European with a string of shady business dealings in his murky past, does not appear to have the support of the man in the street, and has a tenuous hold on power.

Since the siege began, Speight has revelled in the attention of the world's media.

He has held long press conferences, at which he asked journalists their names and chatted casually, and has also wandered out of the parliamentary compound to mix with a small band of his supporters, once drinking kava with them about 5 am.

While Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry has collapsed at least once from exhaustion, Speight remains calm, impeccably groomed and seemingly unaffected by the rigours of the hostage drama, which began on Friday morning.

When he and his band of thugs, as stepmother Lani Speight described them, stormed Parliament, many stunned Fijians were asking, "George who?"

"A son of Fiji" prepared to die for his cause, came the answer from the man himself.

Certainly he has an impressive Fijian pedigree to go with his European heritage. He comes from a long line of wealthy Fijian landowners, and his grandmother is a member of the respected Waimaro clan, traditional warriors of the village of Bau.

His father, Sam, is an MP who left Parliament House shortly after the hostage drama began.

But not everyone accepts Speight's claim to be a son of Fiji.

Ben Padarath, son of Social Welfare Minister Lavinia Padarath, who is one of the hostages, said Speight could not even speak the language.

"And if he's a warrior for the indigenous Fijians why does he want to dissolve the Great Council of Chiefs, the highest house in the land?"

Indeed, many are asking whether George Speight is a warrior hero or a self-centred fraud.

He returned to Fiji four years ago after studying and working in the United States and Australia for many years.

He has a wife and three children living in Brisbane, and a girlfriend and fourth child in Suva.

Aged 43, he studied commerce in Australia and the United States, and also served in the Fijian Army, say people who claim to know him.

He came to some prominence in Australia in the early 1980s after the Wattle Group, an Australian investment company of which he was a director, was accused of unfair dealings with investors and was eventually wound up.

On his return to Fiji, he went into insurance broking and under the Government of 1987 coup leader Sitiveni Rabuka was appointed head of the state-owned Fiji Hardwood Company.

Mr Chaudhry sacked him soon after the Labour Party won last year's general election.

The Fiji Times reported that Speight was an undischarged bankrupt who had pleaded not guilty to exchange rate charges and extortion when he appeared in the High Court in Suva last Monday.

It also alleged he was a director of an Australian investment company that siphoned millions from Australian and Fiji citizens' life savings.

Speight stormed Parliament with seven gunmen armed with a variety of weapons, including Israeli-made Uzi submachine guns, Russian AK-47s and American M16s.

It is thought his men are soldiers, perhaps from a single unit of the Fiji military. But it is clear the rest of the military does not support him.

That the rebels have at least one Uzi suggests they may have links to the disbanded Counter Revolutionary Warfare Unit - similar to the British SAS - as that was the only unit issued with Uzis.

Crates have been trucked into the compound at night and it has been suggested they contained more weapons.

In an exclusive interview with the Herald, Lani Speight said she was disgusted with her stepson's actions.

"George is doing this with a gang of thugs," she said. "I fear for the safety of the nation and all the people. I support [President} Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara - whatever is happening now is a criminal act by George Speight."

Mrs Speight said her husband felt the same way as she about their son's actions, and had gone into hiding to escape the pressures.

The acting editor of the Fiji Times, Netani Rika, said Speight was an unknown quantity, and he did not believe he had much support.

Mr Rika said many indigenous Fijians supported the principle of self-determination, but did not condone a violent takeover of government.