'Between Two Worlds': The Origins, Operation, and Future of the 2013 Fiji <i>Constitution</i>

Abstract

This article analyses the origins, practice, and prospects of the 2013 Fiji Constitution, which delivers on aspects of Brij Lal's hopes for a civilian government under a liberal democratic constitution. Yet the Constitution is also distinctly illiberal in concentrating enormous power in just two offices, and in its unusual amnesty and amendment procedures. It creates a winner-takes-all government system that grants electoral victors great powers. They are constrained mainly by the self-appointed extra-constitutional and expansive role of the RFMF as guardian of the Fijian people and the 2013 Constitution, rendering uncertain the constitutional review proposals of the new regime, elected in December 2022.