Wednesday 10th June 2020
At about 5.30pm on Tuesday 9 June 2020, five Police officers came to NFP headquarters at Tamavua, Suva, with a search warrant.
The search warrant was shown to NFP President Pio Tikoduadua but he was not given a copy. The Police refused to allow party workers to photocopy or photograph it. So we do not know of what crime the party is suspected of.
One of the Police officers claimed that NFP was paying a person to make anti-government allegations on social media.
First, this is false. NFP does not pay anyone to make social media posts on any social media platform except official NFP social media sites.
Second, we still do not know what is the crime alleged. Has it now become a crime to criticise the Government?
The person of interest to Police came to NFP’s Lautoka office offering to help some of our Western based candidates during the November 2018 election campaign. He was not a party employee, nor was he paid for any work he did.
After the elections, our Western officials learned that the individual was a person wanted by Police.
We do not know why this person has suddenly come to the attention of the Police now.
NFP has previously been targeted by “fake news” websites which appeared during the election campaign and then disappeared after it was over. We do not know who has been responsible for these activities.
The Police need to explain to the people of Fiji why, on some wild allegation by one person, they believe they should raid the office of a political party.
What is happening to our basic political rights?
Authorised by: -
Professor Biman Prasad
Leader