Initial Electoral Success
FLP faced its first electoral test in municipal elections held three months later, when it won control of the Suva City Council and its candidate, Bob Kumar was elected Lord Mayor. It also won seats on the Labasa, Nadi, and Ba Town Councils, and subsequently secured a seat on the Lautoka City Council at a by-election.
FLP's main test as a national political force came during the by-election for the North Central Indian National Seat in December 1985, following the resignation of Vijay R. Singh. FLP decised to field Mahendra Chaudhry, who was also the general secretary of the National Farmers Union as its candidate. The NFP candidate was former Alliance Minister, James Shankar Singh and the Alliance candidate was Uday Singh. Whereas, both the Alliance and NFP again used race as an issue, Labour campaigned on policies. The result of the election was: Uday Singh, 7848 votes; Mahendra Chaudhry, 7644 votes and James Shankar Singh 5003 votes. Despite Chaudhry's narrow loss, Labour was considered to have done well.
In June 1986, NFP-elected MP, Satendra Nandan joined the FLP. One month later, he was joined by Davendra Singh, of the NFP Youth Wing, who had defeated the official NFP candidate in an earlier by-election and Jay Raj Singh, another NFP-elected MP.
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