Career
Ratu Madraiwiwi has a Law degree from the University of Adelaide, Australia, and a Masters degree in Law from McGill University, Canada. After working for the Attorney-General from 1983 to 1991, he went on to serve as a permanent arbitrator until 1997, when he was appointed as a judge of the High Court. He resigned from the bench in 2000 in protest against the coup d'état that saw the elected government toppled, the constitution abrogated, and the judiciary reorganized by decree. Thereafter, he practiced law privately as a partner of Howards, besides serving as a director of Fiji Times Limited (the nation's leading newspaper) and as a trustee of the Fijian Trust Fund. He is also a human rights commissioner and former chairman of the Citizens Constitutional Forum, a pro-democracy and human rights organization. Rewa high chief Ro Jone Mataitini said the chiefs unanimously supported Ratu Madraiwiwi because of his extensive knowledge of the law and because of his great rapport with other racial and religious groups. In this regard, he was regarded as a compromise between those who insisted on reserving the Vice-Presidency for a high chief, and those (including Ratu Epeli Ganilau, the former Chairman of the Great Council of Chiefs), who believed it was time for a non-Fijian, to be appointed to the post as a gesture of goodwill to the Indo-Fijian and other minorities.
Fiji Labour Party leader and former Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry welcomed Ratu Madraiwiwi's appointment. "Ratu Joni is an eminent scholar who served Fiji with distinction in the last 20 years holding high offices. He is fully conversant with the affairs of the State and he will certainly restore dignity and decorum to the high office," Chaudhry said.
Tribal and regional factors played a part in the appointment. Fiji's tribes each belong to one of three confederacies - Kubuna, Burebasaga, and Tovata. One member of the Great Council of Chiefs explained to the media that they had understood that as President Iloilo is from Burebasaga and his predecessor, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara was from Tovata, the current Vice-President should be from Kubuna. Installed as the Roko Tui Bau on 11 November 1995, Ratu Madraiwiwi is one of the highest chiefs of the Kubuna Confederacy.
The Constitution of Fiji assigns a purely ceremonial role to the Vice-President, apart from the power to exercise the functions of the Presidency should the President be unable to perform his duties. With the 84-year-old President Iloilo suffering from ill health, the appointment to the Vice-Presidency of a respected individual who could assume the Presidency in the event of an emergency was regarded as a priority.
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