People's National Party (Fiji) - Party History

Party History

The history of the PNP is representative of the many complex about-turns of Fijian politics: it was formed by a merger of the Party of National Unity (PANU) and the Protector of Fiji (BKV), which were both formally deregistered on 23 August 2005. Both parties drew most of their support from Ba Province, and one of their stated goals in uniting was to give the people of Ba a single party to represent their interests in the political arena.

The merger soon began to unravel. On 25 November 2005, Senator Ponipate Lesavua announced that he would play a role in an attempt to revive and reregister the defunct PANU, on the basis of what he said was public demand. The Fiji Times reported on 11 January 2006 that the party had been reregistered. In another development, Lesavua said on 23 January that the BKV had also seceded from the PNP and had signed an agreement to merge with PANU.

In a further twist to the saga, the PNP, the BKV, and PANU decided on 5 March to re-merge, this time under the PANU banner, with Ratu Sairusi Nagagavoka, the Tui Ba (Paramount Chief of Ba), as its leader. On 2 March, Fiji Live revealed that officials of the PNP and PANU had met over the weekend at the village of Sorokoba, Ba, to formalize a merger of their two parties. He also told Fiji Television that he hoped the Grand Coalition would understand the reasons for the merger. "In politics there are no permanent enemies and no permanent friends but we hope they understand and they will be informed of the move," he said. He cited concern at the merger of the United Fiji Party (SDL) with the nationalistic Conservative Alliance (CAMV) as a factor in the decision.

Meli Bogileka, a former Cabinet Minister, was General Secretary of the PNP at the time of its dissolution. He announced on 7 March that a letter would be sent to the Grand Coalition Initiative Group, an alliance of ethnic Fijian parties to which the PNP had belonged, informing them that the party no longer existed.