Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama has advised people not to listen to SODELPA leader Sitiveni Rabuka.

Mr Bainimarama said Mr Rabuka was a snake and could not be trusted.

He said  he had to repair all the damage that Mr Rabuka caused in 1987 when the country was plunged into political and economic turmoil. Mr Rabuka carried out two coups.

Mr Bainimarama said Rabuka in his years of leadership had wrecked this country.

Mr Bainimarama accused him of inciting racial hatred, particularly towards Indo-Fijians and created deep ethnic divisions.

He accused him of using the pulpit to preach his divisive politics in the name of Christianity and forgot about the people he was supposed to serve.

Mr Bainimarama said when he came in he introduced initiatives that removed racial discrimination.

He said he also took care of the poor, the needy, the elderly and the physically disabled, women and children.

Mr Bainimarama was responding to Mr Rabuka’s reference to his Government hitting the reef.

Mr Rabuka said at a SODELPA rally in Lautoka on Saturday that  was the reason why he had returned to politics to save the country.

He had heard Mr Rabuka on radio and Between the Lines had also reported it.

He said this was the same Mr Rabuka who, during his watch, saw the collapse of National Bank.

In 2000, he said, Mr Rabuka turned up at the military camp at Nabua at the height of the mutiny with his uniform on the side to take over.

Mr Bainimarama said some Dreketi people said they asked him who told him to do the coup. He said  Mr Rabuka said it was the Great Council of Chiefs.

Mr Rabuka had also said that in 1987  he wanted the Alliance Government to come back because then Prime Minister Dr Timoci Bavadra was only a figurehead amd someone else was running the Government.

He said  Mr Rabuka had made parallel statements about his leadership.

He said Mr Rabuka had told military officers  then the coup was to deal with disturbances.

“This is the old Rabuka, not the new Rabuka,” he warned.

Mr Bainimarama also warned iTaukei not to be misled by Mr Rabuka.

He said if Mr Rabuka wanted to repeat what he did in 1987, it would  not happen.

Edited by Ranoba Baoa