A faction of SODELPA that met at the Holiday Inn Suva yesterday say they will submit the names of their new appointments to the Registrar of Political Parties, Mohameed Saneem, as early as tomorrow.

The Management Board Meeting, which was chaired via video by SODELPA’s acting president Vijay Singh, who is also the substantive vice-president, is confident that they were legally backed to convene the meeting and make new appointments.

Newly-elected acting general secretary Emele Duituturaga confirmed they had a quorum and that she had no doubt that they are the legitimate SODELPA faction.

The new appointments are Vice President Vijay Singh confirmed as Acting President, Ratu Jone Lesuma and Gina Pareti-Rawalai as the new Acting Vice Presidents, Emele Duituturaga as Acting General Secretary and Ruci Karuru as Acting Treasurer.

They will serve in their new roles until such time the Board decides to commence proceedings for substantive appointments at the next Annual General Assembly.

Speaking on behalf of the party, Ms Duituturaga said unity is paramount within SODELPA as the party aims to iron out internal issues.

“I am honoured. I also know it is a huge responsibility as you are aware the party is facing challenges. We know that there is a lot of support for SODELPA but there is a lot of work to be done within the party. I am excited and positive about it and up to the role, the task,” she said to the media.

“We are living in times when we all have to rise above a lot of the issues and challenges. A lot of our people have no jobs, families have no food, and children are very much in need.”

“One of the major concerns that have been raised this morning is the regularisation of SODELPA’s constitution and that is an important place to start.”

Reactivating and strengthening the party’s Finance Committee, Human Resource Committee and Fundraising Committee were agreed to in an effort to increase the involvement of party members in the day to day running of the party.

“It’s not a long time to the next election and every political party will be thinking about that, it’s very much on our mind. We have internal processes that we have to work on to get our party up and running, fit to win not to fight the next election.”

Legitimacy of meeting

“We are aware that there is another meeting happening on the other side of town by our own party so we are still one SODELPA party,” Ms Duituturaga said.

“Clearly that reflects the challenges that we face and I am hoping that we will be able to talk soon after this in terms of how it works.

However, it is not unusual around the world for parties to face challenges and for people to unite and continue to work together stronger or go their separate ways.”

She said it might take the whole year to address the issues in the party but they all share the same goal which is to form the next government come 2022.

“It’s up to us to sit down and find ways of working through and the fact that everyone is interested in SODELPA for better for worse to me shows there is a lot of interest in what’s happening in SODELPA.”

She reserved her comments when questioned about the absence of Party Leader Sitiveni Rabuka in their meeting and said she foresees a lot of talanoa sessions at all levels in the future.

Ms Duituturaga said legal action against the other faction is not on the books at the moment as it is Mr Saneem’s role to rule on the legitimacy of the meetings held and appointments done.

The board also decided at yesterday’s meeting to re-advertise the position of Party leader in accordance with the Civil High Court ruling last month.

Edited by Caroline Ratucadra

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