Fiji Sun yesterday paid $10.90 for a companies search on Fiji Airways and paid another $237.50 to obtain Fiji Airways financials from 2008 to 2018. It did not take us four hours. Our team of two went to the Registrar of Companies Office at 10am and were told to pick up all reports after lunch.

The team went back, paid and picked up the financials.

This was done to check what National Federation Party (NFP) leader Biman Prasad had said in Parliament.

He had said: “Mr. Speaker, last week, I sent one of my staff members to the Companies Office and this time, he actually spent four hours and found only three copies of annual financial statements. Four hours, Mr Speaker, and that too had a cost of about $10 for the first 10 pages and 50 cents per page thereafter. I want to know from the Honourable Attorney-General, if all copies of financial statements are available in the Companies Office, why were we only able to access three copies? We were told that the others are not there. The question is, where are the other financial statements? Is there a Fiji Airways group filing in the office? If, yes, why are only three years of financial statements in the Air Pacific file? Things do not just add up.”

The Fiji Airways financials from 2008 to 2018 obtained by the Fiji Sun from the Registrar of Companies Office on September 3, 2020.

Mr Prasad is right – but what is not adding up is his claim. It was rather easy for the Fiji Sun staff to go and ask for these reports and the very helpful staff at the office guided us and helped us access not three or five but ten years of Fiji Airways’ financials.

This is yet another example of how politicians murky the waters and mislead the Fijian public by getting away with lying in Parliament. But, was Mr Prasad lying? Was his staff lying? Did anyone even go to ask for these financial statements?

Like the Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum has continued to say in Parliament, the financials of our national carrier are at the Registrar of Companies. Anyone interested should go up to the Registrar of Companies, pay the required fees and obtain a copy. We did. We do not know how NFP staff members could not find these copies.

However, the Fiji Sun is offering to donate $237.50 to the NFP to obtain financial statements of Fiji Airways from 2008 to 2018.

Feedback: jyotip@fijisun.com.fj