Seven years of work went into 2013 Constitution: Former A-G tells parliamentary committee

Former Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum has pushed back against what he called misleading narratives about how the 2013 constitution was made.

Sayed Khaiyum said it was the product of seven years of public consultation adding it was the most extensive in the country's history.

Making submissions to the Standing Committee on Justice, Law and Human Rights on Monday, he said the 2013 constitution was not rushed or imposed, as some politicians and commentators have suggested.

"It is through that wide-scale and intensive consultations over a period of about seven years did we then have the 2013 constitution come into place," he said.

He outlined the process in detail:

• The National Council for Building a Better Fiji held 1,256 consultations at village and settlement level
• The Yash Ghai Commission received 7,170 written submissions and held 110 public hearings around Fiji
• A further round of government consultations received 1,000 additional submissions
• He personally attended 19 public consultations across the country, including in Kadavu and Ra

He contrasted this with the country's earlier constitutions — the 1970 constitution was negotiated by politicians in London without direct public input.

The 1990 constitution, Sayed Khaiyum said was "promulgated at midnight" by the late former President Ratu Penaia Ganilau with minimal consultation and was widely criticised as racially flawed.

Sayed-Khaiyum said it was precisely because of the depth of those 2013 consultations that a referendum provision was written into the constitution so that any future changes to it would require a public vote rather than being left solely to politicians.

"Changing the constitution should not be done willy-nilly," he said.