YouSaid · the spoken record

Josaia Voreqe Bainimarama

lines on the record: 135
first: 2014-09-24
most recent: 2022-09-24
sittings or episodes: 8
sources: un-general-debate

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“I pledge to him our full support and cooperation as he carries out the responsibilities that lie before him. This body holds the promise of raising human beings out of poverty and degradation to health and hope, from conflict and fear to peace, and from an effort to tame our environment to a commitment to live in harmony with it. Fiji will be with him this year, and we will be with our fellow nations until we realize that promise.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“We believe the time has come for the Pacific Islands to provide the Assembly’s President, and we have put forward a candidate for the Assembly’s seventy-first session. Our candidate, duly submitted to the Asia-Pacific Group, is currently Fiji’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Peter Thomson. He is a seasoned diplomat who has demonstrated extraordinary leadership in service to the United Nations. Fiji looks to the friends of the Pacific Islands at the United Nations to give their support to our candidate for the President of the Assembly at its seventy-first Session. Fiji is fully committed to the work of the United Nations under President Lykketoft’s stewardship at this seventieth session of the General Assembly.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“It involves great sacrifice on the part of many Fijian families and, of course, it is dangerous work that has resulted in the tragic loss of life. But I bring to the General Assembly today the solemn will of the Fijian people to continue to serve the cause of peace through the United Nations wherever the Organization is called on to heal the wounds of strife and war. Fiji has been a Member of the United Nations since its independence, in October 1970. Since that time Fiji’s leaders have attended the General Assembly every year to play our part in this great global gathering. Every year we have been wisely guided by a President of the General Assembly hailing from one of our fellow Member States, but never by a President from the Pacific Islands developing States.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“If everyone does the same with their part of the world, large or small, we may have a chance to save this planet. I believe that Fiji’s commitment to the United Nations as an institution and to the work of the United Nations is second to none. Our contributions to worldwide peacekeeping are a matter of national pride, honour and commitment. Today, Fijian military, police and correctional officers are actively engaged in United Nations peacekeeping missions in Iraq, the Golan Heights, Lebanon, Darfur and South Sudan, as well as in the Multinational Force and Observers in Sinai. We are also proud to now be serving in the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization, headquartered in Jerusalem. This national mission of ours — to work with other nations to bring peace to the world — has become a part of our national identity.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“In that short time, Fiji developed and has begun implementing its own green growth framework — a master plan for an economic model that is more holistic, integrated, inclusive and, above all, sustainable. Our framework links economic growth and environmental protection and builds an economy that grows in a more intelligent way and nurtures the interests of all our citizens. No project will proceed if it is not sustainable, or if it jeopardizes our natural resources in any way. We hold our resources in trust for future generations, and we will not squander them for short-term economic gain. We will continue to grow, develop and modernize, but we will embrace a future in which our forests, our mangroves, our coral reefs and our marine life thrive.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Governments, international organizations, scientists, business leaders and others will gather at the five conferences to assess progress and hold all participants accountable for meeting targets. We will host the triennial conference in Fiji in June 2017, and all those dedicated to the integrity of implementation of the oceans Goal will be welcome. We Fijians do not ask others to do what we are unwilling to do. We are a nation that stands up. We stand up for peace. We stand up for our neighbours. 15-29562 45/54 A/70/PV.19 30/09/2015 And we stand up for the environment. We held our first national green growth summit in Fiji only a couple of months before I appeared before the Assembly last year.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Those of us who are old enough to remember our ocean in much healthier times must do more than lament that our grandchildren may never see the ocean as it was created. We must do all we can to make sure that they know the ocean as it was when our forbearers bequeathed it to us. As a founding member of the United Nations group of friends of oceans and seas, Fiji has been working to establish a high-level global platform to ensure that we meet SDG14. I am proud to say that we have found a strong ally in the Government of Sweden to establish the triennial United Nations conference on oceans and seas, with five international conferences spanning the 15 years of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. They will be conferences for action, not talk.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Should that happen, the people of those island States would be refugees, as desperate and lost as the hundreds of thousands fleeing conflict in Syria and Iraq. It is very real and it is happening now. It is time to shed our indifference. Fiji particularly welcomes the establishment of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) on the conservation and sustainable management of oceans and seas. Our destiny is shaped by the ocean in which we are set. But we also welcome this Goal as citizens of the Earth, because the health of the oceans and seas is vital for everyone. In the Pacific Ocean, for too long now, we have observed the decline in our ocean’s health, as evidenced by dying coral, marine pollution, damaged coastal ecosystems, declining fish stocks, and ocean acidification.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“The choices we face may be politically difficult in the short run, but the consequences we are already seeing — environmental degradation, unbearable heat, drought, powerful tropical storms and unpredictable weather patterns — are simply unacceptable. We are elected as leaders, and leaders must be able to explain these consequences to their people and convince them to make the necessary short-term sacrifices for everyone’s benefit. These consequences are real for Fiji and its neighbours. We have plans to move 45 villages to higher ground, and we have already started. We have committed to resettling people from other low- lying South Pacific island States who face the prospect of being swallowed up by the rising ocean and falling inexorably into oblivion.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Earlier this month, the Pacific leaders at the third Summit of the Pacific Island Development Forum adopted the Suva Declaration on Climate Change. This landmark declaration clearly sets out the agreed demands of the Pacific island developing States for an acceptable outcome at the United Nations Climate Conference in Paris later this year. The Suva Declaration calls for the 2015 climate change agreement to limit global average temperature increase to less than 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels. It calls for the Paris agreement to be legally binding on all parties, and for it to recognize loss and damage as a stand-alone element. We also call for climate change adaptation measures to be 100 per cent grant-financed.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Fiji has been outspoken in insisting that all nations carry out their duty to reduce carbon emissions and control the production of greenhouse gases. Fiji is making strenuous efforts to do its part, but our part in creating the crisis is very small, practically negligible. The major developed nations and — I must say it — the major developing nations as well, must do more. It is simply not acceptable for advanced economies to build a high standard of living by degrading the Earth and the seas. It is also not acceptable for major nations that are industrialising to assert that they need to degrade the Earth, the air and the seas in order to build their economies, just as the advanced countries did years ago. The emergency is now. The solution must be now. The time for excuses is over.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“We have a unique perspective 44/54 15-29562 30/09/2015 A/70/PV.19 of the world to share with the international human rights community. That includes calling attention to the detrimental effect that climate change is having on our ability to extend and strengthen human rights in the region. It also includes educating others about the challenges many of us face in creating proper institutions and changing long-held cultural attitudes that can be obstacles to full respect for human rights. Those are issues that Fiji will continue to raise now, and as a member of the Human Rights Council for the term 2018-2020, if we are elected. Like our neighbours in the South Pacific and other small island developing States, we see the bright future we have charted for ourselves dimmed by the prospect of climate change and sea-level rise.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“I am pleased that the Special Rapporteur on the right to education will visit Fiji within a year to assess and support my Government’s efforts and initiatives to strengthen the right to education. Fiji has also committed to ratifying the core human rights instruments in the not so distant future. That is a solemn commitment that flows naturally from our basic belief that all Fijians have the right to live with dignity. We understand that this will carry additional obligations towards our own people, obligations we are eager to take on. As we participate in the Human Rights Council, we find, yet again, that the voice and the unique concerns of the Pacific small island developing States have trouble being heard.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“It is clear that we have fashioned our own democracy on dedication to the rights and dignity of each person in Fiji, and we bring that dedication to our work at the United Nations. Since Fiji established its Mission in Geneva last year, my Government has worked energetically with the human rights community. Earlier this year, I addressed the Human Rights Council in Geneva, outlining Fiji’s human rights priorities, particularly as they relate to our progressive bill of rights in the 2013 Fijian Constitution. Fijians now enjoy an unprecedented level of protection, enforced through an independent judiciary and a human rights and anti-discrimination commission. I have invited a number of special mandate holders under the Human Rights Council to visit Fiji.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“No democracy can survive if each individual’s rights are not sacred and if the State fails to protect, or even works to undermine, the ability of all to think and believe and worship as they choose. No democracy can survive if elections only mean that the winners take all. No democracy can survive if it does not enshrine human dignity as a right and make every effort to assure the people’s socioeconomic rights, as our Constitution provides for. We have made believers out of people who once doubted and criticized us. We have overcome sanctions and isolation, imposed by other democratic nations in the mistaken belief that they would push us to democracy. In fact, we needed no push. We were already committed to that path. What we needed was engagement and support, and I am pleased to say that we have it again, at last.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Our economy has grown at more than 4 per cent per annum for the past three years, and the rate for 2014 was more than 5.3 per cent. National and international economic experts expect us to meet or exceed that figure this year. Investment, particularly domestic investment, is booming. Construction is up, tourism is up, we have a healthy surplus in foreign exchange reserves and job openings have increased substantially, showing that Fijians are confident. They believe in themselves, in their democracy and in their country’s future. This is the most sustained period of economic growth in our history, and it is part of a revolution of initiative and energy directly linked to our new democracy. Dedication to basic human rights is the foundation of democracy.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“Democracy sometimes seems messy, chaotic and prone to petty squabbles, but it is a price that we Fijians gladly pay for the chance to enjoy its many blessings. As is natural, our society is now also more compassionate and our economy more robust. We have carried out wide-ranging social and economic reforms designed to free the energies of our people, encourage investment, create employment and lift up the poor and marginalized in Fiji. We have introduced free schooling at the primary and secondary level for the first time and made great efforts to bring the benefits of Government programmes, technology and the modern market to people in remote and underserved areas of the country. Infrastructure development, including roads, electricity, water and health care, is our priority. The results have been encouraging.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“This is not an experiment. It is a very real and revolutionary change in the way we Fijians govern ourselves and treat one another. I will not say that it has been easy, because it has not. But we have had one year of the give-and-take of parliamentary democracy based on a common and equal citizenry, under a Constitution that values every Fijian equally, regardless of ethnicity, birthright, faith, gender, social condition or geography. That is a first. In the past, we had elections; today, we have elections that do not result in the tyranny of the majority. Things have been raucous at times, as we have battled over ideas and exchanged accusations on the floor of Parliament, in the media and before the public.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“I would like to add my congratulations to the President on his election to those of the leaders who have spoken before me. I wish him success in guiding the General Assembly at its seventieth session to a productive and meaningful conclusion. I would also like to thank His Excellency Mr. Sam Kutesa for his outstanding leadership during the sixty-ninth session. 15-29562 43/54 A/70/PV.19 30/09/2015 Last year, I addressed the Assembly on the heels of an election victory in Fiji (see A/69/PV.15). I said that Fiji was now a fairer, more just and more compassionate society, and that we would accelerate our efforts to alleviate poverty, thanks to a rapidly strengthening economy. Today I am proud to assure the Assembly that our democracy is working, our economy is growing and we are gradually lifting more people out of poverty every day.”
2015-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 70 (2015)
“To strengthen our commitment to meeting our international obligations, this year Fiji opened a Permanent Mission to the United Nations in Geneva, which is focused on strengthening our interaction with treaty bodies, such as the Human Rights Council, the International Labour Organization, the World Trade Organization, the World Intellectual Property Organization, the International Telecommunication Union and other organizations based in Geneva. In closing, Fiji looks forward to contributing positively to the work of the United Nations during the President’s stewardship of the Assembly at its sixty- ninth session. On behalf of all Fijians, I pledge our full support and cooperation as the President carries out his tasks in the cause of the great global family to which we all belong.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“I also warmly thank those nations that came to Fiji’s assistance during that trying period. We will never forget the role played by those Governments in keeping our men safe so that they can continue to fulfil their United Nations mandate and eventually return safely to their families and friends in Fiji. I am proud to say that not once during the course of that crisis were there any calls in Fiji for the withdrawal of our troops from that, or future, peacekeeping missions. Peacekeeping is a noble cause and is our contribution to the welfare of ordinary men and women living in less fortunate circumstances far from our island home. I want everyone to know that Fiji will always be ready to serve.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“For some 36 years now, Fiji has proudly contributed our troops to successive peacekeeping operations in Lebanon, Sinai, Iraq, Syria, Timor-Leste, South Sudan, Darfur, Liberia, Bosnia, Kosovo, Kuwait, Namibia, Cambodia and the Solomon Islands. Some of those peacekeepers have paid with their lives — as have troops from other countries — and we honour those who have fallen in the cause of peace. Last month, 45 of our soldiers currently serving with the United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, were held captive. As a nation, we held grave fears for their safety, but after two anxious weeks our prayers were answered, and our men were freed. I want to thank the skilful team of United Nations negotiators who worked with our military officers and diplomats in a tireless effort to secure the release of our men.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“It is simply not acceptable, purely in moral terms, for the world to allow the small island developing States to sink slowly beneath the waves because of the selfish determination of industrialized nations to protect their own economies. Time is fast running out, and I beg Governments to act. I am also here to rededicate ourselves as a nation to the ideals of the United Nations and to its service, whenever and wherever it is required. That service is at the core of our foreign policy, whose central purpose is to be friends to all and enemies to none. It has been our privilege to chair the largest voting bloc at the United Nations, the Group of 77 and China, and this year to assume the Presidency of the Executive Board of the United Nations Development Programme.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“In this International Year of Small Island Developing States, we need a more concerted effort to strengthen our regional institutions in order to confront the enormous challenges we face in the Pacific, namely, population growth, the unsustainable use of our ocean’s natural resources and rising sea levels caused by climate change. Climate change threatens to engulf some of our Pacific Island States altogether, and is already forcing the evacuation of coastal villages in Fiji. I repeat here what I have said in other forums: history will judge the world’s major carbon-emitters extremely harshly, unless they take immediate and comprehensive steps to reduce emissions.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“Fiji has played a leading role in the formation of the Pacific Islands Development Forum, an addition to the existing regional framework, which, for the first time, links Governments with civil society groups and the private sector in a joint effort to solve our development problems in a sustainable manner. Fiji is privileged to have been given the responsibility of hosting the Pacific Island Development Forum Secretariat in our capital, Suva. We were equally privileged that the outgoing Indonesian President, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyno, was our principal guest at this year’s Forum in June.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“Whatever our differences, let us now work together constructively in our new Parliament, when it convenes on 6 October, to improve the lives of every Fijian. We are currently enjoying the most sustained period of economic growth in our history. The possibility to create more jobs and raise the living standards of our people has never been greater. Let us join hands to put our nation first, to put Fiji first. I want to assure our Pacific neighbours of Fiji’s continuing contribution to the region as we work together and collaborate to resolve the great challenges facing us, develop our economies and improve the lives of all Pacific islanders.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“And having established a common and equal citizenry, along with a secular State, we intend to move forward together to finally fulfil our promise as a nation, to fulfil our destiny. I especially want to pay tribute today to the Fijian people. I say to them today before the world: this was their victory. Whichever candidate they chose, theirs was a vote for a better future for our nation. I pledge again that I will govern for the benefit of all our citizens, no matter who they are, where they come from or who they voted for. Mine will be an inclusive Government over the next four years. I will be the leader of all Fijians, for all Fijians. As we move our beloved nation forward, I am determined to leave no one behind. In that spirit, I extend a hand of friendship to my political opponents.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“For the co-leaders from Australia, India, Indonesia, Canada, the European Union, Israel, Japan, the members of the Melanesian Spearhead Group, New Zealand, the Republic of Korea, Russia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States of America — I offer many thanks to them all. It has been a long and sometimes traumatic journey for our nation in the 44 years since independence: four coups, a rebellion, four Constitutions and 56 days of shame in 2000 when members of our Parliament were held hostage. Fiji has struggled to be unified and cohesive; our development was retarded by our inability to think and work as one nation, one people. But with the recent election, we have put that era firmly behind us. In our new democracy, we are all Fijians, not members of separate ethnic and religious groups.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“Some tried to damage us with sanctions and to degrade our quality of governance because we refused to accept their prescriptive and high-handed approach towards us. But the majority of nations recognized our right to determine our own future and came to understand that we were working not for the benefit of a governing elite but for the common good. To those in the General Assembly who gave us their support, our friends, 1 extend the grateful thanks of the Fijian people. I also want to especially thank those countries that made up the Multinational Observer Group that declared our general election credible, free and fair.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“Plus we now have an array of scholarships and a tertiary loans scheme to enable our young people to go on to higher education. Our vision is to cement our place as a pre-eminent Pacific Island nation, a true regional hub and a Pacific beacon of prosperity and progress for our smaller neighbours. We intend to play a bigger role in the wider world to voice our collective concerns about such issues as the environment, climate change and the need to create a fairer trading system to benefit our people in the Pacific and in all developing countries. As we begin this new era in our national life, I want to thank those in the greater community of nations who have stood by us in recent years as we made the reforms that were necessary to create a better Fiji. Not everyone understood what we were trying to do.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“A range of social and economic rights have also been enshrined in our supreme law for the first time, rights that comply with a number of United Nations conventions — the right to economic participation, a just minimum wage, education, housing, health and adequate food and water. The right to live in an environment free of pollution is a principle we hope that every nation will embrace, as we strive for the preservation and protection of our natural surroundings. So today, I am proud to report to the Assembly that Fiji is a fairer, more just society and a more compassionate society, as we step up our efforts to alleviate poverty on the back of a rapidly strengthening economy. We have also set our sights on being a smarter country by introducing free schooling at the primary and secondary levels for the first time.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“We needed a revolution to put us on the path to true democracy. And from the time that that revolution began in 2006 to our election 10 days ago, we embarked on a series of reforms that have transformed our nation. More laws were passed during this eight-year period to improve our standard of governance than in the entire 36-year period since independence. And central to that was the development of our supreme law — the 2013 Constitution — from which all other laws flow. It is the blueprint for the new Fiji. Now every Fiji Islander enjoys equal opportunity and a common identity — Fijian. That name was once reserved for the indigenous majority but now applies to everyone from the Republic of Fiji, just as the common name American applies to all from the United States or the name Australian to any Australian from Australia.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“We have often heard it said that elections are key to having democracy. We in Fiji knew that that was not the case, because our electoral system, before it was reformed, did not give us true democracy. It did not facilitate justice, transparency or good governance. It was about reinforcing power, the power of elites, and keeping the population divided into different communal groups. That weighted system perpetuated injustice for a great many of our people, created different classes of citizens and encouraged corruption. It was a system that no advanced democracy would accept for itself. The status of any Fijian in national life depended on his or her racial origin, whether that man or woman came from one of the chiefly or business elites, and even what part of the country the person lived in.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“At our general election on 17 September, I led my Fiji First political movement to a decisive victory in the first election to be held under our new Constitution on the basis of equal votes of equal value. The new Constitution replaced the three previous constitutions since our independence from Britain in 1970, in which Governments were chosen under a weighted and discriminatory formula that separated the various communities and favoured some citizens over others. For nearly four decades, we laboured under a system that was undemocratic, unjust and unfair. Indeed, we were a case study of a nation that was supposedly democratic and casting itself as such, but was failing to meet some basic democratic standards — a common and equal citizenry, a common identity and a level playing field on which every citizen can excel.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)
“I join those who have spoken before me in congratulating Mr. Sam Kutesa on his assumption of the office of President of the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session. Like them, I am confident that, under his leadership, the sixty-ninth session will be productive. I would also like to express Fiji’s gratitude for the leadership of Mr. John Ashe throughout the sixty-eighth session. Five years ago, I stood in this great Hall and promised the global community that my Government would introduce the first genuine democracy in Fiji’s history before the end of September (see A/64/PV.10). It is my honour to inform the Assembly that, with the support of the Fijian people, I have kept that promise. I return to the Assembly today as the duly elected Prime Minister of the Republic of Fiji.”
2014-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 69 (2014)