By Mataeliga Pio Sioa
If the Appeals Court ruling to uphold the minimum 6 seats for women in Parliament is the true RULE OF LAW, what about the laws that put the FAST Government into power?
If it is not the real RULE OF LAW then what is it? Is it fair to say it has become the RULE OF THE OUTLAW?
If so, then this FAST Government’s claim to power is now illegal.
The Court of Appeal’s verdict overrules all the others that went before.
Yes, it comes almost two-years too late to prevent the chaotic upheavals that has politically divided Samoa like never before.
But does that make it any less legal than it should be as the RULE OF LAW to be enforced?
This Court of Appeal ruling would have led to a simple ending, if this was the legal RULE OF LAW at the outset, when the HRPP claimed 25 seats and FAST 24.
Fiame and Tuala came in as independents and opted to align with FAST to give them a one seat majority of 26.
At 26-25 the remaining seat to make up the minimum 10 per cent or 6 seats in Parliament for women went to Ali’imalemanu Alofa Tu’uau.
This would have even up the seat numbers to declare the outcome of the April general elections a draw.
The Constitution would then declare a hung Parliament, forcing a return to the election polls as demanded by the supreme law of the land.
Unfortunately, what follows with the RULE OF LAW asserted at the time by the Judiciary legally declared FAST to be the legitimate Government.
This is the same RULE OF LAW that the Court of Appeal has now overruled as illegal.
In very simple terms the RULE OF LAW that favoured FAST would have drowned by now in the Apia Harbour after the Court of Appeal dropped kicked it out of ‘Friendship Park.’
The bigger and most pertinent question this new RULE OF LAW is now legally demanding is where do we go from here?
By virtue of this new RULE OF LAW the FAST Government is outlawed as we have established.
The integrity and respect of the RULE OF LAW cannot be compromised. If it declares the FAST Government illegal, then PM Fiame should do the right thing.
Step her Government down and make an early call for new general elections.
The real, honest to God truth behind the 2021 general election, should have been a return to the election polls.
We have been looking for an end to the eroding hatred that has chomped deeply into our harmony and unity since the 2021 general elections fall out.
We have digested and regurgitated the events responsible and still not find a way out of the volatile zone we are locked inside.
The simmering, volcanic bubbling of angry emotions, is barely hidden below the political surface.
The ongoing drama in Parliament of targeting Tuilaepa and other leaders of the HRPP opposition for alleged violation of standing orders is feeding the fire.
More politically related court rulings are pending that would guarantee no political relief going into 2023.
Be reminded that the Judiciary oversees the RULE OF LAW. The mandate to decide who rules is by the people who exercise their democratic rights to vote.
The RULE OF LAW as the Court of Appeal has proven once and for all does not have that right of mandate to decide the democratic choice of the people.
For us the God-fearing citizens of this free country, the deciding question that continues to nag is what next? Where do we go from here?
God’s name, justice and will, has been passed and kicked around so much since we were struck by this political disaster, it is just as well His mercy is infinite.
If it was finite Samoa will be a country full of people walking, looking, or smelling funny, for disrespecting the Commandments, ‘…though shalt not use thy name in vain.’
PM Fiame should make the honest choice to return peace and harmony back to the country.
Call for new general elections asap.
We have suffered enough as a people the miseries of this continuing political fallout.
If Samoa is founded on God lets put some faith in the truth of the loud Sunday sermons by the ‘faifeau’, of divine justice, endless mercy, and love of our Father in Heaven.
This time when and if we go to the polls, let your faith decide God’s will – not the urgings of a politically motivated ‘faifeau’ like the last time.
God is watching.