BRISBANE (ABC Correspondents Report/Pacific Media Watch): ELIZABETH JACKSON: One week ago, a senior Fijian military officer, an aristocratic Ratu from one of Fiji's highest ranking chiefly families, was plucked out of waters of Fiji by the Tongan navy and whisked away to Tonga where he's been given refuge by his close relative, the King.
Lieutenant-Colonel Tevita Mara, the youngest son of the first prime minister of Fiji, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, headed up the Fiji Army's Third Battalion and was a key supporter of Commodore Frank Bainimarama when Bainimarama staged his coup in late 2006 and took over the country.
However, there's been a falling out between them and the Fijian dictator had Lieutenant-Colonel Mara charged with sedition. The Fijian regime now wants him extradited.
This report from Pacific correspondent Sean Dorney:
SEAN DORNEY: Lieutenant-Colonel Tevita Mara wasted no time putting out an explanation for his decision to flee Fiji.
He posted a video on YouTube.
TEVITA MARA: When I was rescued by the Tongan Navy, I asked to be brought to Nuku'alofa. With under the sure protection of King George's government, I shall be able to tell the truth without fear of retribution about the tragic oppression which stifles my beloved land.
When this hateful dictatorship has been eradicated, all of us who once served it shall answer to the Fijian people for the part we played and I will gladly submit to their verdict.
SEAN DORNEY: Lieutenant Colonel Mara was heavily involved in the coup. He was commanding the soldiers who back in September 2006 herded me and others in the media away from outside the house of the soon to be deposed prime minister Laisenia Qarase.
Tevita Mara is the youngest son of the late Fijian statesman Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara and he was the fourth most senior officer in the Fijian military.
However, last October Commodore Bainimarama ordered him to take leave along with the then third most senior military man, Fiji's land force commander Brigadier General Pita Driti.
Two weeks ago Mara and Driti were both hauled before the courts - Driti charged with sedition and inciting mutiny and Mara with using seditious language.
The lieutenant-colonel claims Fiji's attorney-general Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum hatched a plot to have them locked up on trumped up charges.
His alleged crime he says was that he told a fellow military officer went on a trip to Korea that the state of Bainimarama's government could be summed up with a word beginning with 'F'.
TEVITA MARA: If saying that is sedition then everyone in Fiji, except for Bainimarama and Khaiyum, is also guilty of sedition. What he is saying is that anyone who criticises any aspect of his regime in a private conversation can be reported and charged.
That is not the Fiji I know and love, that is more like Nazi Germany and the Gestapo.
SEAN DORNEY: Commodore Bainimarama has demanded that Tonga hand over Lieutenant Colonel Mara whom he describes as a fugitive.
The Fiji regime is investigating who helped Mara escape. His sister is married to the man Bainimarama appointed the president of Fiji, Ratu Epeli Nailatikau, which has led to speculation that the president could be sacked considering the close relationship between the Mara family and the King of Tonga who is now offering protection to the Fiji president's brother in law.
Fiji has filed extradition papers but Ratu Tevita Mara seems confident the courts in Tonga will give a sympathetic hearing.
Tonga's prime minister Lord Tu'ivakanô has said that it will be up to the independent Tongan courts to decide. But he's also suggested without directly naming Fiji that courts elsewhere might not give Ratu Tevita Mara a fair trial.
In a statement, he said that the discredited indulgence of judicial activism which is prevalent in the courts of some dominions and republics was an affront to the Tongan constitution.
And in a swipe at comments coming out of Fiji, the Tongan prime minister defended his King, saying that it was an offensive breach of protocol to infer for political gain that his majesty's offer of hospitality to his kinsman was an offer of immunity.
Relations between Tonga and Fiji's military-led government may be close to freezing point.
Pacific Media Watch
