The Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Justice, Law and Human Rights Ashneel Sudhakar says SODELPA MP Semesa Karavaki was not removed from the Committee Deputy Chair’s position after an incident in the committee hearing last Friday.
Sudhakar says a newspaper report and the Leader of Opposition’s claims are incorrect as the election of the Chair and Deputy Chair took place last Monday, and Sudhakar was re-elected as Chair while FijiFirst MP, Mataiasi Niumataiwalu was elected as Deputy Chair.
Meanwhile Sudhakar says he is now considering whether he will take the issue further with the committee about Karavaki making comments to the Chairman that:
“What are you afraid of. I know more than you. You are just a little child”.
He says he will let the submissions finish and then let the committee handle the issue.
This came about after Karavaki wanted to talk about issues relating to the Media Decree and MIDA during Peter Waqavonovono’s submission for the Information Bill last Friday.
Sudhakar says these laws were not before the committee but Karavaki continued to insist that he should allow the discussions.
Karavaki says as a committee member, he wanted to know about the conflict of laws after Waqavonovono raised the issue.
He says he does not know why Sudkakar overruled him on that.
Karavaki says he was only reacting to what Sudhakar had said.
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