10 Oct 2003

Fiji Labour Party criticises government rugby trip

4:43 pm on 10 October 2003

The Deputy Leader of the Fiji Labour Party, Krishna Datt, says the allocation of Rugby World Cup tickets to cabinet ministers is unfair.

The prime minister, Laisenia Qarase, and some of his cabinet are travelling to Brisbane to watch the Fiji-France match at the weekend.

Air Pacific has paid for some of their air travel and match tickets.

But Mr Datt says the tickets should have been given to the Speaker of the House to distribute.

"The concern is that there is a whole lot of other citizens in the country who are also very patriotic, there are the members of the House who are just as patriotic who would like to have a chance or at least be considered for such a visit."

And Mr Datt says having at least seven cabinet ministers at of the country at one time is not a good look.

However Mr Qarase has told Fiji TV that all this showed that the Labour party did not really care about the Fiji rugby team and it was about time they did something positive.