The leader of the gunmen who staged Fiji's May 2000 coup says his new security company is not a threat to national security.
The Fiji Sun reports that Ilisoni Ligairi, the former British SAS soldier who served a prison sentence on Nukulau Island for his role in the coup, has formed Ronin High Risk Security Company.
Mr Ligairi, whose gunmen sized the Chaudhry government and held it hostage for 56 days, says he's chosen to be involved in the security business because it's something he specialises in.
He says the suggestion that his company may be a threat to national security is "evil" as everything has been "prayed for."
Mr Ligairi says his company has no intention of sending men overseas, as there's work in Fiji, such as providing bodyguards for people and security for airports and other strategic locations.
Mr Ligairi says the idea of forming a security company had been with him since he retired from the British SAS, and when he came out of Nukulau Prison he decided to move with it.
After his 1987 coups, Sitiveni Rabuka asked Mr Ligairi to set up the army's elite Counter Revolutionary Warfare Unit which carried out the May 2000 coup and an army mutiny six months later which claimed eight lives.
The unit was disbanded after that and many of its members are in jail or awaiting court martial.
