FIJI’S Great Council of Chiefs (GCC) says the country’s worsening drug problem and the rise in HIV infections are now pressing community-level threats, and that traditional leadership must play a bigger role in the response.
Ratu Viliame Seruvakula, Fiji’s GCC Chairman, said the council made crime and drug-related harm a standing concern since it was reconvened after years of disestablishment.
“It is of great concern right now with the Great Council of Chiefs,” he said, adding that the council had repeatedly raised the issue at meetings.
“Right from the outset there have been great concerns about the level of crime, in particular drug-related crime and the HIV issues that’s playing out at community level now.”
He said chiefs had acknowledged that traditional structures had weakened over time.
“We took our eyes off the ball some time ago,” he said, arguing that globalisation, the COVID-19 pandemic and the drug trade have exposed vulnerabilities in Fiji’s community systems.
Seruvakula said the council believes the response must begin at the village level, working through families, clans and traditional structures rather than relying on government alone.
“The family is the foundation in the fight for what we’re trying to fix here,” he said.
To prepare future leaders, the council has launched a Diploma in Traditional Leadership, which Seruvakula said is intended to equip emerging chiefs with the skills to address modern challenges, including development, leadership, and community change.
He said the chiefs also believe that effective anti-drug efforts depend on cooperation between communities, traditional leaders and the state.
“The government cannot work on its own. It is only then that the doors remain open for other initiatives to come in.”
Seruvakula said the broader goal is to get communities to take ownership of the problem, warning that long-term solutions will only work if they fit Fiji’s existing social and traditional structures.
