Tupou Draunidalo

Tupou Draunidalo is a Fijian lawyer. On 9 September 2006, she was elected Vice-President of the Fiji Law Society, defeating Rajesh Gordon. [http://www.fijilive.com/news/show/news/2006/09/10/10fijilive01.html] [http://www.fijilive.com/news/show/news/2006/09/09/09Fijilive0904.html]

Political activism and arrest

Draunidalo condemned the 2006 coup and threatened a possible court challenge to the legitimacy of the interim Cabinet sworn in on 8-9 January 2007. [http://www.fijivillage.com/artman/publish/article_35082.shtml]

She was arrested by soldiers in civilian clothes [http://www.fijilive.com/news/show/news/2007/01/30/30Fijilive04.html] at a Sigatoka hotel on 30 January. Apprehended at the same hotel was another government critic, Angie Heffernan, Director of the Pacific Centre for Public Integrity, [http://www.fijiworldnews.com/news/publish/News_1/Activists_Caught_-_Digitaki_Sought_for_Statement.shtml] to which Draunidalo also belongs. [http://www.fijilive.com/news/show/news/2007/01/31/fijilive17.html] Both women were taken in for interrogation by the Military and police. [http://www.fijivillage.com/artman/publish/article_35509.shtml]

Senior Superintendent of Police Jahir Khan said that Draunidalo had been questioned with respect to possible sedition charges, but had been released for lack of evidence. Colonel Pita Driti, the Military's Land Force Commander, revealed that military officers had found Draunidalo by accident while searching for someone else, but arrested her for having "incited the public to oppose the military led government". [http://www.fijilive.com/news/show/news/2007/01/31/fijilive17.html]

The next day, Draunidalo denied Khan and Driti's version of events, saying that she had voluntarily asked to be interviewed by officers. [http://www.fijivillage.com/artman/publish/article_35571.shtml]

Background

Draunidalo hails from a politically active family that is no stranger to upheaval. She is the daughter of the late Adi Kuini Speed, a Paramount Chief from Nadroga-Navosa and former Deputy Prime Minister of Fiji, whose government was deposed in 2000 in a civilian coup orchestrated by George Speight, and her first husband, Savenaca Draunidalo, a Cabinet Minister in the government of Laisenia Qarase, which was deposed in a military coup on 5 December 2006. Her stepfather, Timoci Bavadra (the second husband of her mother) was briefly Prime Minister of Fiji in 1987, before being ousted in a military coup by Sitiveni Rabuka.

Draunidalo herself was a candidate for the Fijian Association Party (FAP) in the parliamentary election of 2001. She contested the Laucala Open Constituency and polled only 248 votes out of more than 11,500 votes cast.

Draunidalo was educated at Draiba, Veiuto Primary, Suva Grammar, Canberra Girls' Grammar School, the University of the South Pacific and the Australian National University.