Quad pledge spurs hope for Pacific port plan
The US, Australia, India and Japan would partner to build a model port in Fiji.
Daily TribuneThe US, Australia, India and Japan would partner to build a model port in Fiji.
SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) — Fiji Ports’ chief said Wednesday a “surprise” announcement by the US, Australia, India and Japan to build a port had spurred hopes of Quad backing for a billion dollar plan to relocate the South Pacific nation’s main dock.
Fiji’s Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka pitched his plan to redevelop his country’s port and ship building industry to Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2023.
Around a hundred Chinese fishing vessels ply the Pacific Ocean from a base at Fiji’s Suva Port, which also encompasses the country’s navy base and hosts visits from the Chinese navy’s space and missile tracking vessel Yuan Wang 7.
Australia, which views Beijing’s security ambitions in the Pacific with suspicion, sought to block a Chinese port investment by agreeing a year later to work with Fiji on wharf redevelopment, although no commitment was made to move Suva port.
A meeting of Quad foreign ministers in India on Tuesday said the US, Australia, India and Japan would partner to build a “model” port project in Fiji.
Fiji Ports acting chief executive Suresh Prasad told Agence France-Presse the Quad announcement had come as a surprise.
The port agency, 41 percent owned by Fiji’s government, had discussed a list of port upgrades worth $181 million, as well as a $1.82 billion plan to relocate the main Suva port, with US officials.
US deputy secretary of state Christopher Landau met with Fiji Ports in February, with more US officials travelling to Fiji in April to discuss ports funding without confirming which projects the US would back, he said.
“If it’s a Quad project, its going to be a mega project, which is Suva port most likely,” he said.
Prime Minister Rabuka told parliament on Monday that Fiji had struck a deal for a ports feasibility study with the US Millenium Challenge Corporation, Washington’s fund issuing grants for infrastructure in the poorest countries.
Fiji expected to form a funding compact with the MCC, Rabuka said, emphasizing it would involve grants and not loans.
The Pacific nation still owes Chinese state banks $109 million for road building and other infrastructure projects undertaken a decade ago, official data showed.
