Hon. Manoa Kamikamica

Acting Prime Minister Manoa Kamikamica says there is an urgent need for stronger laws and heightened national awareness to combat the rising scourge of scams in the country.

Speaking during the National Scam Awareness Week, Kamikamica highlighted the alarming scale of recent frauds, including eBay scams as even high-profile Fijians became victims.

Kamikamica stressed on the the importance of National Scam Awareness Week in fostering dialogue on the issue, while also noting that stronger legislative measures are essential to effectively counter the growing threat.

“The government can’t go around settling claims for things that at the end of the day are our own individual responsibility. But certainly in terms of creating more awareness, having these kind of sessions and a lot more noise about what concern this is, hopefully, we can actually mitigate to a large extent what has been happening in this space. And sadly, I suspect it’s going to grow bigger.”

While reflecting on the eBay scam, Kamikamica expressed frustration over the limitations in current legal frameworks.

“One of the things that annoyed me when we first discovered the eBay scam was, I got told by RBF you can’t do anything until there’s a police complaint. So even when you see a scam happening, until somebody says I’ve lost money or been scammed, you really can’t do anything. So these are the types of laws that we will have to bring in to try and strengthen laws in Fiji.”

The Acting Prime Minister is urging stakeholders to work together in tackling scams, stressing that collective action is important.