Apenisa Waqairadovu 
Lawyer Jagath Karunaratne
The Fiji Labour Party says the Supreme Court must not pick and choose which provisions of the Constitution to recognize.
Making final submissions this morning, the party’s representative, lawyer Jagath Karunaratne, argued that the Constitution must be applied in full, warning that no court has the power to treat any provision as inactive or invalid.
Karunaratne said the role of the court is to assist in finding a middle ground, but stressed that the ultimate criteria for constitutional interpretation must come from the people themselves.
He told the bench that democracy requires that “the people’s way” decides how such questions are answered, not the courts.
The Labour Party’s position follows similar arguments from other parties in the case, with Karunarate highlighting that constitutional recognition cannot be qualified or selectively applied.
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