Tagaga

Along with his family, Aminisitai Tagaga petitions for review of a decision of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA). 2 The BIA dismissed Tagaga’s appeal and affirmed the immigration judge’s denial of his requests for political asylum and withholding of deportation under the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. §§ 1158 and 1253(h). We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1105a(a) 3 and grant Tagaga’s petition for review.

I.

We consider Aminisitai Tagaga’s asylum application against the backdrop of racially based political discrimination in Fiji, a country which has a bare majority of ethnic Fijians, the remainder of the population being composed largely of ethnic Indians. The Alliance Party governed Fiji from the time the country gained independence from Great Britain in 1970 until 1987. In April 1987 the Indian-dominated Labour Party defeated the Alliance Party in an open and free election. One month later, Major General Sitiveni Rabuka led a military coup to overthrow the new government. Rabuka further consolidated power through a second coup that year. According to the U.S. State Department, the “stated purpose of the 1987 military coups was to ensure the political…