Reverend Daniel Mastapha, the first and only Indo‑Fijian to lead the Methodist Church in Fiji, has died in Australia at the age of 96, church sources confirmed. Mastapha’s passing removes one of the most prominent figures in the church’s efforts to bridge ethnic and linguistic divides in the decades after independence.
Born in Levuka, Mastapha was ordained in July 1959 after training at Wesley Theological College in Adelaide. He went on to study theology at Leonard Theological College in Jabalpur, India, from 1960 to 1963, where he studied alongside Reverend Paula Niukula — another future president of the Fiji Methodist Church. Mastapha spent years building Hindi‑speaking Methodist congregations across Fiji and was widely recognised for his fluency in both Fijian (iTaukei) and Hindi, which underpinned his push for a more inclusive, national church.
He was elected president of the Fiji Methodist Church in 1977, two years before the 100th anniversary of the arrival of the Girmitiya — the indentured labourers from India whose descendants form a large section of Fiji’s population. His presidency came during a formative period in Fiji’s history as the country and the church grappled with questions of unity, representation and social responsibility in a multiracial society. Pacific Conference of Churches General Secretary Reverend James Bhagwan said Mastapha’s election “gave visible expression to the possibility of a church in which Indo‑Fijian and iTaukei Methodists could belong to one household of faith, while honouring their different histories, languages and traditions.”
Mastapha’s leadership was marked by a consistent emphasis on Christian unity and by efforts to strengthen Hindi‑language worship and pastoral care. Those initiatives extended beyond Fiji after he left the country: in Australia he established an international fellowship of Hindi‑speaking congregations in Brisbane, a network that became an important spiritual and cultural anchor for Fiji‑born Hindi‑speaking Christians living overseas.
His name also surfaced during moments of national crisis. In 1987, following the military intervention that year, Mastapha was reportedly invited to serve as a minister in Sitiveni Rabuka’s interim administration — an offer he declined. Church accounts say his response reflected an ongoing concern for constitutional order, the moral responsibilities of church leaders, and the maintenance of community relationships in volatile times.
Clerical colleagues and ecumenical leaders have highlighted Mastapha’s role in showing that church leadership could cross inherited divisions of race, language and culture. As the Methodist Church continues to navigate its place in Fiji’s plural society, Mastapha’s death is being seen by many within the denomination as the close of a chapter in which efforts to integrate Hindi‑speaking congregations into the national church took prominent institutional form.
Funeral arrangements were not disclosed at the time of publication.