George Speight (occasionally known as Ilikimi Naitini) was the principal instigator of the Fiji coup of 2000, in which he kidnapped thirty-six government officials and held them from May 19, 2000 to July 13, 2000. He is currently serving a term of life imprisonment for his role in the overthrow of the constitutional government.

George Speight was born in 1957 as the son of Sam Speight , a prosperous farmer of ethnic Fijian and European descent. The elder Speight participated in the 1987 coup instigated by Sitiveni Rabuka, which was ostensibly about protecting the interests of ethnic Fijians from Indo-Fijians, who had won a significant degree of power for the first time in the recent elections. He subsequently served as a Cabinet Minister in a variety of portfolios in Rabuka's governments throughout the 1990s. By the time his son attempted his putsch in 2000, however, Sam Speight was an opposition member of Parliament, his Fijian Political Party having lost power to the Indo-Fijian-led Labour Party of Mahendra Chaudhry in the elections of 1999.

During the 1990s, the younger Speight built up a modestly successful marketing business, but many contracts were lost after the Chaudhry government came to power in 1999. Charging corruption, Chaudhry revoked the contracts of two marketing firms, both chaired by Speight, that were involved in the country's lucrative timber trade.

Speight began plotting his revenge. He gathered around him a disparate band of loyalists who stormed Parliament and kidnapped Chaudhry and thirty-five other parliamentarians, including cabinet members, on May 19, 2000. Announcing that he had deposed both the government and the President, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, Speight had himself sworn in as Prime Minister by co-conspirator Ratu Jope Seniloli, whom he proclaimed President. (Seniloli has since been convicted of treason for aiding and abetting the coup). President Mara tried to resist Speight's takeover, but was himself deposed on 29 May by Commodore Frank Bainimarama, the Commander of the Military.

Despite the overthrow of the government, Speight's control never extended beyond the parliamentary complex where he was holed up with his captives.

Fifteen soldiers and two of their officers defected to the rebels and George Speight built up a strong private army. On June 9, Speight announced that he had abolished Fiji's multi-racial Constitution. Three days later, Speight's car was sprayed with gunfire, but the army denied that soldiers were involved in an operation to kill him. On June 25, four female hostages were released. On July 13, Chaudhry was released following an agreement between the rebels and the military administration of Commodore Bainimarama. Claiming that he had signed the agreement "under duress," Bainimarama promptly rescinded it. The next day, Speight was arrested with 369 of his followers and charged with treason.

In August 2001, democracy was restored and in the subsequent election, Speight, now using the name of Ilikimi Naitini, was elected to the House of Representatives for the Tailevu North Fijian Communal constituency as a candidate of the Conservative Alliance Matanitu Vanua Party. He was unable to take up his seat in Parliament, however, as he remained in jail, and in December, he was expelled from parliament for nonattendance. In February 2002, Speight was sentenced to death, but President Ratu Josefa Iloilo, who had replaced Mara following the coup, commuted the sentence to life imprisonment. Speight is currently serving the sentence on Nukulau Island.

On 15 September 2004, a source close to the Fijian government revealed that Speight had converted to Christianity during his imprisonment. According to the source, Speight's conversion had led to a change of heart towards the Indo-Fijian community, and that he wished to participate in the upcoming Fiji Week, a series of prayer meetings and multicultural programmes aimed at reconciling Fiji's ethnic communities, planned for the week of 4 October through 11 October. "He now feels inspired by the word of God and would like to take part in the week of reconciliation," the source told the Australian Associated Press. This request for permission to leave his island prison to take part in the observances was refused, however. At a more personal level, a spokesman for deposed Prime Minister Mahendra Chaudhry said that on principle, Chaudhry would consider meeting Speight and forgiving him - provided that he reveal the identities of the persons who had planned and financed the coup. So far, Speight has not done so.

At the time of his trial, some of Speight's acquaintances recalled that he had long emphasized the non-Fijian side of his mixed ancestry, until his sudden and spectacular transformation as a Fijian nationalist at the time of the 2000 coup.