At the next municipal elections held in 2002, the Labour Party made significant gains, winning the five seats in the Samabula Ward.
In 2004, the coalition collapsed, with the 5 FLP councilors teaming up with the SDL to reelect Ratu Peni Volavola, who had replaced Umaria as Lord Mayor the previous year.
Disagreements over the 2002 memorandum of understanding between the SDL and the NFP thwarted attempts to forge an electoral coalition between them for the 2005 municipal elections.
The NFP charged that in making a common cause with the FLP in 2004, the SDL breached the agreement, which it said specified that in the third year, the Lord Mayor should be chosen jointly by the two parties.
The original plan was to postpone the poll in those two wards only, but the Commission decided that it would be a "tidier" process to conduct the whole election simultaneously.