Month: February 2016

Cooking the Goose

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It‘s easy to cast aspersions at the people who stood down on the wharf road yesterday and threw stones at a bus full of visitors. That kind of behaviour is unacceptable under any circumstances. No amount of frustration can justify such violence and intimidation.

The costs of such behaviour are difficult to calculate, too. There’s the immediate loss of approximately 5 million vatu daily in tours and activities that get booked by passengers before they arrive. There’s the knock-on benefits derived from staff income being spent closer to home, including bus and taxi fares.

Then there are the indirect costs. The lost fares for those very drivers whose frustrations have boiled over. The opportunity cost to the countless shops, handicraft vendors and duty free suppliers in and around town. The shifting perception of cruise operators, which might lead them to question their significant investment in Vanuatu as a destination.

Goodwill is priceless, and if we fritter that away simply because we can’t manage a single high-traffic location, then we really have to ask ourselves some basic questions about the direction this country is going in. Read more “Cooking the Goose”

A Prayer for Fiji

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The first survey flights are done, and although there has been welcome evidence that many communities in Fiji have survived intact, the number of towns and villages that have been obliterated is distressingly large.

While we can take comfort that Suva, Nadi and other international ports of call are more of less intact, the numerous smaller islands in Winston’s path, along with the lower part of Vanua Levu, have clearly been devastated.

On Viti Levu, Lautoka, Ba and Tavua all sustained significant damage, and the evidence from elsewhere is that numerous shoreside communities have simply been wiped away by the combination of record-strength winds and a massive storm surge.

None of us who experienced the power of cyclone Pam’s winds can remain unmoved by the photographic and video evidence emerging from the overflights of Fiji’s affected areas. The images are depressingly familiar. The blasted landscape, the corrugated metal roofing dotting the countryside like confetti, ships run aground and ashore, whole hillsides collapsed. Entire villages have been left without a single domicile standing.

This cyclone is the strongest storm ever to strike the Fiji islands. Clearly, Winston’s relief and reconstruction effort will be similar in scale to Fiji’s economy as Pam’s has proven to ours. Read more “A Prayer for Fiji”

‘The people want change’

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‘The people want change’ — that was the core lesson that newly elected Prime Minister Charlot Salwai took from the January 22nd general election. With over 60% of its members new to Parliament, it seems clear that change is what we’re getting—whether we like it or not.

But there’s change, and then there’s change. Let’s hope we get the good kind. If the composition of the Council of Ministers is any indication, we’re headed for an administration that takes the business of doing government seriously.

Led by veteran politicians such as Ham Lini and Joe Natuman, balanced with technocrats in such key ministries as Infrastructure and Public Utilities, Health and Education, and leavened with a few fresh faces, this new coalition seems to have a decent balance of experience—political and professional—ability and energy.

But will the centre hold? Can we have what Lands Minister Ralph Regenvanu called, ‘Unity at last’?

Perhaps the most important virtue that this new cabinet will need is moral probity. Several of its members have already shown themselves to be capable of putting the good of the many ahead of the good of the few. But it’s one thing to mean well, and another to do well.

As the saying goes, handsome is as handsome does. Read more “‘The people want change’”

Strengthen the Electoral Commission

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The members of the Vanuatu Electoral Commission managed a small miracle when they wrangled this snap election to a mostly successful conclusion. Were it not for the valiant efforts of the Commission members and the staff of the Electoral Office, things could easily have gone wildly awry.

We cannot afford to let this happen again. To do so would be flirting with disaster.

The Electoral Commission is not a beast that wakes every four years, runs a national election and then sleeps again. Far from it. There are municipal and provincial elections to be run, there is the electoral roll to be managed, there is the review of electoral districts and voting processes to be considered, and last but certainly not least, there is the long-delayed research into future voting procedures to correct the problems that inevitably arise during elections.

The Electoral Commission and the Principal Electoral Officer have done well—better than well, actually—in the face of chronic staff and budget shortfalls. But that’s only because of the stalwart, hard-working and principled people who fill the ranks.

There is no substitute for having the right people in the right positions, but their mandate and their abilities can be enhanced by taking a few simple measures. Read more “Strengthen the Electoral Commission”