Whispers

Pleasing China: China's diplomatic foray into Pacific Islands affairs has just secured insolvent Nauru in the line up of islands governments who cash in on pleasing Beijing by breaking with Taiwan. All it took was just a loan of a couple of million dollars and it was goodbye to the Taiwanese and hello to the keepers of Tiannamen Square. But there could be a hitch in China's move to become the first non-Pacific Islands member of the South Pacific Tourism Organisation, an outfit anxious for alternative sources of cash after the European Union turned off budget support for it while maintaining project aid. Now that mainland China is an SPTO member, SPTO is still waiting to hear from the Oz and Kiwi tourism offices whether they're joining the regional tourism outfit. SPTO feels that being a non-political thing, it should ask free and independent Taiwan, already a source of aid for it, to join too. Await the screech from Beijing!

Bye, bye Henderson: Henderson Field, the Solomon Islands air gateway, is now Honiara International Airport. Built by the Japanese after their invasion of Guadalcanal, it was captured by the Americans and named after Major Loften Henderson, a pilot killed in the Battle of Midway. Minister for Communications and Aviation, Daniel Fa'afunua explained that the renaming was due to local and international pressure. It took the government five years to decide because of American sensitivities, he said. American sensitivities continue unabated. What arrived from the direction of the Americans in the form of what was a directive to the effect that the change needed United States approval, which wouldn't be forthcoming, wasn't received in Honiara very happily. What lies in store now for Vanuatu's gateway, Bauerfield Airport, also named after an American, and Port Moresby's Jackson's Field, named after an Australian fighter pilot?

UNDP under microscope: The United Nations' Pacific regional office continues to be pained by the performance of certain of its expat staff. Like the one whose many flashed qualifications have turned out to be bogus and who is whispered to have diverted funds into an account they were never intended for.

Oz paranoia: Are any Pacific Islanders experiencing inexplicably long delays with the delivery of small packets dispatched by them to such South East Asian destinations as Thailand? For those that are, here's the explanation and it's just another indication of the mounting paranoia, in some places of early 21st Century times. The packet will eventually, marked with the explanation that it's been held up under Australian postal security procedures. Does that mean it's been steamed opened to be checked for weapons of mass destruction?

PINA/PIBA merge update: How goes the merger of the Pacific Islands New Association (PINA) representing most print news businesses and the Pacific Islands Broadcasting Association (PIBA), composed mostly of government-controlled radio stations? Not easily.
At the utterly chaotic, unconstitutional and partly rigged meeting at Apia in August at which the two associations met to discuss their proposed union, some dubious PINA members wondered what liabilities PINA might expose itself to if it teams up with an outfit that couldn't account for the past five years of spending.
A promise was made that audited accounts would be available in three weeks; PINA is still waiting. Meanwhile, the two associations with so many members so constantly critical of mismanagement by governments' fumbling, lack of transparency and other little human failings, have failed to hold constitutionally correct annual meetings.

Coral concern: Dive and snorkel businesses of Efate, Vanuatu are bothered about the volume of fish and coral being removed in the last eight months by a company that is shipping it all to an associated business in Miami, Florida. The shipments are being made by a company called Sustainable Reef Supplies.

Siwatibau's replacement: Talking of higher learning, with the tragic loss of one of the Pacific's best brains in the form of Savenaca Siwatibau, the search has begun for a new vice chancellor of the University of the South Pacific. Word has it that the late VC had recommended his deputy, qualified sociologist and administrator Professor Rajesh Chandra.
But whether the Fiji academic will get the blessing of his own government is worth keeping an eye out for.
Meanwhile, having been frustrated in its attempts to win the appointment of Pacific Islands Forum Secretary-General for Dr Langi Kavaliku, Fiji is whispered to be preparing to back the veteran Tongan cabinet minister for the job as the next Vice Chancellor USP.

Stirring up resentment: Around the jealous region, it'll be a couple of more black marks chalked up in the Pacific Way against Fiji, where most regional and international organisations are headquartered because it's operationally the easiest and cheapest place for them to be.
ESCAP (Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific) is shifting shop from Port Vila to Suva.
The Asian Development Bank is downgrading its regional office, also in Port Vila, to deal with just local activity, to shift to Suva too. This will annoy Vanuatu and a lot of other countries like Samoa and Tonga, who fret that Suva's strange magnetism leaves their economies bereft of all the millions of local spending by such agencies.
Meanwhile, the Fiji Government is whispered to be looking for a commercial partner to put up the millions needed to build a sort of a Pacific Village at Suva so as to house even the more money-loaded agency folks. In the Pacific Way this little project is sure to stir up more resentment from the neighbours.

Fiji's air disaster: By the way, contrary to the assertions of some badly misinformed Fiji Government folks, Tonga and Samoa have absolutely no intention of returning control of their air space to Nadi Airport. They're very happy, thanks, with a deal they have with the New Zealand air traffic control outfit that manages it for them and gives them a share of the profits.
The move cost Nadi over F$3 million (US$1.62 million) a year. What's more, it can expect to soon lose control of the Kiribati, Vanuatu, and perhaps New Caledonia regions to either the New Zealanders or Australians, now busily lobbying for them.
This is very, very bad news for Fiji, which spent quite a few million dollars ramping up Nadi's air traffic control capabilities in the mistaken belief that the airport was destined to remain the regional control centre.

Enga Show must go on: Be advised: In future Papua New Guinea's Enga Show will be on in the second week of August, come what may. This year's was cancelled because a local businessman got shot dead, not because of it but because someone went gunning for him before it. Lots of tourists cancelled out of Enga and there were far fewer of them when the show eventually happened, very successfully, in October. The loss of patronage grieved Enga's governor, Peter Ipatus, who declared that future shows would happen in August no matter what, "even if someone dies, even if it is election time, even if there is a tribal fight, the show must go on."

History repeating itself: Pacific Islands leaders, 13 of them, who reportedly fronted up at a meeting at Honolulu's East-West Centre in October, were surprised or not surprised to be confronted by George W. Bush. President Bush was passing through town after a swan through bits of Asia and a bit of Australia but not nuclear-free minded New Zealand.
They heard from him about security and terrorism. Ten years or so back, then Pacific Islands leaders had a meeting there with the president's presidential daddy.

Meddling with USP marks: Fancy how some of those who work in institutions of higher learning scale to greater heights to make the experience quite well, intriguing. Like the story making the rounds recently of how a clerk got the boot for meddling with students grades. From an E to an A, this clerk, it's said, could easily make the changes for a fee of course. The clerk had a soft spot for FJ$500. The crime caught up with the criminal, but one wonders about all those successful job applicants with doctored grades!

Forum up for changes? With preparations for a change in office at Naisonini, home of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat in Suva, there's this story of a letter making the regional rounds over the status of the Forum's new authorising agent for the Cotonou Agreement, the source of aid and trade to Pacific islands members of the Africa, Caribbean and Pacific bloc from the European Union. With a non- ACP-EU officer moving in to head the secretariat next year, the job of authorising agent will have to be stripped from him, the letter argues, and given for now, to one of his directors. The letter written by a former chair of the Forum seems to imply that the director as authorising agent will have the power to overrule his own boss, the secretary general.

PNG questions SOPAC decision: Following closely on the heels of the Pacific Islands Forum's failure to reach a consensus on the appointment of its new Secretary-General, another regional body has floundered in the absence of the so-called Pacific Way of decision making. SOPAC (South Pacific Applied Geoscience Commission) members met at the Rock of Polynesia (Niue) and like their Forum counterparts could not agree on who to succeed Fiji's Alfred Simpson.
The result of the secret ballot was surprising as it was disturbing for at least one member, Papua New Guinea. While Fiji-born now New Zealand passport holder Cristelle Pratt got the nod in the secret ballot, Port Moresby is crying foul.
Weeks after the decision of SOPAC at Niue, Papua New Guinea has since lodged an official complaint against Pratt's appointment, declaring it null and void since SOPAC's constitutional requirement that th e winning candidate should have obtained two thirds of the votes was never met. Port Moresby, who fielded a highly qualified candidate, is now calling for a fresh start, or re-start.