Kiribati

Out on the west coast of Betio, not far from the causeway that links it to the other sandy islets of the atoll of Tarawa, are remnants of guns placed by the occupying Japanese to repel an expected American invasion.

The invasion came on November 20, 1943. It became one of the bloodiest landings the Allied Forces had staged. In four days, about 8061 soldiers and civilians were killed, wounded or missing.

Almost 70 years later, the guns of Betio are rusty and battered. They've been partly restored as a tourist attraction.

Now, years after independence from Britain, the people of Kiribati and their leaders have other enemies.

They are already in Kiribati and makes one wonder whether the 25 years of independence is really a cause for celebration.

Enemy number one is the terrible overcrowding in the capital, Tarawa. About 37,000 people live in South Tarawa where government offices and the main port are located.

With 2324 people per square kilometre, South Tarawa is one of the world's most densely populated places.

Overcrowding causes bad social and economic problems. There's land degradation and the stress that too many people put on the atoll's fragile water table and sewerage capacity.

Kiribati...a view from the air.

With just under half of Kiribati's entire population at Tarawa and its sparse private sector, there are hardly any jobs.

Official statistics put unemployment at a mere 2% but most of the 40,556 people supposedly in a job in 2000 were just performing mainly unpaid village duties.

Kiribati's main exports are mainly copra and fish, both items hit often by low world prices. Previous governments didn't get much by selling fishing licenses to foreign fishing fleets.

Economists say the economy averages a low 1.5% growth, far too low to keep pace with the needs of a fast growing population.

Kiribati is alarmed about global warming and sea level rise. Already islanders are complaining about the contamination of underground water tables and eroding shorelines. Just a small rise of the sea level will be catastrophic.

Another terrible enemy is HIV/AIDS. By the beginning of this year, 42 cases had been detected and the number is rising.

The figure may appear to be insignificant in the global context, but health experts say that for a country of not quite 90,000 people, and 70 percent of them young people, the HIV/AIDS rate has reached explosion status.

As President Anote Tong hosts the Silver Jubilee independence celebrations, not all of Kiribati's affairs were doom and gloom ones.

Prudent management of a trust fund established with phosphate sales has built the fund up to around A$400 million. Interest from the fund balances the national budget and leaves the country virtually debt-free.

Kiribati's greatest resource is its people and the export of labour is a fast growing business. Nearly 2000 seamen, graduates of the country's Maritime Training and Fishery Training Centre, work aboard foreign cargo ships, Japanese fishing boats and cruise liners, and remittances are a big source of income.

According to the Kiribati statistics office, remittances grew from A$3 million in 1985 to A$10.43 million in 2000.

President Tong talks of making more money from fish by forming a tuna fishing cartel with other Pacific Islands countries. If he could possibly do that, the cartel would be linked with local fish processing factories.

He wants to attack the atolls's waste problems and overcrowding in South Tarawa.

It appears he will be able to secure a reliable air link from Tarawa to Kiribati's eastern-most Christmas Island (Kiritimati).

President Tong told Islands Business: "There's always been the comment that Kiribati has a very bleak chance of economic survival. I have always resented that. What should we do? Jump in the sea? We must never accept that kind of assessment." Nor would his people let him. Not so long ago in the maneaba (meeting place) of the Kiribati Protestant Church headquarters at Antemai on Tarawa, the church's youth held a week-long workshop. Issues covered were on the president's 'to tackle' list: HIV/AIDS, global warming, and alcohol abuse among others.

During a break, the maneaba reverberated with the melody of young voices as they sang and acted a Christian chorus. They sang about being friends of Jesus in order to ward off the devil.

That is one of the challenges before President Tong and other leaders of Kiribati: finding the 'Jesus' in them to fend off the encroaching tentacles of today's enemies.