Government Briefs
Government Briefs
August 2005
Region The
last remaining family in immigration detention on Nauru has begun their new life
in Canberra, Australia. The nine Afghani members of the extended Rahmati family
had been detained since December 2001 under the Australian government’s Pacific
solution of processing asylum seekers offshore. Marshall Islands Marshall Islands Parliament Speaker Litokwa Tomeing visited
Taiwan amid difficult times for relations between the two countries. Rumors have
been circulating since before Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian visited the Marshall
Islands in May that several members of the ruling party received several thousand
dollars each from China. In June, a Taiwanese volunteer was attacked in Majuro
by a Marshallese man who has since been convicted and sentenced to seven years
in jail for attempted murder. For the past two years, the Marshall
Islands has received the largest amount of funding issued by the USDA Rural Development
program in the western Pacific through its community facilities grants. In 2004,
Rural Development funded 14 grant requests from Marshall Islands local and national
government agencies and non governmental organizations for $753,664—which
accounted for 49 percent of the more than $1.5 million Rural Development gave
out to the Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Guam and the Northern Mariana
Islands. Vanuatu Vanuatu has ratified the Pacific
Island Countries Trade Agreement (PICTA). “This will help to deepen the integration
of Forum Island Country economies as it evolves over the coming years,” says
Pacific Islands Forum Secretary General Greg Urwin. Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati,
Nauru, Niue, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga and Vanuatu have
now ratified the trade agreement. French Polynesia French
Polynesia President Oscar Temaru says Australia and New Zealand have the potential
to participate in Tahiti’s development in the areas of education, job training
and technology transfers. Temaru visited both countries in June. He also visited
a tuna-breeding farm in Port Lincoln, Australia, signaling he was keen to see
a similar operation underway in French Polynesia. Temaru followed this with a
visit to Paris, where he claimed “all ambiguities had been dispelled”
in the relationship between France and French Polynesia. Fiji Chinese
Premier Wen Jiabao has proposed creating a cooperation forum with Pacific Island
countries to boost trade during a meeting with Fiji Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase.
During the visit, Qarase also signed an agreement with China to expand trade links
in the fields of agriculture, fishing and infrastructure development, according
to the China Daily. Qarase’s visit came a month after ties between the two
countries became strained by the stopover of Taiwan’s President Chen Shui-bian
and Fiji’s voicing of support for Taiwan to become a member of the World
Health Organization. American Samoa Governor Togiola
Tulafono is proposing sweeping changes to the Department of Public Safety (DPS)
dealing with promotions, raises and other personnel actions. The governor said
on his June radio program that years of favoritism and unjustified promotions
have created a top-heavy police force where there are more sergeants, lieutenants,
and captains than rank and file officers. Samoa Samoa’s
public servants received a hefty salary increase, in some cases by as much as
42 percent, following a major pay restructure by the newly set up Remuneration
Tribunal. Questions were raised about government’s ability to pay especially
as the country was already heavily committed financially with preparations to
host the 2007 South Pacific Games. The opposition parties called the increase
a ploy to win next year’s election. But government said the increase was
part of ongoing reform and was justified by positive economic growth. Adoption
of Samoan children to foreign parents is almost impossible today after Parliament
amended adoption legislation following the death of a one-year-old girl while
in the care of a foreign adoption agency. Two U.S. adoption agencies, Focus on
Children and Affairs of the Heart had been operating in the country for a number
of years arranging adoption of Samoan children to couples in the U.S. There had
been growing fears that many parents did not fully understand the implications
of adopting their children overseas. CNMI The
Department of Labor has lost over half a million dollars for not collecting the
right amount from labor application fees, according to findings of the Office
of Public Auditor. In a report issued June 6, Public Auditor Michael S. Sablan
noted that records at the Department of Finance did not match the amount the Department
of Labor was supposed to collect. The Department of the Interior’s
Office of Insular Affairs announced the granting of $600,000 in federal assistance
to the Northern Marianas government. Of that amount, $100,000 will be used to
assist displaced non-resident workers, most of whom lost their jobs when three
garment factories on Saipan closed recently. The rest of the funding, according
to deputy assistant secretary David B. Cohen, will be used to improve the Northern
Marianas labor and immigration system. Guam A
federal judge on June 15 ruled that the government of Guam must pay the island’s
working poor the federally mandated Earned Income Tax Credit. For the past 10
years, local officials declined to pay more than $110 million, claiming that the
federal government should be liable for the payments since it imposed them on
the cash-strapped local government. Several days after the ruling, Governor Felix
Camacho and attorney Mike Phillips, representing a taxpayer in the class-action
lawsuit, announced that a settlement had been reached requiring the government
to pay $90 million over the next several years. In his decision, Judge Ricardo
Martinez left open the possibility that the government of Guam might sue the federal
government for the funds, according to the Pacific Daily News. Kiribati Plans
are in the pipeline to start a Coconut timber saw mill on Abaiang Island, just
north of Tarawa. A report from the Ministry of Environment, Lands and Agriculture
Development says the island has a lot of senile trees that can be utilized for
construction purposes. A combined team of experts from the Food and Agriculture
Organization and Secretariat of the Pacific Community will arrive in the country
soon to make initial preparations before the project gets underway before the
end of the year. It’s plain to see that there are a lot
of secondary school leavers still looking for jobs. When a government or private
vacancy exists, lots of these school leavers will apply but only a few will be
taken. A classic example is a vacancy for a nursing position that’s just
been announced. The Ministry of Labor said well over 400 students have registered
for just 45 positions for next year’s intake in the School of Nursing. |
