People Briefs
People Briefs
Sept/Oct 2006
The 23rd Pacific Education Conference held in Palau during July brought together hundreds of educators from American-affiliated islands. Nine teachers were presented with Teacher of the Year awards by Harcourt International, a leading textbook company. The outstanding teachers honored were Lucia Tabelual, Palau; Louisa Moongog, Yap; Obten Jibas, Marshall Islands; Marino Eperiam, Pohnpei; Shra Wabol, Kosrae; Sheri Kojima, Hawaii; Charlotte Deleon Guerrero Camacho, CNMI; Rosalinda Walter, Chuuk; and Lise Sharon Sauni, American Samoa. - BP
Kirk Gray is the new chief executive office for the LBJ Medical Center in American Samoa. He replaces Taufete’e John Faumuina, whose contract ended in August. Gray has over 36 years of health care management experience and most recently was the president and CEO of the Tuba City Regional Healthcare Corp., which operates a hospital and outpatient clinics for the Navajo Nation in Arizona, in the western United States. - FS
- ADVERTISEMENT -
 |
| Sitiveni Rabuka [photo: ZoomFiji/Bruce Southwick] |
Pacific rugby has importantly kept one its own at the International Rugby Board (IRB) round table for another two years with the reelection of Samoan lawyer Tauili’ili Harry Schuster as president of the Federation of Oceania Rugby Unions (FORU). Tauili’ili, a former Manu Samoa representative and current secretary of the Samoa Rugby Union, has held the post since 2004. The IRB changed its governance structure in 2004 to allow a seat for FORU on its exclusive executive board. This allowed the sitting chairman at the time, Tauili’ili, to sit on the board with full voting rights, becoming the first Pacific Islander to sit on the board in the game’s history. Tauili’ili says he will continue to lobby for a change to the IRB’s restrictive eligibility rules that hurt the Pacific unions. - PR
Andra Samoa is the new CEO for the American Samoa Power Authority. The post has been vacant since former boss Utu Abe Malae left in late August 2004. She started working for ASPA in 1997. - FS
Taito Phillip Field, New Zealand’s first Pacific Island Member of Parliament, survived a nine-month government inquiry into his personal dealings after a report released in July cleared him of corruption. The report by lawyer Noel Ingram cost New Zealand taxpayers NZ$479,000 but failed to put an end to the debate with opposition MP’s and sections of the community divided by the verdict. The National Party has asked for Taito to appear before Parliament’s privileges committee saying Ingram failed to investigate the matter fully. While the Mangere MP was cleared of any wrongdoing involving a Thai immigrant working on his house in Samoa and the sale of a house in South Auckland, Prime Minister Helen Clark admitted Taito had made some “errors of judgment.” Taito has since said he would like to return to Cabinet. He was replaced as Associate Minister of Pacific Island Affairs last September by fellow Samoan Labor MP Luamanuvao Winnie Laban. Field told the Samoa Observer recently that he feels victimized by the investigation that was initially scheduled to last for just three weeks. - PR and AT
Northern Marianas College (NMC) President Tony V. Deleon Guerrero stepped down at the end of August after giving the college 60-days notice of his plan to retire. The NMC’s board of regents’ decision to not act on Guerrero’s performance evaluation prompted Guerrero to retire. Guerrero told the news media that the board’s lack of decision is a sign that they were dissatisfied with his performance, a contention board chairman Kimberly King-Hinds confirmed. King-Hinds also left the board, and is now attending graduate school at the University of Guam. Former public school system Commissioner Dr. Rita H. Inos was named the new chairperson. - FSR
Barbara Wheadon is the new president of FIBA Oceania, the regional basketball organization that is based in Australia and serves the Pacific Islands. She takes over from Australian Bob Elphinston, who stepped down after four years in the post. Wheadon also doubles as Basketball New Zealand president. - GJ
The remains of an American fighter pilot, whose plane went missing in the dense highlands of Viti Levu, Fiji’s main island, 64 years ago, have finally been returned to the U.S. The pilot, whose name was not released, went down in his single-seat P-39 on April 22, 1942, during a World War II sortie. Villagers stumbled across the wreckage in 2004 while hunting for wild boar. In early July, a 12-member team from the Hawaii-based Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command traveled to the remote village of Naivucini in Naitasiri province to recover the pilot’s remains. - RM
French President Jacques Chirac has appointed 63-year-old career diplomat Jean-François Bouffandeau to replace Ambassador Eugene Berg, who was based in Fiji. In addition to Fiji, Bouffandeau will represent France to Nauru, Tuvalu, Marshall Islands, Tonga, Kiribati and the Federated States of Micronesia. Prior to taking up his new post, he was the Paris-based ambassador in charge of regional cooperation between French countries and territories in the Indian Ocean. - GJ
Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann, the city’s first chief executive of Samoan ancestry, has been selected by his peers to be a member of the Advisory Board of the U.S. Conference of Mayors. “This will help Honolulu through contacts and networking and greater opportunities for federal funding and public-private partnerships,” Hannemann said. He is the first mayor from Hawaii to hold a national leadership position in the organization since then-Honolulu Mayor Neal Blaisdell served as the group’s president in 1965-66. - GJ
Palau’s first-ever female marine law enforcement officer, Syringa Gulibert, was sworn in by director of Public Safety Hazime Telei in mid-July at Vice President Camsek Chin’s office, marking the end of Gulibert’s year and a half of rigorous training. Marine law enforcement chief Ellender Ngirameketii acknowledged that he had reservations about allowing her to join marine law enforcement, which is male-dominated not only in Palau, but throughout the Pacific. But, Ngirameketii says, Gulibert proved herself during her training period and he is happy to welcome her to the force. - BP
Fiji Prime Minister Laisenia Qarase and a high chief from a northern province were jointly awarded the prestigious Global Ocean Conservation Award in early June for their work in putting Fiji in the forefront of marine conservation. Ratu Aisea Katonivere, the Tui Macuata (chief of Macuata province) was recognized for his efforts to promote the protection of the world’s third-largest barrier reef in his province. Qarase got recognition for government support of the program. - RM
Bank of Hawaii named James Polk as manager of its Pacific Islands Division, which includes Guam, Saipan, Palau and American Samoa, effective September 1. Polk has been with Bank of Hawaii since 1999. He succeeds Ron Leach who was with the bank for 19 years, eight in the Western Pacific. During his tenure in Guam, Leach was chairman of the University of Guam board of regents and was active in a number of charities and civic organizations. - FW
 |
| Arthur Somare [photo: Alex Rheeney] |
Samoan associate minister of revenue Lafaialii P. Leiataualesa admitted to the Samoa Observer that he had served time in prison in New Zealand in the late 1980s following conviction there for murder. Lafaialii is a first time Member of Parliament coming in as an independent during the March general elections, but then joining the ruling Human Rights Protection Party. Lafaialii’s conviction came to light when a visitor from New Zealand wrote complaining of “overstayers, gangsters, criminals and politicians in Parliament.” Under Samoa’s electoral laws Lafaialii is eligible to be a Member of Parliament. Both Prime Minister Tuilaepa S. Malielegaoi and Leader of the Opposition Le Mamea Mualia support Lafaialii’s right to be in Parliament saying he had served his time. - AT
The High Court judge who sent Guadalcanal War Lord Harold Keke and his two self-proclaimed commanders to prison for life in 2005 for the murder of a government minister three years earlier now heads the Solomon Islands Law Reform Commission. Former Judge Frank Kabui is now chairman of the commission. Kabui left the High Court earlier this year because the Solomon Islands constitution requires High Court judges to retire at age 60. - AO
Papua New Guinea charity worker Tessie Tsoi has been recognized by the PNG government for her community-based welfare programs. Tsoi, who founded the Port Moresby-based Friends Foundation, was made an Officer of the British Empire (OBE) in the Queen’s Birthday Honors List announced by the PNG government in June. Some programs undertaken by Friends Foundation include burying unclaimed bodies of babies from the Port Moresby General Hospital morgue. - AR
The best journalists in all Fiji media except print were recognized at the Fiji Awards for Media Excellence recently. The Fiji Media Council also gave its “lifetime achievement” award to former Fiji Times managing editor, the late Sir Len Usher, and Islands Business Publisher Robert Keith-Reid, who died in May. Geoffrey Smith of Fiji TV and Vijay Narayan of Communications Fiji, Ltd. were recognized as the television and radio journalists of the year, respectively. No print journalist won an award because the judges said the entries were inadequate. Fijivillage.com won the online award. - GJ
Laura Dacanay became the regional manager for First Hawaiian Bank’s Guam and Saipan operations on June 30 following the retirement of John Lee after 48 years with the bank. Lee came to Guam in 1971 and became region manager in 1989. Dacanay is from Guam and has been with First Hawaiian since 1991. Ed Untalan replaces Dacanay as vice president and Maite Banking Center manager. - FW
Contributors: Frank Whitman, Blaire Phillips, Fili Sagapolutele, Ricardo
Morris, Peter Rees, Afamasaga Toleafoa, Frank S. Rosario, Giff Johnson,
Alex Rheeney and Alison Ofotalau.
