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Jacob’s ladder makes travel easy and safe in Titinge

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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Jacob’s ladder funded under World Bank-IDA at Titinge which the community continues to benefit from

BY LYNTON AARON FILIA

Jacob’s ladder funded under World Bank-IDA at Titinge which the community continues to benefit from

THE Rapid Employment Project (REP) completed a new small access infrastructure subproject making daily travel much easier and safer for Titinge community.

A Jacob’s Ladder has been built up the steep hills of Titinge 2 community, making walking up and down safer and easier.

The new ladder is actually the second small access subproject under REP’s pilot activities agreed under Honiara City Council and the Guadalcanal province.

30 community members from Titinge 2 and Valeato communities are contractors of this development.

They are ones who previously undertaken one week Life Skills Pre-Employment Training under the REP in preparation for implementation of their subproject.

Work started on the 100-metre long Jacob’s ladder on March 6, 2018 and was completed after three weeks on March 28.

Total cost of the subproject is around $62,000 which includes labour and materials.

The new development is a big leap from what was once a slippery track especially during rainy season.

Philistus Meke said she was able to apply what learnt from the Pre-Employment Training about ‘Safety at Work’ such as wearing proper work clothes and how to handle hand tools and now understands how concrete ladders are made.

David Koevania, the group leader said he has picked up skills in ‘form work’, laying down wire mesh and scaffolding for the concrete to run along.

Christina who is a Form 2 student at Mbokona and Stella a Form 1 student said it was very hard to get up the hill in rainy weather.

They said one has to find a safe foot rest and use aid of a stick while going up or down the path.

With the new pedestrian it changed Titinge community as there is no longer a tiring job like before and do not have to take long way around.

It is also women and girls who done washing at the Community western top end of Titinge benefit from such difference in terms of easy accessibility to water source.

Peaceful Easter celebrations across Malaita

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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BY SAMIE WAIKORI

Auki

MALAITA Provincial Police Commander has acknowledged people in the province for good behaviour shown during the Easter session.

PPC Timothy Apaesi says the good behaviour shown portrays that people truly observed and were driven with the spirit of the Easter.

He said yesterday that all through the Easter weekend his office generally recorded no major incident both in Auki and across the province.

Apaesi said there were one or two cases but police worked really well to keep them at bay.

He said cooperation shown between people and public was really great resulting in a peaceful Easter celebration in Malaita.

Apaesi said people should uphold the same kind of behaviour as being law abiding citizens for the good of the province and the country.

He also asked the general public for cooperation with police to ensure Malaita province is a safer place for everyone.

Apaesi once again thanked chiefs, community elders, stakeholders, church leaders and followers and both men and women for their good behaviour during the Easter weekend.

What ‘NO’ and ‘STOP’ means

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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Josephine Teakeni and Georgianna Sogotee on behalf of Vois Blong Mere Solomon and Women For Peace

THIS month, we have shared feelings of great anger, shame and grief.

We are angry that our children are not safe from the most cruel and devastating violence of rape.

We are ashamed that our community makes excuses for these inexcusable acts.

And we grieve for the victims of these horrors, for their families and for our country.

By now everyone must have read or heard about the rape of young children across our islands.

We write on behalf of Vois Blong Mere and Women for Peace to condemn these perpetrators in the strongest terms.

You may also have read or listened to the opinion of your fellow citizens about these heinous crimes?

We write today to condemn all those who apologise for and reason away these acts of violence.

These people, who make excuses, make our community unsafe for victims to come forward.

These apologists for rape and paedophilia allow perpetrators to walk free because they see rape as the fault of victims, their guardians, or as a man’s right; rape is none of these things. Rape is a crime that ruins lives.

In the Island Sun on Thursday March 22, three men and three women were asked – ‘What is the cause for men raping a child and how can we avoid such behaviour?’

Every person questioned made excuses, saying that rape happens when women ‘overlook’ their husband’s rights, parents aren’t watching their children, men are stressed, or their ancestors raped so it is genetic, the devil tempts us, or men don’t understand women who act without inhibition.

We tell you now – every man knows what the word NO means, every man knows what the word STOP means and every man can and must stop.

Are we not made in God’s image according to His likeness?

We all know what a man’s role is: to provide, protect and make a safe space for his family.

No good or god-fearing man would wish rape upon his mother, sister or daughter.

There is no reason for rape other than insanity. And no victim of rape has any responsibility for that crime.

Women, children, all of us have a right to be safe and to control what happens to our bodies. It does not matter if children are alone or young women are drinking.

I call on all of you who read or listen to this statement to think seriously about this scourge in our community and the part you can play in correcting it.

Mothers and fathers – speak to your sons about respect and women’s rights. Talk about what it means to be a good man.

Men – do not be complicit when you see harassment, hear jokes about hurting women or witness threatening behaviour by your friends.

Women –do not tolerate excuses, blame victims or contribute to a culture of silence. Be advocates for survivors.

My thoughts are with all the survivors within our community and I pray every day for our families and our country to be safe and free.

–VOIS BLO MERE SI

West urges national gov’t to lower tax rates

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

BY ALFRED PAGEPITU

GIZO

THE Western province government has called on the national government to seriously consider lowering its ‘very high taxation rate’.

Minister of Tourism and Culture Division Christian Mesepitu in his Sine Die deliberations last week said the country’s high tax rates is making investing in the country ‘very difficult to impossible’.

“I challenge the national government to pin down the very high taxation rate and allow some sort of incentives to selected category of investors to lure attraction to invest in our shore.

“If the national government finds it difficult to indentify taxation, why not Western Province takes the initiative.

“We can start of is by indentifying airfares for our international inbound tourists and travelers.”

Mr Mesepitu said subsidiary airfares should be provided lowering it to an affordable rate to maximise capacity on airplane seats.

“By the rate, I believe we can address high airfare rate currently in place which is ridiculous.

“Our national airline is struggling with empty seats on most of its international flight especially to Australia.

“This is because it is too expensive then they rather go to Vanuatu, Fiji, PNG or even Bali for vacation because it is three times cheaper compared to us.”

He said Solomon Islands is being regarded as an expensive holiday destination that only high-end customers can afford to come to Solomon Islands.

“But they are occasional or seasonal travelers. Therefore, we need to target demographic age group from 10-40 years but middle and working class who travels just about any time.”

Wale wants bauxite operations ceased

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

By Mike Puia

MEMBER of Parliament for Aoke/Langalanga, Mathew Wale, has called for a cease to all bauxite mining operations on Rennell Island, Renbel Province.

Mr Wale made this call when staff of the Ministry of Mines, Energy and Rural Electrification (MMERE) appeared before the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) recent inquiry.

The outspoken Wale urged staff of the Ministry to bring an amendment to Parliament to address issues relating to bauxite operations on Rennell or cease all bauxite mining operations on the island.

He said it appears the Ministry has been careless when handling this matter.

Wale said the Ministry should not wait on its new law to deal with issues relating to mining on Rennell but treat this issue with urgency by bringing an amendment to Parliament.

“The Ministry must come to Parliament with an amendment to deal specifically with bauxite issues as a matter of urgency,” Wale said.

He described the situation the country is facing with regards to bauxite mining as a “leakage”.

Wale said even if the country is not having issues with cash flow, it is immoral to get minerals out of the country without any legislative oversight or system to test and know what is going out and what returns the country is getting.

He was making reference to statement from staff of the Ministry who revealed that the Ministry has no formula to calculate what the country will get from the bauxites exported.

“I think the Ministry has two options here. You come to Parliament with an amendment urgently or cease all operations on Rennell,” Wale said.

He said the Ministry cannot allow bauxite mining operations to continue on Rennell when it has no law to cater for bauxite mining operations.

“This is a very concerning issue therefore the Ministry must not take it lightly,” Wale said.

Since the commencement of mining on the island in 2014, a total of 47 exports have been made.

On average, about 70,000 of metric tonnes are shipped out in one shipment.

Lauru shipping operation flows

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

BY BARNABAS MANEBONA

NOT all of Lauru Shipping Company’s ships are out of service as MV Nuatabu is continuing her operation for Choiseul Province.

Solomon Islands Maritime Safety Administration (SIMSA) Acting Director Jonah Mitau confirmed this after concern from Choiseul Province citizens had it that all of Lauru Shipping’s ships are out of service in which the situation will affect transport services in the province.

The Director clarified from query that both MV Lauru 1 and MV San Marcos are indeed experiencing mechanical problems in which their administration awaits both master’s or responsible officer’s reports on the incident.

“MV Nuatabu owned by Hon Manasseh Sogavare’s Constituency and operated by Lauru Shipping Company however is continuing her operation,” said Mr Mitau.

Currently, people of Choiseul Province are calling on their Provincial Government to advice Lauru Shipping Company to charter or make arrangements with other shipping services purposely to operate sea transport services to the province.

“Business houses in the province are badly affected by the major setback on quick and efficient services provided by Lauru Shipping Company in which we sympathise with them for that matter,” said locals.

Walking the talk or taking a walk?

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

DEAR EDITOR, this is what has transpired over the weeks with our 4billion dollar budget.

It baffles me a lot how politicians here in the Solomons do their daily business and expects the public to just swallow the outcome of their actions.

Better be warned that China town burning can repeat itself.

A strong democracy is where there is stability in all levels of governance, a good opening remarks published in the Island Sun by Hon Manele in the DAP party’s fundraising drive.

What the government has done has been a mockery to what they have been advocating all along.

The Finance minister has rightly spelled out the anticipated revenue collection points and has warned that the forestry sector has stabilised at a very high level.

Not only that but very unsustainable and once not acted upon, the country is to lose a great deal of its natural forest in few years’ time.

Sadly, the newly lodged JICA programme in partnership with the ministry of forestry will be of no good at this current rate of forest depletion.

The SI Finance has further reiterated that the other strong collection points will be fisheries and the Agriculture sector. Where have you injected your 2018 budget? CDF?

Have you gauged your achievements? Please publish quantitative data for the public to see. The PCDF has done that in the paper recently.

Why have you taken the $70m from the Solomon Islands and selfishly increased your share through the CDF?

Is this combating corruption head-on or committing corruption head-on?

Why have we ingested the financial system with all these?

Have we taken some time out to rethink of our actions?

A strong institutionalized fund; is the PCDF, please give back to the people what rightful is theirs.

This is the only successful programme the SIG has ever partnered with – Availing infrastructures in the provincial level to boost your anticipated revenue collection sectors!

A “natural death” to PCDF as pointed out by Malaita premier will be slap on the face of all Solomon Islanders.

The world will witness what next year will be like with PCDF & our current Highest House representatives.

The SIG highest house has been mocking the citizen of this country for too long; a public protest is thus guaranteed – It’s time we exercise our powers – the people’s power.

By Deebonz

Honiara

SIPEU loans

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

DEAR EDITOR, I have been waiting patiently for my loan for almost two months now. SIPEU keep on saying that next week, next week! I am left confused.

Please credit committee show some commitments to the people whom you serve. Enough of this $500 sitting allowance.

My saving should be rightly available for me when the need arises.

The fund has been there for many years and the construction of the box SIPEU house shouldn’t be an excuse for funds depletion.

Take for instance for every paydays (monthly) an average of $250 saving X 1000 workers equate to a quarter million SBD deposits excluding the 5 percent interest paid by members for their advances.

A general meeting for its members is yet to be done so as the financial status update of the saving.

This is people’s money and its dealings has to be disclosed to its rightful owners.

Where investments are made and returns are made must be made to its owners. This is another saving club like the NPF.

But the difference is that with NPF, Contribution are given electrically to its members, SPO returns are published and so forth.

I think SIPEU should be better off since individual investments on average is more compared to NPF, if I am right.

The credibility of NPF is through the strive by the workers themselves. Creativity and taking initiative to make a change in the organisation.

With SIPEU, the problem was created by taking on board incompetent workers. Are we employing this workers on merit basis?

We should only have one teller lady there to stamp and give out advances.

The rest should be well trained people who are vigilant in their hunt to grow the investment.

A manager who has the vision for the fund must be put in place before we encounter the similar fate of the police saving club.

All that is happening behind the SIPEU doors now is usual old fashion working style.

Even with simple desk customer service was lacking as well. Once I asked for the status of my loan and the reply was, “we give priorities for school fees”.

Where on earth did you take that answer?

I am loaning against my share. I have contributed over 10 years and this is what you have to tell me.

To conclude, an audit to the saving must be immediately carried out and financial statements must be made to the members.

Qualified people must be taken on board and rid-off the unproductive bunch.

Deebonz

Honiara

Did the party to party executive meeting end it all?

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

By Alfred Sasako

IT was supposed to be a private affair. But private it was not. This is because it was the first time the executives of the Kadere and Democratic Alliance Party (DAP) met face to face in four months.

To everyone it was a bad marriage.

But at the meeting, everything reportedly flowed freely – trays of crayfish, mud crabs and fish of all descriptions, according to insiders who attended the 26th March top level meeting.

The importance of the meeting could not be understated. The reason(s) are obvious. DAP and Kadere have the controlling share so to speak in the company called Solomon Islands Democratic Coalition for Change Government (SIDCCG).

Without a course mutually agreed for the nine months’ journey to the next election, there could be a lot of detours along the way. And so the meeting was very important in that aspect.

It was also important because the Government’s budget for 2018 was by then still in the air. Any wrong move could trigger unwanted outcomes.

SIDCCG’s Coalition Minor Party, the People’s Alliance Party (PAP) was represented at the meeting by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and External Trade, Hon Milner Tozaka MP.

If there were a star performer at the meeting, it was none other than the President of Kadere Party, Peter Boyers, according to one insider.

He spoke at length about the importance of the customary governance system in a show intended to impress his political masters. Some were not impressed.

“You cannot apply that in every province. It may work in provinces such as Isabel and Choiseul, but certainly not on Malaita. It simply would not work,” some observers said quietly afterwards.

After his verbal presentation, Mr Boyers was confronted with the reality.

“Would you prepare a report on the customary governance system for our consideration, one Minister reportedly told Mr Boyers.

A deadline was reportedly given the former finance minister to furnish the executives of the ruling coalition parties his report, something which almost cost him his job when the issue consultants (political appointments) came before the new Prime Minister Ricky Houenipwela in January this year.

Being President of Kadere Party saved his job, except that the legality of such appointment is still under question mark based on sections of the State-Owned Enterprises Act.

That said, it was admirable to see the two leading parties accepted the need to convene a meeting with the aim of resolving the impasse, which had kept them apart for four months.

Leadership is about making tough and courageous decisions in tough times. Tough times call for tough decisions. They did. Whether or not both Parties have buried the hatchets so to speak, no one really knows.

The fact that no public statement came out after the meeting of feasting seems to suggest many outstanding issues were never resolved. They might have been swept under the carpet.

The half-day meeting was held in what was certainly a tough time for the coalition partners. It was even tougher for the people of Solomon Islands who expected political stability but instead witnessed the removal of Hon Manasseh Sogavare as Prime Minister last December.

The sad fact that no statement was made about the outcome of such an important meeting suggests that the undercurrents would continue undeterred.

One can only hope that Prime Minister Houenipwela has his sights firmly on his vision for the nation. He will certainly need all the support he needs particularly from within to arrive at the destiny he has set for our struggling nation.

People power for health

Written by
Milton Ragaruma
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0

Anything is possible if we set our mind to it.

RECENTLY, within a week, a father’s plea had been answered when he appealed for assistance from the public to send his daughter overseas for medical check.

His plea came out the same time we received news that our 10 beds arrangement with St Vincent hospital had been suspended.

St Vincent hospital 10 bed arrangement had been described as discriminatory by some on social media citing it as an arrangement for the ‘elite’ only, whilst for some, it had served its purpose in ensuring genuine citizens have access to medical treatment not offered in the country.

That aside, this is proof of what we as citizens can do if we set our mind to it.

‘People power’ though might be defined as campaign to overthrow the government or a social movement to have the voices of the people heard, this recent ‘people power’ demonstration is neither a social movement calling to government for recognition nor one intended to overthrow the government.

This demonstration shows how we as Solomon Islanders can unite in times of need. It shows that despite the much talked about high cost of living, people still practice compassion and have shown what true charity is.

Such an act should be highly commended by our leaders.

True a CT scanner might be costly and run into millions of dollars but what is more important than life itself?

We have demonstrated already that nothing is impossible.

Thus it is pleasing to see youths initiating innovative ideas to raise funds with the knowledge and skills they have.

Thumbs up to everyone who have supported one way or another.

Let us not stop there.

Let us continue to raise funds for our health sector and let us lead the way for our leaders to see how things should be done.

Because at the end of the day, while our leaders have their privileges, we the grassroots people will be left to seek medical assistance from our local health centres.

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