People

Three men, each with a vital mission ahead, were pictured together at the October South Pacific Conference in Noumea: Young Vivian, Niue’s Minister for Economic Development, Agriculture and Education; Toalipi Lauti, Prime Minister of Tuvalu and chairman of the conference; and Tonga’s Macu Salato, Secretary-General of the South' Pacific Commission (page 27).

Mr Vivian’s challenge is his election as successor to Secretary-General Salato. He will step into Dr Salato’s shoes in mid-1979, for the time being

giving up his political responsi

bilities in Niue where he is regarded as a possible suc cessor to Premier Robert Rex.

Secretary-General Salato’s

challenge is to work with the South Pacific Bureau for Econ omic Co-operation’s Director Mahe Tupouniua, toward a better understanding between the two organisations. Dr Salato has been in the Secretary-General’s job for three years and during that time has obviously earned the trust and respect of his staff at the SPC headquarters in Noumea. There’s a desperate need for more co-operation and co-ordination between the SPC and SPEC. Macu Salato and Mahe Tupuoniua are the men to do it.

Prime Minister Toalipi Lau d’s challenge is the job of run ning a brand new independent country. He had only just got

through Tuvalu’s indepen

dence celebrations when he had to fly to Noumea to chair the South Pacific Conference.

If he runs Tuvalu along the lines he ran the conference there should be no worries.

Toalipi Lauti has an imper turbable air about him.

There’s good news for Tuvaluans (and others) con cerned about Princess Mar

garet’s health following the

‘respiratory tract infection’ that

prevented her from officiating at Tuvalu’s independence cel ebration on October 1 (PIM November). Just a little more than three weeks later on October 24, London news papers reported that the Prin cess ‘brought the house down’ when she appeared the night before as Mae West, Sophie Tucker and a Valkyrie at a fancy dress ball in Scotland.

The Princess has clearly made a rapid and complete recov ery.

Prominent Cook Islands poli tician laveta Short was appointed Australasian Re gional Representative of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association at a CPA con ference held in Jamaica in Sep tember. He succeeds Sir Vijay

Singh of Fiji whose three-year

term has expired.

One of the most popular teachers in Solomon Islands, Sister Lyn Sadler, has returned to New Zealand after 15 years at Goldie College. Her main subject was English, but she was noted throughout Solomon Islands as author and

producer of pantomimes. Dur

ing her stay she and her cast of youngsters took eight different pantomime productions to various parts of Solomon Islands. Sister Lyn belongs to the United Church.

Cook Islands News, published daily by the Cook Islands

Government’s Broadcasting

and Newspaper Corporation,

has a new editor Arthur Taripo, Rarotonga-born and New Zealand-educated. Be fore taking over the News Mr Taripo was with the New Zealand High Commission in the Cooks. The News was already in the process of a facelift, following the dramatic July change of government in the Cooks, when Mr Taripo assumed duties.

Rory Scott, director of Papua New Guinea’s Office of Tour ism 1975-77, has been appointed director of sales, Asia, for Holiday Inns Inter national. He is based in Hong Kong. Before his PNG appointment, Mr Scott worked as a district officer for the

Government of Fiji and as gen eral manager for Fiji Visitors Bureau.

A World Health Organisation (WHO) consultant who has served in Fiji and Papua New Guinea, Dr Remigio D. Mer cado of the Philippines, has been appointed director of health services development and planning in WHO’s West ern Pacific regional office in Manila.

Felise Va’a, managing editor of The Samoa Times, unaware of a court order prohibiting publi cation of the name of a defend ant, allowed the name to be printed. He soon found out that ignorance of the law is no excuse. The Chief Justice, Judge Nicholson, hit him with a $lOO fine for contempt of court.

Detective-Constable Talakai Misi of Tonga helped Queensland police arrest a Brisbane man, subsequently charged with possession of marihuana. On duty with the drug squad with three other policemen, Det.-Const. Misi took part in a raid on a house in Brisbane, where they found marihauna and made the arrest. It was his first practical training exercise on a criminal

investigation course arranged by Rotary International Dis trict 960 in Queensland which has paid for his fares and ac commodation (PIM Novem ber). After two weeks training, with emphasis on drug detec tion, he started a three-week criminal investigation course.

Tonga’s crooks if of course there are any had better watch out when Misi comes home.

The West German Govern ment has appointed William Keil honorary consul in Apia.

Mr Keil is general manager of Morris Hedstrom’s in Apia and is also a director of Samoa Holdings, Samoa Paints, the Pacific Commercial Bank, South Pacific Industrials and Samoa Meats. At the time of his appointment, the Samoan Government named Mr Hayo Breckwoldt as honorary consul for Western Samoa in Ham

burg, West Germany. Diplo

matic missions in Apia now include the New Zealand and Australian High Commissions, the Chinese consulate, a United States consular agent’s office, and honorary consuls for France, South Korea, West Germany and Nauru.

Delegate A.P. Lutali has an nounced from Washington that

Princess Margaret watches welcoming dancers at Funafuti, Tuvalu: 24 hours later a temperature of 104 degrees Fahrenheit Photo Bob Hawkins

he will not seek another term as American Samoa’s Delegate

to Washington. His four-year

term will expire on December 31. Lutali said that before he took office in 1975 he promised his family, as well as his con stituents, that he would serve only one term. T am not going to renege on that promise,’ he said. ‘But it is certainly more than a promise,’ he went on.‘As a high chief, I have important responsibilities bestowed upon me by my people under the Samoan customs, including re sponsibility for the lands and affairs of my extended family and home island. To stay away for another four years would make it extremely difficult for me to meet those traditional obligations. I know I cannot do it from 9 000 miles away in

Washington.’

More than 20 million Britons will learn something about Papua New Guinea when BBC television presents Ileksen, a documentary film on PNG’s general election last year made by two young Australians, Denis O'Rourke and Gary Kildea.

Ileksen, (pidgin for election) is the product of joint efforts by the film-makers, British Air ways and the PNG Govern

ment. British Airways agreed

to help with the travel needed to complete the film and then to introduce it to the world market. Connections between

Air Niugini’s Port Moresby-

Hong Kong service and BA’s

Hong Kong-London service

made it easy for O’Rourke and Kildea to commute to Europe.

The PNG Government granted them total freedom to put the election story together as they saw it. Prime Minister Michael Somare and Electoral Commmissioner James Mileng guaranteed their right to

independent judgement on

content and to film all cam

paign activities, including even

secret party meetings.

Ileksen was selected for a showing at the Edinburgh Film Festival. It was such a success there that BBC 2 Television de cided to buy rights to show it

on the top-ranking programme

The World Around Us.

O’Rourke and Kildea have received invitations to screen

Ileksen at festivals in Toronto, Geneva, Chicago and Los Angeles. The Australian pair have already won the world’s premier award for documen taries. the first Grand Prix at MIFED, the annual documen tary film festival held in Milan.

Their award-winning film also had a PNG theme. It was Yumi Yet (a pidgin phrase translating roughly as ‘we ourselves’) which told the story of PNG

achieving independence.

Western Samoa’s Prime Minis ter Tupuola Efi keeps the Samoas reunification pot boil ing with a sly dig now and then.

Many Samoans believe that

reunification is possible if not for a long time. But Salanoa S.P. Aumoeualogo, president of the American Samoa Senate, bluntly says: ‘I believe one should never waste

time discussing something that

shall never happen’. Salanoa, however, who is chairman of the 1978 Political Status Study Commission for American Samoa, told the Samoa News that the question of Samoan unification would probably be on the commission’s agenda again. A more earthy comment on reunification came from an American Samoan government driver: ‘Why should we? We get everything for free.’

Japanese Hironobu Shibuya,

for two years director of the United Nations Information Centre for Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands, has been transferred to UN head quarters in New York. The resident representative of the

UN Development Programme

(UNDP) in PNG, Tom Unwin, will act as director of the centre until a new appointment is made.

Australian boxing promoter Norm Salter, for the moment, has won his battle to stay in Papua New Guinea. He was told to leave after complaints, alleged to have been triggered by jealousies in the PNG box ing scene, that he had broken his conditions of residence. Mr Salter went to PNG as a company business manager but it was not long before he got involved in management and training of boxers and fight promotions. Perhaps his grea test success was as manager trainer of John Aba who has

fought his way impressively to the Commonwealth junior

lightweight championship.

Prime Minister Michael Somare was drawn into the controversy at one stage and, after several weeks ‘exile’ in Australia, Mr Salter was granted a temporary visa. Now, ‘purely on its merits as an individual application’, his re quest for residence has been met with a residence permit listing him as a ‘professional boxing promoter, manager and trainer, permitted to exercise these occupations for two years’.

A senior official of the Papua New Guinea Department of Education, Geno Roakeina, back from a World Bank sponsored visit to the east African state of Zambia, has said that localisation should

take place gradually, realisti

cally and with a degree of cau tion. He said Zambia had the same skilled manpower needs as PNG, but a presidential de cree on localisation had had a paralysing effect on the Zam bian economy and public ser vice when skilled expatriates were forced to leave the country. As a result Zambia was now being forced to recruit skilled manpower from Asia.

Captain Clive Mclver, an Aus tralian pilot working for the Papua New Guinea airline Talair, is probably not anxious to visit neighbouring Irian Jaya for some time to come. He was an involuntary guest of the Indonesian authorities in October when the aircraft he flew into Jayapura’s Sentani airport was impounded for al

leged ‘illegal entry’. The

Indonesian authorities dropped their demand for pay ment of a SUS6OO fine and al lowed Captain Mclver to return to PNG following inter vention with Jakarta by Indonesian ambassador to PNG, Major-General Busiri Surjowinoto. It was the second time Captain Mclver has been in command of an aircraft

impounded by Indonesian

authorities in Irian Jaya. The first was at Merauke in south east of the province during a period of tension on the border between Irian Jaya and PNG.

British Airways Port Moresby manager David Graeme (left) with, from left, Denis O’Rourke, Gary Kildea, Electoral Commissioner James Mileng and Prime Minister Somare

Western Samoa’s Salanoa S.P.

Aumoeualogo: no deal -Photo: Samoa News