People

I Governor Paul Calvo of Guam [late last year presented the [Ancient Order of the Cham morri, one of the territory’s highest awards, to Bank of Hawaii Vice-President Michael Ord.

Calvo said the award was given to Ord on behalf of the

people of Guam. ‘During

Mike’s years in Guam, he was involved in not just the com mercial sector, but in civic affairs as well,’ Calvo said. ‘He made a wonderful contribution to the enrichment of the island and we hope he will come back to Guam.’

Ord was the Bank of Hawaii’s district administrator and branch manager of Guam from 1968-1976. During his time there he was president and chairman of the Chamber of Commerce and held many other civilian posts. ‘The years in Guam were the best years of my life because I

was able to help make things

happen in a developing econ omic area,’ Ord said. ‘When I first went out there, the country

was just becoming economi

cally active from a develop

ment point of view.’

Ord said that during those pears Guam’s economy ikyrocketed. i had the chance )f a lifetime to help in some vay to formulate economic growth and expansion,’ he laid. leine Sanft, 32, is the first Vestem Samoan to gain an air raft maintenance engineer’s icence in New Zealand. Heine, fflo works for Polynesian Air nes, has been studying off and n in New Zealand and has re irned to PAL to work.

Villiam Scott, a 46-year-old

lachelor of Economics, is Aus ralia’s new Trade Com

missioner to Papua New

iuinea. He succeeds Patrick orbes, who will become Trade

’ommissioner to Yugoslavia,

before joining the Australian

trade service, Mr Scott spent 16 years with the ANZ Bank, two and a half of them in Suva.

The first woman from Raro tonga to gain a law degree is Tina Pupuke, 24, daughter of Cook Islands’ Deputy Premier Dr Pupuke Robati. She had been in New Zealand on a Cook Islands Government scholarship for six years, and returned home in December after working for an Auckland law firm for a year to gain court

experience.

Fiji’s Minister for Youth and Sport, Vivekananda Sharma, has resigned. An unconfirmed report said Mr Sharma would

be leaving Fiji to join the

Switzerland-based World Government of the Age of

Enlightenment headed by the

Indian guru Maharani Mahesh Yogi. The Maharishi last year named Mr Sharma as the 11th honorary minister to take charge of the portfolio of Youth and Invincibility. Mr Sharma later denied the report, saying he would retain his seat in parliament. ‘I shall remain in Fiji to serve the country as best as I can.’ He gave no reason for

resigning his portfolio< but

government sources said the resignation was ‘part of a reshuffle that Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara had foreshadowed late last year.’

Group Captain Stewart

Mitchell, DFC, of the Royal Australian Air Force, has been appointed Australia’s Defence Adviser in Papua New Guinea.

He succeeds Group Captain

lan Gordon, who has returned

to Australia to become Staff Officer (Operations) at the

RAAF headquarters. Oper

ational Command, at Penrith, New South Wales.

The French airline UTA has chosen two local women for top positions in its Fiji oper ations. They are Mrs Carmella Maharaj, who becomes Com mercial Manager, and Mrs Patricia Figgess, who becomes Administrative and Financial Manager. Both have been with UTA in Fiji for a number of years. UTA Fiji is now attached to the UTA New Zealand representation headed by General Manager J. P.

Mouflard.

Ernest E. Ullrich has been

appointed honorary consul for

Tuvalu in New Zealand. He is operating out of consular offices in both Auckland and

Wellington.

Two of the busiest people in Vila these days are Ross Borland and Maria Kalsakau, who are serving respectively as Clerk of the Assembly to the New Hebrides’ Representative

Assembly (parliament), and

head of the Assembly’s Sec retariat.

Ross, 57, a former Australian postal official who has worked

on and off in New Hebrides in various capacities, postal and otherwise, over the past 28 years, describes his new job as ‘by far the most interesting I’ve ever had’.

When he spoke to PIM in Vila, he said that despite con tinuing political problems he was confident that the Pacific’s newest democratically elected parliament would work well.

After a short talk, he excused himself as he had important business to attend to: getting the money together to pay the new MRAs their salaries .. .

Maria Kalsakau hails from Fiji, but in 1977 made a fateful holiday visit to Vila. There she met and later married a young man called Kalpokor Kalsakau, now Minister of Finance in the New Hebrides Government.

An experienced stenogra pher, she is at present single

handedly preparing a

‘Summarised Record of

Proceedings’ of the Assembly

until more stenographers can be recruited (they aren’t easy to come by) and a proper Hansard-type service can be set up. It is hoped this can be done

by independence later this

year.

She says she has little dif ficulty in adapting the sounds of Pidgin to her Pitman short hand.

The Kalsakaus have one son, aged one year.

Maria is a first cousin of Agnes Mitchell, formerly of Fiji, whose cheerful and

friendly disposition is well

known to all visitors to the reception desk in PlM’s Syd ney office. Their mothers are sisters.

Above: Governor Paul Calvo of Guam (left) presents the Ancient Order of the Chamorri to Bank of Hawaii Vice-President Michael Ord. Governor Calvo said Mr Ord had made a wonderful contri bution to the enrichment of the island’. Above right: Maria Kal sakau, head of the secretariat of New Hebrides' Representative Assembly. Trouble finding sten ographers...

I Sir Josua Rabukawaqa. Fiji’s I roving ambassador in the I South Pacific, is leaving the I diplomatic service for the sec liond time and plans to concen- I trate his efforts on one of the I loves of his life music, and I its application to Fijian cus rtom. f Sir Josua. 62, has taken on a two-year, $lOO 000 project backed by Prime Minister Ratu [ Sir Kamisese Mara to record and codify Fijian customs, tra dition, song and dance, which are in danger of dying with the older Fijian people.

There’s no better choice than Sir Josua, composer of Western-style music blending with Fijian-style rhythm, com piler of a singing manual in Fijian and, for many years, conductor of Fijian choirs.

He hopes to produce the true [forms of ceremonial pro cedures. music and dancing pvhich. he says, are being eroded by tourism. [ Fijian entertainment groups are giving the tourist what he wants, which is good as far as it goes, comments Sir Josua, adding, ‘lf that is the trash tour ists want, let us give it to them, but let us retain our own tra dition.

The dignity and grace of Fijian dancing is the main ■hing that is thrown into thin tir with the tourists. For the

lancers performing for the

ourists is a “laugh” but, of all he recordings I have listened o. not a single one was true to radition.’

Most of the $lOO 000 will ome from the South Pacific Commission and the Aus ralian Government’s fund for

he preservation and develop

nent of South Pacific culture, iongs and ceremonial will be ipe-recorded and these, 3gether with a definitive book n the whole subject to be pro uced at the end of the two ear period, will be housed in le Fiji Museum in Suva.

The Ministry of Education is taring in the work through the :hools and there is full sup □rt from the Fijian chiefs and ie people. All oral and written :cords will be collected and ie traditional ceremonial pro cures of the vanua (confeder ions) of Burebasaga. Kubuna Tovata will be

documented and co-ordinated.

Gaps in material will be filled in with the help of the elderly people in the villages.

Sir Josua, a civil servant for 44 years, first retired two years ago after serving as Fiji's High Commissioner in London, but he was brought out of retirement to become Fiji’s

ambassador-at-large in the South Pacific. John Carter.

Fiji soldier Platoon Sergeant Sikiba Navitilai Suwai has won the Military Medal for his leadership under fire in Lebanon last July, when he fought his way out of an ambush to capture four ter rorists.

FIJI PM IN ISRAEL. In his recent state visit to Israel, Fiji prime minister, Ratu Sir Kamises Mara, views the City of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives and (below) visits the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. Earlier he had talks with Israel’s president, Yitzchak Navon.