Deaths

of Islands People

For many years he was a vice president of Rishikul Maha Sabha in Nasinu. He was also a past treasurer of the Rakiraki boy scouts, president of the Sikh Temple in Lautoka, and served as manager and coach of Suva Athletic Union for many years.

timothy Banga, Ronald

Paul On September 11, when the Taiwanese fishing vessel Shut Long Shing sank off Santo, Vanuatu.

Timothy Banga, 21, was from Ambae, and Ronald Paul, 22, from Paama. Both had joined the ship as fisheries trainees only the day before they died.

Bishop Paschal Sweeney

A member of the Passionist Congregation, Father Paschal Sweeney was the first Mission Superior when the Australian

Province of the congregation took responsibility for the missionary region of Vanimo, Papua New Guinea, in 1955.

He was ordained bishop when the diocese of Vanimo was created in 1966.

Bishop Sweeney, after many achievements in expanding the work of the diocese, was forced by ill health to retire from active duty in 1979, when he returned to Australia.

Martha Ann Shave In Suva in September, aged 90.

Mrs Shave was the eldest of the large Blanch family, one of the oldest European pioneer families in Fiji.

Her daughter, artist Loma Livingston, a former MP, said: ‘She was a professional at her job as a mother and home maker.’ Don Burness, of Suva, paid tribute to the way in which Mrs Shave supported her hus band, Herbert Lennox Shave, who was blind for 20 years before his death in 1958.

Eparama Ketedromo

In South Australia on September 22.

Widely known as ‘Abe’, Eparama Ketedromo was a

founding member of the Fijian Association in South Australia.

He was a dedicated worker at the Mt Lofty Municipal Gar dens, where his speciality was developing rhododendrons and azaleas.

His father Paula flew from Fiji to Adelaide for the funeral, which was attended by 500

people.

F. G. Jordan.

Johnson Seimo At Port-Vila Base Hospital, Vanuatu, on September 24, aged 25.

Johnson Seimo was a pho tographer and reporter on the government weekly Tam-Tam.

He was also well-known as a musician with the popular Fatuana String Band. He was an active member of the Presbyterian Church, and of the Charismatic Movement.

Father Peter Rushton In Tasmania, Australia, on September 14, aged 54.

A former Anglican priest.

Father Rushton became a Cath olic in 1956. He had married in 1950.

After three years lay mission ary work in Fiji on behalf of the Catholic Church, the question of his becoming a priest was raised by his parish priest in the Sydney suburb of Ryde to which he had returned. After consultations with the local church hierarchy, and with Rome, Peter Rushton became the first married priest of the Latin rite to serve in an English speaking country.

At the time of his death, Father Rushton was a parish priest of St. Francis Xavier’s Church, South Hobart.

Samuela Ariki At his home in Mauke, Cook Islands, on September 6.

One of the Ariki of Mauke, Samuela Ariki became the first person in the Cook Islands to be baptised a Catholic in 1903.

Cooks Prime Minister Sii Thomas Davis and his wife, Pa Tepaeru Arike, went to Mauke for the funeral service at the island’s Catholic Church.

Tamata Manuela In New Zealand in September, aged 58.

A former chairman of the Manihiki, Cook Islands, Island Council, Tamata Manuela was also extremely active in church affairs, serving as the Manihiki representative on the Cook Islands Christian Church executive for several years.