Kiribati A Strike Casualty

WHILE the Naurans can still use their three 737 jets to ferry patients and politicians and essential provisions on private flights to Australia, crewing the aircraft with the handful of non-striking pilots, the people of Kiribati are not so fortunate.

Air Nauru provided the fastest and cheapest air link with Australia, and the Boeing 737 could maintain a reasonable airfreight service: but now the grounding of the flights has stretched into its fifth month, Kiribati has only a weekly flight by Marshall Islands Airways, which op erates between the Marshalls and Fiji with a call at Tarawa in Kiribati.

While the airline can accommodate most of the passengers wanting to get to Kiribati, its relatively small aircraft the DO2B cannot meet the demand for air freight, and even medical supplies are being delayed. The Kiribati Government is understandably working on the premise that it could be some time before Air Nau ru’s jets touch down at its international air

port, and has apparently approached the Australian and New Zealand govern ments for help in establishing its own di rect service, probably to Australia.

According to one observer, the Kiri bati Government is considering several options, including the possibility of An sett extending its Cook Islands/Western Samoa operation to include Tarawa.

There fs one ominous development ac centuated by the Air Nauru strike: many young i-Kiribati men work abroad as sea men, a valuable source of overseas re mittances for the cash-strapped island economy. It is understood that some of the shipping companies employing these men are baulking at the cost of flying them home between engagements, arguing that it is cheper to employ Asian seamen whose homes are served by more frequent and cheaper air links. The loss of that employ ment would be a serious blow to the Kir ibati economy, and is one factor adding urgency to the government’s search for a new air service. □