The Sunias’ rise from

Profile

By David North

FAMILIES play important roles in the politics of all islands, but the recent ups and downs of the Sunia family in American Samoa may be without precedent.

Four years ago the head of the family was in a Mainland prison for mis-using federal funds now Fofo Sunia and his three siblings all hold powerful positions in the American Samoan Government

(Asg).

Tause Sunia was elected Lieutenant Governor on A.P. Lutali’s Democrat ticket in November.

Soon thereafter Lutali appointed Aitofele Sunia to what is probably the most important position in his Cabinet, that of Treasurer.

And then their sister, Vaoita Savali, an experienced radio broadcaster, was named by Lutali to run the government owned television station, and, as such, serves as head of the of ASG Office of Information.

Meanwhile, their eldest brother, Fofo, is the ranking staff member of the Fono,

Samoa’a legislature.

Although the positions are important, the immediate tasks for the Sunias are not pleasant: • Tauese, as acting Governor, was given the job of running a major reduction in workforce wiping out the jobs of 1000 of ASG’s 5000 employees while Governor Lutali was off in Washington, helping to celebrate the inauguration of Bill Clinton. • Brother Aitofele, as Treasurer, had to try to scrape together enough money to meet the payroll; which consumes a

remarkable 84 per cent of ASG’s expen ditures. (The departing Republican Governor, Peter Tali Coleman, had left an empty treasury when he left office.) • And sister Vaoita had to try and explain all the bad news through the ASG information office and its television station.

All in all, a rough challenge for the family.

But the Sunias had seen tougher times in the past.

Fofo, the oldest brother, was born in 1937 into a powerful family which had roots in both Samoas. For example, his mother’s brother, Taofilau Eti Alesana, is the Prime Minister of Western Samoa; his mother was born to Western Samoan parents while they were missionaries in Papua New Guinea. The young Fofo studied at high schools in American and Western Samoa and then went to the University of Hawaii where he secured a BA in economics.

He became, fairly early in life, both a high chief and a talking chief (or orator) in Samoa’s matai system, and 10 years after leaving university he was chosen j (by the other matai in his village) for a seat in the territorial senate. He had both a modern education and the ancient titles, as well as the skills to move ahead in Samoan politics.

In 1980 he became the first delegate from Samoa to be seated in the US House of Representatives and was re-elected to that post in 1982, 1984 and 1986. He fared well in Congress, and by 1987 had become a chairman of a congressional sub-committee that dealt with non island affairs, the first island delegate in American history with that distinction.

Meanwhile, with a salary of close to SIOO,OOO a year, Fofo ran a nearly 51 million-a-year enterprise his office in the US House of Representatives. (The other members had similar salaries, of course, but each of them had 10 times as many constituents as Sunia.) Just why the delegate defrauded the taxpayers is not totally clear, but how' he did it, and how he got caught are matters of record.

Press speculation at the time (in 1988) was that Fofo felt a need to entertain and entertain lavishly the many Samoans who came to Washington. It was within the tradition, but there was no provision for it in the congressional

budget.

According to leaked reports from the prosecutors, what he and his then administrative assistant did was to add several residents of Samoa to the payroll and then cashed the paychecks. As these things go, it was neither a sophisticated

aor fool-proof scheme; although the

lames and salaries of the “ghost em iloyees” appeared in a public document which rarely finds its way to Pago s ago), there was no outcry.

But one of the “ghosts” later found hat the federal tax system planned to issess taxes on him for moneys he never eceived. He complained, and soon ederal investigators broke the case.

Fofo Sunia did not have the option of . trial in the friendly courts of the islands; ince the cheques were signed in Wash igton, he had a choice of pleading guilty r facing trial in the District of Colum ia. He pleaded guilty, was given a fine nd a short sentence in prison, and his seat in the House.

Days after finishing his sentence and "turning to Pago Pago Fofo Sunia was ired by the Fono as a ranking staff

member. Despite his problems with the law, no other Samoan (with the possible exception of the alternating governors, Coleman and Lutali) had his depth of experience with territorial and federal government, and so he was put to work by his former legislative colleagues. He has spent the recent years working quietly, largely out of the limelight.

But in 1992 the jSunia family surged forward.

First there was the selection of Tauese Sunia by A.P. Lutali as his running mate, for the office of Lt. Governor. (In Samoa, as in many Mainland states, the voters select among slates for these offices; if you wanted to vote for Sunia then you had to vote for Lutali, and vice versa.) Tauese had a very special, very Samoan occupation; he worked as a lay advocate (sort of a lawyer-substitute) handling matai claims before the High Court of American Samoa.

Lutali and Sunia defeated the Coleman-Toloa team by a wide margin in the November elections, and were sworn into office in early January.

On the last day of 1992 Lutali announced a number of Cabinet ap pointments including that of Aitofele Sunia as the new ASG Treasurer. The job is roughly comparable to that of the British Chancellor of the Exchequer or the Australian Treasurer; the incumbent supervises the development of budgets, the collection of taxes, and the payment of wages and other government bills.

There was some criticism of this Sunia appointment on the grounds that the new Treasurer was a lawyer, not a money man. Lutali’s spokesman replied the new governor wanted someone with a background in the law “to ensure that the law is followed at all times”.

Aitofele had previously served as Chief Legislative Counsel to the Fono , and, in more recent years had been in private practice with Ward and Associates.

Ironically, earlier in 1992 he had made headlines by successfully defending the former vice-speaker of the island House of Representatives on a fraud charge.

Moananu Va had been charged with taking government travel vouchers (for off-island travel), not using them, and converting them to cash. Aitofele had argued not that the act did not happen, but that no crime was involved because ASG did not give Moananu adequate opportunity to return the funds once he was caught. This presumably, is a line of reasoning Aitofele will not use in his new position.

The Sunias, of course, are not the only families involved in American Samoa politics. The appointments of former Governor Coleman’s son as his chief-of staff, and ofhis son-in-law as Washington representative had been highlighted in earlier issues of PIM as was the selection of Coleman’s daughter to the non-paid position of American Samoan member of the Republican National Committee.

And, more recently, it was learned that Governor Lutali’s daughter, Josephine, had been working for the ASG Treas urer’s office in an unannounced capacity, but apparently not that of deputy Treasurer.

Meanwhile, Savali Alesana Sunia, mother of the four office-holding Sunias and several other children, is in an odd situation. While she must pay taxes to Aitofele, and can watch Vaota’s tele vision, she has never been able to vote for either Fofo or Tauese.

No women and few men in Samoa can vote for representatives in the Samoa territorial senate where Fofo served for so long, as these selections are made by the malai. But male and female nationals can and do vote for both Lt. Governor and for the delegate to congress but Ms Sunia is not a national and never can be.

Although she has lived most of her life in American Samoa, and her children (born there) are national and prominent ones at that, there is no naturalisation process in American Samoa, so she will remain an alien in her children’s country for the rest of her life. □