In the black

WHAT a difference a year makes.

Who could forget last year’s fire works at the 32nd South Pacific Conference in Suva? Within hours of his appointment, as SPC secretary general-elect, Ati George Sokomanu hit out at the “colonial club” attitude he said still existed in this region, pointing .the finger especially at Australia. His attack was in response to some SPC member-countries including Australia, the United States, France the Cook Islands and French Polynesia not being happy with his appointment to the South Pacific Commission’s (SPC) top

position. Especially in light of the

financial mess the commission pres ented at last year’s meeting, feeling he was not the man to clean it up.

He had his knuckles rapped in the final report to last year’s conference. Com ments by the representative of French Polynesia, the Cook Islands, France and Tokelau, condemning his ‘colonial club’ media outburst, were endorsed by the conference.

The commission’s financial misman agement also came under fire, especially from the metropolitan members the biggest donors to the SPC. The finger naturally pointed at then incumbent secretary-general, Atanraoi Baiteke. The SPC’s big guns warned the commission to clean up the financial mess or they would reconsider their financial contributions.

The 33rd South Pacific Conference in Noumea couldn’t have been more differ ent. Sokomanu, who took the SPC helm

in January this year, announced a financial surplus at the close of their books at the end of 1992. “The audi tor’s report confirms that the SPC was truly in the black at the end of 1992,”

Sokomanu told the meeting with the hint of a smile on his face. But he was quick to point out that the credit for this good perform ance goes to Baiteke and his team who he said were directly responsible for overcoming the financial deficit.

Australia, the United States, New Zealand and the United Kingdom were among the first to congratulate Sokomanu on the improved financial situation paying

tribute to the secretary-general’s efforts and his lucid report.

However, Sokomanu said the financial outlook for 1994, particularly the contri butions to the Works Programme, was rather disappointing. He said a number of programmes were going to be drastically reduced and staff laid on because of a lack of funding. “Your secretariat’s Work Programme is totally at the mercy of donors. Despite all the noises made about country priorities, corporate plans and industrial democracy, the bottom line is quite simple no money, no service,” said Sokomanu.

“I would therefore request conference to consider very carefully the implications of under-funding some SPC programmes in 1994, in terms of terminating services previously entered into with island countries, high termination costs due to staff contracts’ early curtailment, and also the high cost of resetting up programmes from scratch, when additional funding becomes available. These cutbacks, you would appreciate, arise due to a lack of funding rather than a lack of demand for technical assistance services.”

Sokomanu said while he realised money did not grow on trees, and fully appreciates the difficulties that SPC’s traditional donors face, he felt it was his duty to keep asking the conference for guidance on how he should proceed on securing resources for the Work Pro gramme budget. “This after all is your organisation and if you cannot resource it sufficiently then it would be les than fair to expect it to perform,” said Sokomanu.

It was clear from Sokomanu’s report that work programmes had been rather am bitious in setting their 1993 objec tives. The aver age success rate was approximately 70 per cent with only the Finance Sec tion able to meet its objectives.

Sokomanu said what was clear from his report was in an “over

whelming num

ber of cases, pro grammes failure was due to lack of financial resources”. □

Martin Tiffany Sokomanu: announced financial sur plus