Today marks one month since a 7.3-magnitude earthquake struck Vanuatu’s capital, Port Vila, claiming 14 lives, injuring more than 200 people, and displacing thousands more.

Downtown Port Vila remains a no-go zone.

Star Wharf, the international port, is still out of action and parts of the city and some of the villages surrounding it still have not had their water supply reconnected.

The Recovery Operations Centre estimates around 6000 workers from 200 businesses that operate in the CBD have been impacted.

All the while, loud rumbling tremors continue to rock the city; a recent one measuring above magnitude 5 on the Richter scale.

Leinasei Tarisiu lives outside of Vila but came in to vote in the snap election yesterday. She said children in her household still panic when there is an earthquake, even if it is small.

“They are still afraid. Even last night when we had that one that happened, we all ran outside,” she said.

“It’s hard for us to remain in the house.”

Ongoing trauma
The only mental health specialist at Vila Central Hospital, Dr Jimmy Obed, said the ongoing seismic activity is re-traumatising many.

Obed said as things slowly returned to something resembling normalcy, more people were reaching out for mental health support.

“What we try and tell them is that it’s a normal thing for you to be having this anxiety,” he said.

“And then we give them some skills. How to calm themselves down . . . when they are panicking, or are under stress, or have difficulty sleeping.

“Simple skills that they can use — even how children can calm and regulate their emotions.”

Trenold Tari, an aviation worker who spoke to RNZ Pacific after he had cast his vote, said he hopes they are able to elect leaders with good ideas for Vanuatu’s future.

“And not just the vision to run the government and the nation but also who has leadership qualities and is transparent. People who can work with communities and who don’t just think about themselves,” he said.

Wanting quick rebuild
Many voters in the capital said they wanted leaders who would act quickly to rebuild the quake-stricken city.

Others said they were sick of political instability.

This week’s snap election was triggered by a premature dissolution of parliament last year; the second consecutive time President Nike Vurobaravu has acted on a council of ministers’ request to dissolve the house in the face of a leadership challenge.

Counting this week’s election, Vanuatu will have had five prime ministers in the last four years.

The chairperson of the Seaside Tongoa community, Paul Fred Tariliu, said they have discussed this as a group and made their feelings clear to their election candidate.

“We told our candidate to tell the presidents of all the political parties they are affiliated with — that if they end up in government and they find at some point they don’t have the number and a motion is brought against you, please be honest and set a good example — tell one group to step down and let another government come in,” Tariliu said.

Desperate need of aid
Election fever aside, thousands of people in Port Vila are still in desperate need of assistance.

The head of the Vanuatu Red Cross Society is looking to start distributing financial relief assistance to families affected by last month’s earthquake.

The society’s secretary-general, Dickinson Tevi, said some villages were still without water and a lot of people were out of work.

“We have realised that there are still a few requests coming from the communities. People who haven’t been assessed during the emergency,” Tevi said.

“So, we have made plans to do a more detailed assessment after this to make sure we don’t leave anyone out.”

Tevi said with schools due to restart soon, parents and families who had lost their main source of income were under a lot of stress.

In a release, Save the Children Vanuatu country director Polly Bank, said disasters often had the power to suddenly turn children’s lives upside down, especially if they had lost loved ones, had their education interrupted, or had been forced to flee their homes.

Critical for children’s recovery
“In the aftermath of any disaster, it is critical for children recovering that they are able to return to their normal routines as soon as possible,” she said.

“And for most kids, this would include returning to school, where they can reconnect with friends and share their experiences.”

She said at least 12,500 children in the country may be forced to start the new school year in temporary learning centres with at least 100 classrooms across the country damaged or destroyed.

It is back to business for Vanuatu today after the public holiday that was declared yesterday to allow people to go and vote.

Unofficial election results continue to trickle in with local media reporting an even distribution of seats across the country for the Leaders Party, Vanua’aku Party, Reunification Movement for Change and the Iauko Group.

But it is still early days, with official results a while away.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

More than 180,000 registered voters are expected to cast their votes today with polls now open in Vanuatu.

It is remarkable the snap election is even able to happen with Friday marking one month since the 7.3 magnitude earthquake struck the capital Port Vila.

According to the government, 14 people died as a result of the quake, more than 210 were injured and thousands displaced.

Despite all of this Principal Electoral Officer Guilain Malessas said they worked around the clock to deliver the election within the two-month timeframe stipulated by the constitution.

The voter turnout at the last election was less than 50 percent but Malessas is optimistic participation today will be high.

He urged voters to go and exercise their democratic right.

“This country — we own it, it’s ours. If we just sit and complain that, this, that and the other thing aren’t good but then don’t contribute to making decisions then we will never change,” Malessas said.

Not everybody convinced
But not everybody is convinced that proceeding with the election was the right decision.

The president of the Port Vila Council of Women, Jane Iatika, said many families were still grieving, traumatised and struggling to put food on the table.

“If they were thinking about the people they would have [postponed] the election and dealt with the disaster first,” she said.

“Like right now if a mother goes and lines up to vote in the election — when they come back home what are they going to eat?”

This is the second consecutive time Vanuatu’s Parliament has been dissolved in the face of political instability.

And the country has had four prime ministerial changes in as many years.

The chairman of the Seaside Tongoa community, Paul Fred Tariliu,. said people were starting to lose faith in leadership, not just in Parliament but at the community level as well.

Urging candidates to ‘be humble’
He said they had been urging their candidates to be humble and concede defeat if they found themselves short of the numbers needed to rule.

“Instead of just going [into Parliament] for a short time [then] finding out they don’t have the numbers and dissolving Parliament,” Tariliu said.

“We are wasting money.

“When we continue with this kind of attitude people lose their trust in us [community] leaders and our national leaders.”

The official results of the last election in 2022 show a low voter turnout of just over 44 percent with the lowest participation in the country, just 34 percent, registered here in the capital Port Vila.

Conducting the election itself is a complicated logistical exercise with 352 polling stations spread out over the 12,000-sq km archipelago manned by 1700 polling officials and an additional one in Nouméa for citizens residing in New Caledonia.

Proxy voting is also being facilitated for workers overseas.

360 police for security
Deputy Police Commissioner Operations Kalo Willie Ben said more than 360 police officers had been deployed to provide security for the election process.

He said there were no active security threats for the election, but he said they were prepared to deploy more resources to any part of the country should the need arise.

“My advice [to the public] is that we conduct ourselves peacefully and raise any issues through the election dispute process,” Kalo Willie Ben said.

The head of the government Recovery Unit, Peter Korisa, said according to their initial estimates it would cost just over US$230 million to fully rebuild the capital after the earthquake.

Korisa said they were getting backlash for the indefinite closure of the CBD but continued to work diligently to ensure that, whatever government comes to power this month, it would be presented with a clear recovery plan.

“We still have a bit of funding but there is a greater challenge because we need to have a government in place so that we can trigger the bigger funding,” Korisa said.

Polling stations close at 4:30pm local time.

Unofficial check count
Principal electoral officer Malessas said an unofficial count would be conducted at all polling station venues before ballot boxes were transported back to the capital Port Vila for the official tally.

According to parliamentary standing orders, the first sitting of the new Parliament must be called within 21 days of the official election results being declared.

A spokesperson for the caretaker government has confirmed to RNZ Pacific that constitutional amendments aimed at curbing political instability would apply after the snap election.

The most immediate impact of these amendments will be that all independent MPs, and MPs who are the only member of their party or custom movement, must affiliate themselves with a larger political party for the full term of Parliament.

They also lock MPs into political parties with any defection or removal from a party resulting in the MP concerned losing their seat in Parliament.

However, the amendments do not prohibit entire parties from crossing the floor to either side so long as they do it as a united group.

It remains to be seen how effective the amendments will be in curbing instability.

The only real certainty provided by the constitution after this snap election is that the option to dissolve Parliament will not be available for the next 12 months.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The electoral commission in Vanuatu is trying its best to clear up some confusion with the voting process for tomorrow’s snap election.

Principal Electoral Officer Guilain Malessas said this is due to the tight turnaround to deliver this election after Parliament was dissolved last year.

The Vanuatu Electoral Office has confirmed that 52 seats, across 18 constituencies, will be contested by 217 candidates, seven of whom are women.

But Malessas said against all odds, preparations were almost complete.

The final ballot boxes are being deployed to the farthest polling stations in the country and final checks are being carried out.

He said the premature dissolution of parliament last year forced them to have to deliver an election a year early, and within a two-month timeframe, as required in the constitution.

“The final challenge that remains is for us to make sure all the ballot boxes that we have deployed have reached all the polling stations safely,” he said.

“Also, there is the challenge of a new ballot structure which we have not had enough awareness on.”

He said they had not had enough time to conduct community awareness about the new system, and there was also new electoral legislation, which was passed in preparation for 2026 — the original date for the next election.

“With the new ballot structure you just have a single page with all the candidates and their symbols on it and you just have to tick the one you want,” Malessas said.

“We have not had enough awareness.

“We have used all existing social media platforms but lots of people in rural areas do not have access to these things.”

Extra training
Malessas said they had had extra training for polling station officials to help voters on Thursday, and had printed lots of informational material to be posted up at polling stations.

He said election candidates had also been conducting awareness during their political campaigns.

With the December 17 earthquake forcing the relocation of many polling stations, they were also anticipating people turning up with national ID cards at the wrong polling stations.

To manage this, they plan to verify that the person is a resident of the constituency and that their ID card was issued before the close of voter registrations for this election on 3 December 2024.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Out of the rubble of last year’s 7.3 magnitude earthquake that hit Vanuatu’s capital Port Vila on December 17 and the snap election due next week on January 16, a new leadership is required to reset the country’s developmental trajectory.

Persistent political turmoil has hampered the Pacific nation’s ability to deal with a compounding set of social and economic shocks over recent years, caused by climate-related and other natural disasters.

The earthquake is estimated to have conservatively caused US$244 million (VUV29 billion) in damage, and the Vanuatu government’s ability to pay for disaster response, the election, and resume public service delivery will require strong, committed and stable leadership.

Prior to the devastating quake and dramatic dissolution of Parliament on November 18, economist Peter Judge from Vanuatu-based Pacific Consulting warned of an evolving economic emergency.

Vanuatu’s US$1 billion economy faced a concerning decline in government revenue from value-added tax, down 25 percent on the previous year.

This was a ripple effect from the decline in economic activity after the collapse of national airline Air Vanuatu last May, as well as the falling revenues from the troubled Citizenship by Investment Programme.

Both were plagued by lack of oversight by parliamentarians.

Struggling economy
In 2024, Vanuatu is expected to record about 1 percent economic growth, as it struggles to climb out of the red and back to pre-pandemic levels.

Conversely, Vanuatu has a much more positive, although somewhat contradictory democratic profile.

According to the Global State of Democracy Initiative, Vanuatu is one of the more democratic states in the Pacific islands region, and currently ranks as 45th in the world.

But this performance comes with a significant price. Leadership turnover is frequent, with 28 prime ministerial terms in just 44 years of statehood, 20 of those in the last 25 years — the highest frequency of change in the Melanesian region.

The impacts of disrupted leadership and political instability are highly visible. Government decision-making and service delivery is grindingly slow.

In Vanuatu’s Parliament, the legislative process is frequently deferred due to regular motions of no confidence, with several critical bills still awaiting MPs’ attention.

Last October, for example, the Vanuatu government proposed a 2025 budget 10 percent smaller than 2024’s, due to reduced economic activity and declining government revenue.

Sudden dissolution
Parliament was unable to approve this year’s budget due to its sudden dissolution on November 18, only two-and-a-half years into a four-year political term.

This is the second consecutive presidential dissolution of Parliament, the previous one in 2022 also occurring barely two-and-a-half years into its term.

The Bill for the appropriation of the 2025 budget now awaits the formation of the next legislature for approval. In the meantime, earthquake recovery and election management costs accumulate under a caretaker government.

With deepening economic hardship and industries facing slow economic growth across multiple sectors, voters are looking for leadership that can stabilise the compounding cost of living pressures.

The new government will need to urgently tackle overdue, unresolved issues pertaining to reliable inter-island transport and air connectivity, outstanding teacher salaries and greater opportunities for the nation’s restive youth.

The youth unemployment rate is at 10.7 percent and rising.

Democracy with political stability is the holy grail for Vanuatu. But attaining this legendary and supposedly miraculous prize comes with costs attached.

Rules come into force
In response to civic and youth activism in late 2023 calling for political stability and transparency, the last Parliament approved a national referendum to make political affiliation more accountable and end party hopping.The rules come into force in the next parliamentary term for the first time.

The referendum passed successfully on May 29, 2024, but cost US$2.9 million. The 2022 snap election required US$1.4 million and the 2025 poll is expected to require another US$1.6 million.

While revenue from candidature fees of US$250,000 does cover part of these costs, each legislature transition also weighs on the public purse.

The current crop of outgoing 52 parliamentarians were paid out US$1.62 million in gratuities and benefits — around US$31,000 per MP — even though most did not see out their full terms.

Vanuatu’s average annual household income in 2020 was US$9000.

Whatever the outcome of the 2025 snap election, the incoming government will need to refocus attention on stabilising the trajectory of Vanuatu’s economy and development.

The next legislature — the 14th — will need to commit to stability in the interests of Vanuatu’s people and the nation’s development.

Budget, earthquake recovery priorities
The most immediate priorities for a new government should be the passage of the 2025 national budget and the implementation of an earthquake recovery and reconstruction plan.

In the 45 years since throwing off the British and French colonial yoke, citizens have enthusiastically done their duty at elections in the expectation of a national leadership that will take Vanuatu forward.

Now their faith appears to be waning, after the 2022 poll saw voter turnout — a key indicator of the health of a democracy — dropped below 50 percent for the first time since independence.

This election therefore needs to see a return on the considerable investment made in Vanuatu’s democratic processes, both in terms of financial cost to successive governments and donors, and more to the point, a political dividend for voters.

Anna Naupa is a ni-Vanuatu scholar and currently a PhD student at the Australian National University. Republished from BenarNews with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The Pacific year started with a ferocious eruption and global tsunami in Tonga, but by the year’s end several political upheavals had also shaken the region with a vengeance.

A razor’s edge election in Fiji blew away a long entrenched authoritarian regime with a breath of fresh air for the Pacific, two bitterly fought polls in Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu left their mark, and growing geopolitical rivalry with the US and Australia contesting China’s security encroachment in the Solomon Islands continues to spark convulsions for years to come.

It was ironical that the two major political players in Fiji were both former coup leaders and ex-military chiefs — the 1987 double culprit Sitiveni Rabuka, a retired major-general who is credited with introducing the “coup culture” to Fiji, and Voreqe Bainimarama, a former rear admiral who staged the “coup to end all coups” in 2006.

It had been clear for some time that the 68-year-old Bainimarama’s star was waning in spite of repressive and punitive measures that had been gradually tightened to shore up control since an unconvincing return to democracy in 2014.

And pundits had been predicting that the 74-year-old Rabuka, a former prime minister in the 1990s, and his People’s Alliance-led coalition would win. However, after a week-long stand-off and uncertainty, Rabuka’s three-party coalition emerged victorious and Rabuka was elected PM by a single vote majority.

In Samoa the previous year, the change had been possibly even more dramatic when a former deputy prime minister in the ruling Human Rights Protection Party (HRPP), Fiamē Naomi Mata’afa, led her newly formed Fa’atuatua I le Atua Samoa ua Tasi (FAST) party to power to become the country’s first woman prime minister.

Overcoming a hung Parliament, Mata’afa ousted the incumbent Tuila’epa Sa’ilele Malielegaoi, who had been prime minister for 23 years and his party had been in power for four decades. But he refused to leave office, creating a constitutional crisis.

At one stage this desperate and humiliating cling to power by the incumbent looked set to be repeated in Fiji.

Yet this remarkable changing of the guard in Fiji got little press in New Zealand newspapers. The New Zealand Herald, for example, buried what could could have been an ominous news agency report on the military callout in Fiji in the middle-of the-paper world news section.

Fiji
Although Bainimarama at first refused to concede defeat after being in power for 16 years, half of them as a military dictator, the kingmaker opposition party Sodelpa sided — twice — with the People’s Alliance (21 seats) and National Federation Party (5 seats) coalition.

Sodelpa’s critical three seats gave the 29-seat coalition a slender cushion over the 26 seats of Bainimarama’s FijiFirst party which had failed to win a majority for the first time since 2014 in the expanded 55-seat Parliament.

But in the secret ballot, one reneged giving Rabuka a razor’s edge single vote majority.

The ousted Attorney-General and Justice Minister Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum – popularly branded as the “Minister of Everything” with portfolios and extraordinary power in the hands of one man – is arguably the most hated person in Fiji.

Sayed-Khaiyum’s cynical “divisive” misrepresentation of Rabuka and the alliance in his last desperate attempt to cling to power led to a complaint being filed with Fiji police, accusing him of “inciting communal antagonism”.

He reportedly left Fiji for Australia on Boxing Day and the police issued a border alert for him while the Home Affairs Minister, Pio Tikoduadua, asked Police Commissioner Sitiveni Qiliho, a former military brigadier-general to resign over allegations of bias and lack of confidence. He refused so the new government will have to use the formal legal steps to remove him.

Just days earlier, Fiji lawyer Imrana Jalal, a human rights activist and a former Human Rights Commission member, had warned the people of Fiji in a social media post not to be tempted into “victimisation or targeted prosecutions” without genuine evidence as a result of independent investigations.

“If we do otherwise, then we are no better than the corrupt regime [that has been] in power for the last 16 years,” she added.

“We need to start off the right way or we are tainted from the beginning.”

However, the change of government unleashed demonstrations of support for the new leadership and fuelled hope for more people-responsive policies, democracy and transparency.

Writing in The Sydney Morning Herald, academic Dr Sanjay Ramesh commented in an incisive analysis of Fiji politics: “With … Rabuka back at the helm, there is hope that the indigenous iTaukei population’s concerns on land and resources, including rampant poverty and unemployment, in their community will be finally addressed.”

He was also critical of the failure of the Mission Observer Group (MoG) under the co-chair of Australia to “see fundamental problems” with the electoral system and process which came close to derailing the alliance success.

“While the MoG was enjoying Fijian hospitality, opposition candidates were being threatened, intimidated, and harassed by FFP [FijiFirst Party] thugs. The counting of the votes was marred by a ‘glitch’ on 14 December 2022 . . . leaving many opposition parties questioning the integrity of the vote counting process.”

Rabuka promised a “better and united Fiji” in his inaugural address to the nation via government social media platforms.

“Our country is experiencing a great and joyful awakening,” he said. “It gladdens my heart to be a part of it. And I am reminded of the heavy responsibilities I now bear.”

The coalition wasted no time in embarking on its initial 100-day programme and signalled the fresh new ‘open” approach by announcing that Professor Pal Ahluwalia, the Samoa-based vice-chancellor of the regional University of the South Pacific — deported unjustifiably by the Bainimarama government — and the widow of banned late leading Fiji academic Dr Brij Lal were both free to return.

Paul Barker, director of the Institute of National Affairs, discussing why the 2022 PNG elections were so bad. Video: ABC News

Papua New Guinea
Earlier in the year, in August, Prime Minister James Marape was reelected as the country’s leader after what has been branded by many critics as the “worst ever” general election — it was marred by greater than ever violence, corruption and fraud.

As the incumbent, Marape gained the vote of 97 MPs — mostly from his ruling Pangu Pati that achieved the second-best election result ever of a PNG political party — in the expanded 118-seat Parliament. With an emasculated opposition, nobody voted against him and his predecessor, Peter O’Neill, walked out of the assembly in disgust

Papua New Guinea has a remarkable number of parties elected to Parliament — 23, not the most the assembly has had — and 17 of them backed Pangu’s Marape to continue as prime minister. Only two women were elected, including Governor Rufina Peter of Central Province.

In an analysis after the dust had settled from the election, a team of commentators at the Australian National University’s Development Policy Centre concluded that the “electoral role was clearly out of date, there were bouts of violence, ballot boxes were stolen, and more than one key deadline was missed”.

However, while acknowledging the shortcomings, the analysts said that the actual results should not be “neglected”. Stressing how the PNG electoral system favours incumbents — the last four prime ministers have been reelected — they argued for change to the “incumbency bias”.

“If you can’t remove a PM through the electoral system, MPs will try all the harder to do so through a mid-term vote of no confidence,” they wrote.

“How to change this isn’t clear (Marape in his inaugural speech mooted a change to a presidential system), but something needs to be done — as it does about the meagre political representation of women.”

Vanuatu
In Vanuatu in November, a surprise snap election ended the Vanua’aku Pati’s Bob Loughman prime ministership. Parliament was dissolved on the eve of a no-confidence vote called by opposition leader Ralph Regenvanu.

With no clear majority from any of the contesting parties, Loughman’s former deputy, lawyer and an ex-Attorney-General, Ishmael Kalsakau, leader of the Union of Moderate Parties, emerged as the compromise leader and was elected unopposed by the 52-seat Parliament.

A feature was the voting for Gloria Julia King, the first woman MP to be elected to Vanuatu’s Parliament in a decade. She received a “rapturous applause” when she stepped up to take the first oath of office.

RNZ Pacific staff journalist Lydia Lewis and Port Vila correspondent Hilaire Bule highlighted the huge challenges faced by polling officials and support staff in remote parts of Vanuatu, including the exploits of soldier Samuel Bani who “risked his life” wading through chest-high water carrying ballot boxes.

Tongan volcano-tsunami disaster
Tonga’s violent Hunga Ha’apai-Hunga Tonga volcano eruption on January 15 was the largest recorded globally since the eruption of Krakatoa in 1883. It triggered tsunami waves of up to 15m, blanketed ash over 5 sq km — killing at least six people and injuring 19 — and sparked a massive multinational aid relief programme.

The crisis was complicated because much of the communication with island residents was crippled for a long time.

As Dale Dominey-Howes stressed in The Conversation, “in our modern, highly-connected world, more than 95 percent of global data transfer occurs along fibre-optic cables that criss-cross through the world’s oceans.

“Breakage or interruption to this critical infrastructure can have catastrophic local, regional and even global consequences.”

“This is exactly what has happened in Tonga following the volcano-tsunami disaster. But this isn’t the first time a natural disaster has cut off critical submarine cables, and it won’t be the last.”

Covid-19 in Pacific
While the impact of the global covid-19 pandemic receded in the Pacific during the year, new research from the University of the South Pacific provided insight into the impact on women working from home. While some women found the challenge enjoyable, others “felt isolated, had overwhelming mental challenges and some experienced domestic violence”.

Rosalie Fatiaki, chair of USP’s staff union women’s wing, commented on the 14-nation research findings.

“Women with young children had a lot to juggle, and those who rely on the internet for work had particular frustrations — some had to wait until after midnight to get a strong enough signal,” she said.

Around 30 percent of respondents reported having developed covid-19 during the Work From Home periods, and 57 percent had lost a family member or close friend to covid-19 as well as co-morbidities.

She also noted the impact of the “shadow pandemic” of domestic abuse. Only two USP’s 14 campuses in 12 Pacific countries avoided any covid-19 closures between 2020 and 2022.

COP27 climate progress
The results for the Pacific at the COP27 climate action deliberations at the Egyptian resort town of Sharm el-Sheikh were disappointing to say the least.

For more than three decades since Vanuatu had suggested the idea, developing nations have fought to establish an international fund to pay for the “loss and damage” they suffer as a result of climate change. Thanks partly to Pacific persistence, a breakthrough finally came — after the conference was abruptly extended by a day to thrash things out.

However, although this was clearly a historic moment, much of the critical details have yet to be finalised.

Professor Steven Ratuva, director of Canterbury University’s Macmillan Brown Pacific Studies Centre, says the increased frequency of natural disasters and land erosion, and rising ocean temperatures, means referring to “climate change” is outdated. It should be called “climate crisis”.

“Of course climate changes, it’s naturally induced seen through weather, but the situation now shows it’s not just changing, but we’re reaching a level of a crisis — the increasing number of category five cyclones, the droughts, the erosion, heating of the ocean, the coral reefs dying in the Pacific, and the impact on people’s lives,” he said.

“All these things are happening at a very fast pace.”

Geopolitical rivalry and West Papua
The year saw intensifying rivalry between China and the US over the Pacific with ongoing regional fears about perceived ambitions of a possible Chinese base in the Solomon Islands — denied by Honiara — but the competition has fuelled a stronger interest from Washington in the Pacific.

The Biden administration released its Indo-Pacific Strategy in February, which broadly outlines policy priorities based on a “free and open” Pacific region. It cites China, covid-19 and climate change — “crisis”, rather — as core challenges for Washington.

Infrastructure is expected to be a key area of rivalry in future. Contrasting strongly with China, US policy is likely to support “soft areas” in the Pacific, such as women’s empowerment, anti-corruption, promotion of media freedom, civil society engagement and development.

The political and media scaremongering about China has prompted independent analysts such as the Development Policy Centre’s Terence Wood and Transform Aqorau to call for a “rethink” about Solomon Islands and Pacific security. Aqorau said Honiara’s leaked security agreement with China had “exacerbated existing unease” about China”.

The Pacific Catalyst founding director also noted that the “increasing engagement” with China had been defended by Honiara as an attempt by the government to diversify its engagement on security, adding that “ it is unlikely that China will build a naval base in Solomon Islands”.

However, the elephant in the room in geopolitical terms is really Indonesia and its brutal intransigency over its colonised Melanesian provinces — now expanded from two to three in a blatant militarist divide and rule ploy — and its refusal to constructively engage with Papuans or the Pacific over self-determination.

“2022 was a difficult year for West Papua. We lost great fighters and leaders like Filep Karma, Jonah Wenda, and Jacob Prai. Sixty-one years since the fraudulent Act of No Choice, our people continue to suffer under Indonesian’s colonial occupation,” reflected exiled West Papuan leader Benny Wenda in a Christmas message.

“Indonesia continues to kill West Papuans with impunity, as shown by the recent acquittal of the only suspect tried for the “Bloody Paniai’” massacre of 2014.

“Every corner of our country is now scarred by Indonesian militarisation . . . We continue to demand that Indonesia withdraw their military from West Papua in order to allow civilians to peacefully return to their homes.”

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The results of Vanuatu’s snap election have been released, but it is not clear who has come out on top.

The official results have revealed a fractured Parliament with seven being the highest number of MPs won by a single party.

The caretaker prime minister and leader of Vanua’aku Pati, Bob Loughman, has secured seven seats and former opposition leader Ralph Regenvanu’s Graon mo Jastis Party has four seats.

A commentator on Vanuatu politics, Dr Tess Newton Cain, said both sides now needed to rely on independents and minor parties to form a majority.

Leading up to the release of the official results on Sunday, two coalition groups had formed.

Ralph Regenvanu’s coalition claims to have 31 out of 52 seats.

However, some candidates are appearing on the roster for both coalitions and things will not become clear until Parliament is called to swear-in the MPs.

Woman elected
It has been confirmed that a woman has been elected for the first time in more than a decade.

Gloria Julia Kings of the Union of Moderate Parties has been elected in Efate Rural alongside two colleagues. She was the fourth of five elected candidates with 1618 votes.

The election was triggered when Vanuatu’s Supreme Court dismissed a constitutional application in September challenging the dissolution of Parliament.

The 27 opposition MPs had challenged the legality of the dissolution, given a motion of no confidence had been filed against Loughman as prime minister.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Voter turnout in 🇻🇺 reached below 50% in this year’s election. Only 48.45% of all registered voters who turned up to vote on the 13 October 2022. pic.twitter.com/9OJduQRCtf

— Jason Matariki (@Jaxniel) October 23, 2022

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A woman candidate appears to have won a seat for the first time in Vanuatu in more than a decade in unofficial results from last week’s snap election.

Julie King, a member of the Union of Moderate Parties, is reported to have won one of the seats in the Efate constituency.

She is from Mele Village, outside Port Vila, the same town that provided the country’s first president, Ati George Sokomanu, in 1980.

Official results are expected later this week.

Meanwhile, a group of parties has formed with the aim of producing a coalition government.

A pact has been signed between five of the largest political parties and associated smaller parties, and, with independent MPs they are claiming the support of 31 members of the new Parliament.

RNZ Pacific correspondent in Port Vila Hilaire Bule said the main parties in the new group are the Union of Moderate Parties, the Reunification of the Movement of Change, the Leaders Party, the Land and Justice Party, the People’s Progressive Party and others.

“The next step is to agree with which political party will hold the prime ministership and if the members of Parliament who are in those parties sign the pact it will be okay, but if they disagree there will be a problem,” Bule said.

Second coalition
A second coalition has now emerged in Vanuatu following last week’s election.

This one involves the Vanua’aku Pati, the Rural Development Party, the Iauko group, the National United Party, the People’s Unity Development Party and the Reunification of the Movement for Change, or some members of these parties.

A number, including the RMC, are also party to the pact signed by the earlier coalition grouping.

The leaders of that first grouping, which is in camp at the Sunset Bungalow Resort, claim they retain the numbers for a majority in the 52 member house.

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Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz