NEWSPAGE 25 October
2013

(Photo: Waikato University)

(Photo: CETC)

SAMOA: Samoa Receives CETC Golden Champion Award
Source: CETC Press Release

The Community Education Training Centre (CETC) of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community (SPC) celebrated its 50th anniversary last week from Monday 14th - Friday 18th, October 2013. This marked 5 decades of successfully training young women in what initially began as a home economics course and had evolved into a recognized technical and vocational training program, for business enterprise and community development.

The ‘Golden Champion Awards’ Ceremony held on the 17th October 2013 awarded Ms. Seletuta Visesio-Pita the Community Development Champion Award, in recognition of her engagement with communities through the advancement of women and youth. Ms Pita was a trainee and graduate of CETC in 2002 further enhancing her knowledge in community development.

Since then she had led or was engaged in various initiatives for women and particularly youth and was eventually assigned as Program Manager for the TALAVOU Program; prioritizing youth development advocating for young entrepreneurs and small business initiatives by individuals and youth-groups ultimately creating employment or sources of income for many young people. Ideal examples of successful youth entrepreneurs were awarded prizes at the National Samoa Youth Awards 2013.

This success in youth development was recognized by the Commonwealth Secretariat when it awarded a young Samoan farmer and aspiring entrepreneur the Commonwealth Youth Award earlier this year. In 2011, Ms Pita was appointed to the post of Assistant Chief Executive Officer (ACEO) for the Division for Youth, where her consistency and commitment are reflected in the development of the second National Youth Policy 2011-2016 and in leading preparations for the establishment of the Samoa National Youth Council, which now has an established membership of about 205 youth representatives who are also aspiring leaders.

Ms Pita’s award marks a success-story for the Ministry and whole of Government in the realms of social and community development as well as the success of the CETC as a training mechanism. It also reiterates progress made by women in leadership positions and articulate applications of knowledge and skills for community development. Moreover, the award has great sentimental and historic value as it also marks the completion of the program by SPC as it will be transferred to the University of the South Pacific in the coming year.

The CETC by SPC has played a vital capacity building role in training women and entrepreneurs of Pacific communities. Graduates of this comprehensive program have served in their respective countries in the Public and Private sectors and continue to contribute to their national development goals.

Photo: Ms. Seletuta Visesio-Pita.
 

AUSTRALIA: Former Liberal MP attacks Australia's treatment of West Papuans

Former Liberal MP Judi Moylan has hit out at the Abbott government over its treatment of seven West Papuan asylum seekers who arrived by boat in the Torres Strait last month.

The seven, including a woman and a 10-year-old child, told customs officials when they landed in Australia on 24 September that they feared for their lives after taking part in a protest against Indonesian human rights abuses in West Papua. But their claims for asylum were ignored and they were swiftly deported to neighbouring Papua New Guinea, where they were handed over to local immigration officials.

Moylan described the move as “extraordinary”.

“I mean, we’ve just completely trashed our commitment to the UN [refugee] convention and to the convention on human rights,” she told Guardian Australia.

“We’re not even offering to share part of the burden with some of the poorest countries in our region now. We’re saying: we won’t allow any asylum seeker who comes by boat to set foot on our territory.”

The West Papuans have since been transferred to a settlement near the PNG-Indonesian border where a community of West Papuan refugees lives a mostly subsistence existence, too afraid to return home but without citizenship rights in PNG.

Guardian Australia spoke with one of the group, Yacob Mechrian Mandabayan, on Monday night.

“This place is not like detention centre,” he said on the phone from the remote PNG camp. “It’s hard for everything: it's hard for food, hard for transport, hard for clean water and power, it’s very hard to find a toilet here.”

At the camp, Mandabayan said the group had been placed in a house that had not been occupied in six years and was in a state of disrepair. He said they were afraid because the settlement was so close to the Indonesian border and there was no security or police officers. “It’s very difficult to live in here and it’s not safe,” he said.

Judi Moylan was one of a “gang of four” Coalition MPs who spoke out against the former Howard government’s increasingly draconian border policy in 2005.

In 2006, after 43 West Papuans arrived in an outrigger canoe and successfully sought asylum in Australia, the Howard government tried to quell a backlash from Indonesia by expanding its offshore processing regime to prevent similar incidents.

Moylan gave a speech to parliament in response, in which she described diplomatic pressure from the Indonesian government over the West Papuan asylum seekers as “offensive to our style of democratic government and to the rule of law which underpins it”.
 

(Photo: AFP)

KIRIBATI: I-Kiribati man’s plea for NZ asylum intrigues world media
Source: Pacific Media Centre Press Release via Scoop

The story about the i-Kiribati man seeking climate asylum in New Zealand has made headlines in news media around the world.

Last week, a man from Kiribati, Ioane Teitiota, asked New Zealand’s High Court in Auckland to let him appeal a decision that refused him asylum on the grounds his claim fell short of the legal criteria, such as fear of persecution or threats to his life.

Teitiota, who came to New Zealand in 2007 and has three children born here, said he and his family would suffer serious harm if forced to return to Kiribati, because there was no land to which he could safely return, ONE News reported.


The lawyer of the i-Kiribati man said his client was being “persecuted passively by the circumstances in which he’s living, which the Kiribati Government has no ability to ameliorate”.

If the High Court rules in favour of Teitiota, he would become the world’s first climate refugee and create a wholly new class of refugees, according to France 24.

A decision in the case is expected in “the coming weeks”, BBC News reported.

Media coverage
The developments in the Auckland High Court has interested news media from all over the world.

A Google search quickly revealed that several renowned international news media outlets, ranging from the US, UK and Australasia to India, the Middle East and continental Europe, had covered the case in the last few days.

BBC News, Al Jazeera, The Times of India, The Washington Times, the US online news website Slate.com, France 24, The Huffington Post, The Telegraph, Radio Australia,The Wall Street Journal, The Guardian, Reuters, AP and AFP were only a few of the news media covering the story.

In a commentary article, The Times of India called the story “curious” and argued international justice could only be served by recognising the category of climate refugees.

Other news media, however, quoted legal experts saying the likelihood of Teitiota’s claim being granted is very small.

“The definition in Article 1A(2) [of the Refugee Convention] has to do with a well-founded fear of persecution on the grounds of race, ethnic origin, nationality, religion, gender and so on,” Associate Professor of Law at the University of Auckland Bill Hodges told Radio Australia.

“I’m afraid - and I’m trying to be sympathetic and humanitarian here - but the definition in the convention does not apply to a person who is effectively a climate refugee or an economic refugee because of climactic reasons.

“So I think he’s got a big uphill battle here - I don’t think he will be successful.”

‘Basic human rights’
Teitiota’s lawyer was of a different viewpoint.

“Fresh water is a basic human right…the Kiribati Government is unable, and perhaps unwilling, to guarantee these things because it’s completely beyond its control,” Kidd said.

“The Refugee Convention which came into effect at the end of the Second World War needs to be changed, to incorporate people who are fleeing climate catastrophe, and what’s happening to Kiribati in the next 30 years is a catastrophe,” he told Radio New Zealand.

He said Teitiota’s case had the potential to set an international precedent, not only for Kiribati’s 100,000 residents but for all populations threatened by man-made climate change.

Except for the island of Banaba, Kiribati consists solely of low-lying atolls prone to sea-level rise caused by anthropogenic climate change.

Last month, leading climate change scientists said in a report they were now 95 per cent certain human activity was the main cause of climate change and warned that the world was set to experience more heat waves, floods, droughts and rising sea levels that could swamp coasts and low-lying islands as greenhouse gases build up in the Earth’s atmosphere.

Photo: This undated photo shows inhabitants of Kiritimati coral atoll in Kiribati building a stone seawall in their struggle against rising seas.
 

(Photo: UNDP)

VANUATU: Vanuatu hosts first National Youth Parliament
Source: UNDP Press Release

Fifty-two youth representing Vanuatu’s six provinces are in Port Vila this week participating in the country’s first ever National Youth Parliament which is generating a lot of interest among the youth groups, many of whom for the first time will enter Vanuatu’s Parliament Chambers. The project is conducted by the government of Vanuatu with UNDP’s support.

The youth will undergo a week-long training programme facilitated by Transparency International Vanuatu (TIV) in collaboration with the Parliament Secretariat and support from the Vanuatu National Youth Council (VNYC).

The Youth Parliament was organised to allow the youth the opportunity to experience the procedures for parliamentary democracy, understand how a parliamentary system functions, its procedures, structure and organization of the Parliament. The youth participants will also experience how decisions made in Parliament can impact development and human rights issues in Vanuatu.

Speaking at the opening of the training, the Clerk of the Parliament, Mr Louis Kalnpel told the youth participants that as the leaders of tomorrow, they’ve made history by participating in Vanuatu’s first ever Youth Parliament in Vanuatu representing their provinces.

“Vanuatu desires to see young leaders who have the courage to lead this nation forward in the future, leaders who can stand for the principles of good governance amid the current development challenges. Leaders who are called to deliver the needs of citizens and contribute effectively to the transformational changes in the livelihood of the people of Vanuatu.”

“We are grateful to UNDP for the support provided for this initiative. The Government of Vanuatu Government will continue to maintain this good will relationship with UNDP and other UN agencies in our collective endeavour to achieve the shared vision in strengthening our parliamentary system and to groom our young people to become leaders of tomorrow.”

On the third day of the training, Ms Akiko Fujii, UNDP Deputy Resident Representative addressed to the participants. “The youth holds the key to the future development of Vanuatu. Understanding the Parliament’s key role as law making body and its responsibility to serve for the people of Vanuatu is a very important step for the youth.”

The training will end with the Youth Parliament on Wednesday 23 October followed by the Parliament Open Day and United Nations Day on Thursday 24 October. The youth will be deliberating on issues which are of paramount importance to their livelihood in the Parliament Chambers resembling the current Members of Parliament representing their constituencies.
The Parliament Open Day organized by the Vanuatu Parliament Secretariat will be an opportunity for the public and schools to learn more about the Parliament, its key functions including decision making processes including how laws and policies are endorsed through the parliamentary procedures.

The support to the National Youth Parliament is part of UNDP’s overall assistance to the Government of Vanuatu to support governance and promote democracy in Vanuatu.

Photos: (L-R) Youths assembled in the Parliament Chambers. The opening address from the Clerk of Parliament Mr Louis Kalnpel.
 

AROUND THE WORLD: Experts Agree Way Forward for Aligning Ocean Health and Human Well-Being
Source: Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat Press Release

A unique panel of business, government, conservation and academic leaders has agreed a global strategy for aligning ocean health and human well-being. The Pacific Islands Forum Secretariats, Secretary General, Tuiloma Neroni Slade is part of the Blue Ribbon Panel, which includes 21 global experts from 16 countries, emphasizes that without action to turn around the declining health of the ocean, the consequences for economies, communities and ecosystems will be irreversible.

“This is a critical time in history,” said Tuiloma Neroni Slade, Secretary-General of the Pacific Islands Forum. “All levels of society and all stakeholders need to combine in joint action as a response to this very global problem.”

Recent science from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the International Programme on the State of the Ocean (IPSO) has intensified the focus on declining ocean health.

“Ocean change is climate change and vice versa,” said panel chair and ocean adviser to the IPCC Ove Hoegh-Guldberg. “With looming threats of rising sea levels, warmer waters and a growing human population we need healthy oceans and coasts to mitigate climate change, feed billions and protect coastal communities.”

But there is good news: solutions exist that benefit both oceans and economies, according to the panel’s report.

Convened by the World Bank to advise the Global Partnership for Oceans (GPO), the Panel includes high-level players ranging from CEOs of some of the largest seafood companies in the world - including Thai Union Frozen Products, Bumble Bee Foods and High Liner Foods - to government officials and prominent marine conservationists.

According to the panel, fragmented approaches that fail to consider social, political, economic and ecological relationships will fail to meet the complex challenges facing ocean health. The report calls for an integrated approach to ocean investment and emphasizes the essential role of public-private partnerships.

The panel agreed that the Global Partnership for Oceans is a platform that brings together the multi-stakeholder support, technical expertise and finance needed to change the course on oceans.

“Getting to healthy oceans is a global challenge that needs the concentrated effort of big and small business, government and science,” said Ove Hoegh-Guldberg. “Though they brought very different world views, everyone on this panel agreed that we can’t keep going with business-as-usual and all parts of society must be part of the solution.”

The panel agreed there is no “silver bullet” to resolving urgent ocean challenges. Therefore, it proposes these five principles to ensure effective GPO investments: (1) sustainable livelihoods, social equity and food security; (2) a healthy ocean; (3) effective governance systems; (4) long-term viability and (5) capacity building and innovation.

“Being a member of the Blue Ribbon Panel has been a rewarding opportunity to collaborate with key players and thought leaders in ocean sustainability." said panelist Chris Lischewski, President and CEO of Bumble Bee Foods. “The process reinforces that improving ocean health is a complex process that requires participation and interaction across a broad sphere of communities, industries and governments.”

The Panel’s principle-based strategy provides an approach to prioritize where, when and how the GPO can take action with high impact. The panel recommends that the principles be incorporated into all levels of reform - from fisheries management to incentives for pollution reduction to habitat restoration.

“Bringing this diverse and powerful group together to reach consensus on the challenges and what needs to be done shows what is possible through effective global partnership,” said Juergen Voegele of the World Bank. “The panel’s top priorities build naturally from the GPO’s objectives of healthy oceans and poverty alleviation and their recommendations will make this partnership strategic in how and where it works.”