Enthusiasm died down [1]
Wednesday, July 1, 2009 - 21:49. Updated on Monday, September 9, 2013 - 18:40.
From the House, an English translation summary from the Tongan vernacular, by Pesi Fonua.
Tonga Legislative Assembly, Minute No. 8, Tuesday night June 16, 2009.
Highlights:
- USA to set up an office at Fa'onelua Centre to process USA travel visas for Tongans.
- The public has less enthusiasm about engaging with the Commission for political reform, and applying for Dual Citizenship.
- Concern over the formation and the delegation of tasks to too many working committees, which in turn either did very little work or were overlapping in their activities.
Presumed coming late
The Clerk made the Roll Call. He said that away on leave of absence were the Minister of Education, Minister of Labour, Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, and Noble Vaha'i. The rest of the members he presumed were coming late.
The Speaker dissolved the Legislature into Committee and the Chairman took his chair. He said that on the agenda was Program No. 6 of the Ministry of Finance and National Planning.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
There were some figures that members wanted the Minister of Finance to clarify, but he was not in the House, so proceedings moved on to Program No. 7, the vote of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs.
PR Sunia Fili wanted to know what had happened to the attempt for the USA to establish an office in Nuku'alofa so that they could issue visas to Tongans who wanted to travel to the USA.
The Prime Minister, Hon. Dr Feleti Sevele said that after he met and discussed the possibility of issuing USA travel visas in Tonga things had changed following the election of a new government in the USA. There had been further negotiation and what was going to happen was that the Tonga government would refurbish an office at the Fa'onelua Centre to house an official from the US Embassy to issue the travel visas.
Vava'u development projects
The Chairman suggested that MPs ask the PM, the Acting Minister for Foreign Affairs, why it was so difficult to get a visa for Australia.
PR 'Etuate Lavulavu expressed his concern over what appeared to be the drying up of foreign aid funds for Vava'u, leaving a number of development projects either waiting to be completed or waiting to start.
The Prime Minister, with regards to Vava'u Development projects, said that the chairperson for the Vava'u Development Committee was the Governor for Vava'u who had left Tonga to become the Tongan Ambassador in New York . A new chairman should be appointed, and they would do that once the king appointed a new Governor for Vava'u.
With regards to the difficulty of getting visas to go to Australia, he said that Tongans were partly to blame because of various groups who were given visas ended up over staying in Australia. He warned that we may end up like it was during the 1970s when all visa applications were sent to Australia.
Dual Citizenship
PR 'Isileli Pulu wanted to know why there was a drop in the revenue from the acquiring of Dual Citizenship.
The Prime Minister said that Dual Citizenship was similar to work of the Political Reform Commission, after the initial excitement when the Commission went out to the villages very few people attended meetings. With the Dual Citizenship it was the same, after the initial enthusiasm, things had died down.
Diplomatic missions
PR Clive Edwards wanted to know why the big left over of about $4 million from an allocation of over $5 million for the purchase of goods and services.
The Prime Minister explained the reason was that during the current financial year government planned to set up diplomatic missions in Canberra, Wellington and Brussels. The Canberra mission was not established until about October, Wellington was not established until May this year, and Brussels had not been established.
Clive also wanted to know the big increase in travel expenses from the initial figure of over $500,000 to over a million.
The Prime Minister pointed out that such differences did occur, but the expenses of the Ministry in general were dropping.
Pr 'Akilisi Pohiva expressed his support for the establishment of a mission in Brussels, but he suggested that Tonga should close down the London mission and rent out the property.
The PM reminded the member that the establishment of diplomatic missions is based on international laws relating to the establishment of diplomatic missions, and not just on whether it was commercially viable or not. He pointed out that the vote for the Ministry for Foreign Affairs is about $10 million, but the amount of aid funds that come through the Ministry is about $100 million annually.
Noble Luani expressed his concern with the government's approach in establishing various committees to deal with certain concerns. He worried that there could be overlaps in the activities of these committees or nothing is done at all.
He also expressed his concern about the approach of including in the budget projects without financial allocations.
The Chairman said, "let's say we have finished the No. 6 paper."
The Acting Speaker closed parliament until 9.30 am Thursday morning.