From Matangi Tonga Magazine, Vol. 15, no. 4, January 2001.

Tonga is expected to have a new 8000 tonnes container ship by January 2002, according to Erwin M. Ludewig, Tonga’s Honorary Consul to Hamburg, Germany. The new ship is a replacement of the container ship, MV Fuakavenga.

Erwin was in Nuku‘alofa in early November for the signing of a Tripartite Agreement between the Government of Tonga, the Hartman Shipping Group of Germany, and the Pacific Forum Line.

He said that the ship would be built in China, “under German design, German engineering and German supervision, by the Hartman Group, who have their own people in China. ”

Erwin said that the $12 million ship would be built in China because it was the most economical way to build a ship these days, “it will be 40 per cent cheaper to build in China than if it was to built anywhere else.”

Tripartite

Erwin said that under the Tripartite Agreement the ship is owned by the Hartman Shipping Group, but the government of Tonga and the Pacific Forum Line had a small stake in the funding, “and therefore have the right to buy the ship after eight or ten years of operation. It is optional. The ship may continue under a Charter Operation or may be sold one day and then the fund will be divided among the three shareholders,” he said.

“The ship will fly the Tongan flag. The captain and the Chief Engineer will be Germans, but the rest of the crew will be Tongans,” he said.

Columbus  Line

Erwin first came to Tonga in 1978, as the president of the Columbus Line. At that time the Forum Line was just formed along with the introduction of German Aid to this part of the world, “and we, the Columbus Line, were responsible for the administering of German Aid in this country, as well as in Samoa.”

Erwin retired from the Columbus Line in 1990, but remained a technical adviser until recently. In 1983 he became the Honorary Consul for the Kingdom of Tonga in the northern part of Germany.

“But two years ago when they were looking for a replacement for the Forum Samoa and the Fuakavenga, I called the partners together, the German Hartman Shipping Group, which is operating out of Cyprus, the Government of Tonga and the Pacific Forum Line.”

The outcome of that meeting is the Tripartite Agreement and the building of the new Fuakavenga.

Consul

While Erwin was in Tonga he also took time to discuss with the Tonga government various issues.

“I am one of the two Honorary Consuls of Tonga in Germany, the other is Mr Muller. At the moment we are officially referred to as the Consuls to the old states of the German Republic, but there are now five new states since reunification, and so although I am working all over Germany, I should say I am not officially accredited to the new states. So we were talking about consular districts, and about the German loan for the old Fuakavenga. I try to help here, bettering the situation for the Kingdom as far as the original loan is concerned,” he said.