A car windscreen was smashed with a shovel in a confrontation between a road-worker and a tourism operator after tensions rose last week during one of many long closures of the main road to Ha'atafu.

The three kilometers stretch of road is the only public road out of the Lausi'i, a narrow strip that connects six villages and eight beach resorts with the rest of Tongatapu, and where road works have been in progress for about four months.

Shane Egan, of the Blue Banana Beach Houses at Kanokupolu said his car windscreen was smashed by a road worker, and that he and two overseas guests in the vehicle could have been seriously injured in the incident on May 16.

"My tour driver rang to say he was stuck with our guests on the Nuku'alofa side of the road works on Hihifo Road and they needed to return to their accommodation at Kanokupolu."

Shane drove from the beach to pick up the guests, who had to walk through the road works to meet him on the other side.

"A road worker on the Hihifo Road, just outside of ‘Ahau village, swung a shovel at the driver's side of my windscreen. I was driving at the time and both my two guests and I were showered with fine slivers of glass from the shattered windscreen."

Shane said they suffered superficial cuts. "I was lucky I did not get blinded. We were all quite shaken by the experience as the results could have been much worse," he said. The head of the shovel broke off and remained embedded in the front of the car.

Long closures

The resort owners and residents of the area are frustrated by the long road closures caused by the road works.

"For several months now the road has been randomly blocked, without proper notice, from morning till night," said Shane.

Staff cannot get to work and guests cannot get into or out of the area during the day between 9:00am and 6:00pm.

"The free movement of residents and international guests to Tonga has been restricted to the point of absurdity. Despite promises from the Ministry of Transport the situation continues without detours or a passing lane. Guests cannot freely come and go to and from the airport, go on tours, attend floorshows or shop in Nuku'alofa.

"It is understandable road works must be carried out and we are most appreciative of this," said Shane. "But considering the bad state of the economy is it unreasonable not to allow the traffic to pass at reasonable intervals."

But he said that after last week's attack on his car, he had decided not to accept any new bookings for a few weeks until the road workers moved out of the area.

Peseti Ma'afu owner of the Likualofa Beach Resort stated that he had contacted the deputy Prime Minister last week with a plea for the government to not only advise the public on the roads schedule, but also to reduce the work hours from 10:00am to 4:00pm, and to fix another road or detour to allow access for the residents and tourists while the work is ongoing.

Police investigation

Taniela Faletau, the Acting Police Commissioner, stated that the Nukunuku Police officers were investigating the windscreen incident.

He said that the Ministry of Transport is the supervising Government ministry responsible for the road improvement project carried out by Chinese contractors and he believed that consultations were required to come up with some resolutions to the issues expressed by the residents.

Tarsealing

The road construction is funded with a multi million government loan from China, and carried out by the China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC), which is also the main contractor for the reconstruction of Nuku'alofa.

Pesalili Tu'iono, the Tonga Ministry of Work's officer in charge of the engineering workshop and road construction said that there was a public consultation before the road construction began between Ha'atafu Village and 'Umu Tangata. The Town Officers and District Officers were their contact people and with the cooperation of people in the villages, he believed that, "the road work could be finished in two days."

Pesalili said that the most difficult part of the process was the applying of the tarseal, and that is why they had to close the whole road. "If we want to have a quality road, then we have to abide with the demands of the road builder," said Pesalili.

He said they had made some adjustments to their working timetable to meet public demand. "We don't work on Mondays and on Fridays. That was for the convenience of the beach resorts to transport their guests back and forth. But the more days that we don't work, the longer it is taking to finish the road work."

Pesalili said that as of today, May 24, "the road will be completed in two days, but because there will be no work tomorrow and Monday, so it will be sometime next week."