An initial donation of $3,450 was presented to the President of the Tonga National Youth Congress (TNYC), Drew Havea, by Nigel Cox, the Director of the Asia Pacific Unit of the British Foreign Commonwealth Office on August 13.

The Youth Parliament program, was initiated by the Tonga National Youth Congress in 2002 when the young people took over the Tongan parliament for a week, and elected their own Speaker, Chairman of the Whole House Committee, Cabinet Ministers, Noble's Representatives and People's Representative. The Youth Parliament then debated issues that were important to Tongan youth. A similar program ran last year, but this year Drew said they had decided to extend the program to include a Youth Election, with candidates campaigning for election.

Drew said that an electoral roll has been compiled by the TNYC and that only registered voters would be able to vote.

Drew said that to be eligible to be a candidate for election, a candidate must not have a criminal record and must be between the ages of 18 and 35 years.

The youth election is planned for the second or the third week of September and for the Youth Parliament will open for its third session in the second week of November.

"Of course, we will be more than thrilled to see the youth election as a stepping stone for future Parliamentarians. But what we want achieve at the end of the day is to educate and arm the young candidates to heighten discussions on common issues that are of utmost importance to them," said Drew.