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Tagata o te Moana is a weekly Pacific programme, broadcast on Radio New Zealand National (Saturdays at 5.30pm). It features news, interviews, and discussion of issues. Presented by Don Wiseman.
The programme for 24 February 2007 includes the following:
- One of the authors of Fiji’s constitution says moves by the military-backed government to change the constitution and remove race-based voting are illegal. The interim government says the 1997 constitution is undemocratic. But nationalists argue Commodore Bainimarama is using the race card to justify staging the coup of December 2006. Margot Staunton reports, and interviews co-author of the constitution, Brij Lal. Mahendra Chaudhry also comments.
- Fiji’s military leader is said to have been studying an Eminent Persons Group report on the takeover of power last December. The report calls the coup ‘unconstitutional’, and recommends that Commodore Bainimarama resign, and the military return to their barracks. Philippa Tolley reports on how the report has been received, and speaks to a spokesperson for Fiji’s Citizens' Constitutional Forum. Laisenia Qarase also comments.
- The government of Niue has agreed to a raft of cuts to try to ease a financial crisis. The cuts come after an outcry over earlier plans to reduce the working hours of some public servants by 20 per cent. Don Wiseman speaks to Finance Minister Fisa Pihigia about new plans to reduce the salaries of all public servants, including MPs, by 10 per cent.
- An increasing number of environmental groups are expressing concern about the rapid depletion of rainforests in Indonesia’s Papua region. The international demand for hardwood, particularly kwila, is fuelling environmentally damaging illegal logging in Papua. Indonesia’s Minister of the Environment is appealing to foreign governments, including New Zealand, to ban the import of all uncertified timber. Johnny Blades reports, and there are comments from with Greenpeace New Zealand’s Forest Campaigner Grant Rosoman, Indonesia’s Minister for the Environment, and Maire Leadbeater.
- A New Zealand based film company, TMI Pictures, is working on a documentary looking at how people in Bougainville are rebuilding their lives after the ten-year-long civil war, which started in 1989. The New Zealand lead Truce Monitoring Group (TMG) was deployed in 1997. TMI Pictures Director, William Watson, speaks about his trip to Bougainville, the documentary, and the work of the TMG.
- UNESCO Pacific delegates have been at a workshop in New Zealand, preparing a session of the World Heritage Committee in Christchurch in June. Most Pacific states have ratified the World Heritage Convention, but only one Pacific site outside of Australia and New Zealand is currently on the World Heritage List - UNESCO and its Pacific delegates want to change this. Dubravka Voloder reports.
- There has been a call from the Race Relations Commissioner, Joris De Bres, for the New Zealand government to make a greater effort to foster the languages of Tokelau, Niue, and the Cook Islands. Statistics show many New Zealand-born Pacific children cannot speak their mother tongues. Elma Maua reports, and there are comments from Joris De Bres, and Pacific Island Affairs Minister, Phil Goff.