Dear Editor – I really sympathize with Kuma and those whose views he is trying to represent in his contribution to the current debate on the question, “who should take the responsibility to pay the former attorney general for his forced removal from Solomon Islands in December 2007?”
Unfortunately, he missed the whole point of the argument and instead resort to dirty debating tactics that can be best described as “a deliberate attempt to distort the facts of the issue”.
As a matter of fact, he is resorting to the old tactic of “attacking the person instead of the issue”.
He put up a very disjointed argument that is very confusing. These are very effective debating tactics used by people who run out of relevant debating points and if your readers are not careful they will be misled.
For the same reasoning I will not waste my time responding to Kuma’s personal attack on Moti, instead my primary purpose of responding is to get him on line.
In any case, the issue he raised and the manner in which he raised them are reminiscent of the arguments advanced against these very policies by our people at that time.
Whilst I share his sentiments about the Mamara-Tasifarongo Bill as regards its workability considering the fact that the financing arrangement placed a perpetual threat on the national budget if implemented, I will not venture beyond that point to make statements that may be unfounded as regards the alleged involvement of Moti in the arrangements highlighted by Kuma.
The SMI case is a very interesting one and a debate on it can make very interesting reading.
My personal view, although I did not participate in the public debate at that time, is that the decision that saw the demise of SMI could in retrospect be described as ‘throwing the baby with the water’.
The broader policy issue in the SMI case is for Solomon Islands to have a locally owned Insurance Company as a monetary policy strategy to place a check on the remittances by subsidiaries of foreign Insurance companies in Solomon Islands by way of reinsurance and other remittances.
I will not venture any further than making that passing comment.
Kuma also shed tears over my removal of “a most efficient and experienced national lawyer..”.
It is interesting he raised that point and I excuse him for his ignorance. This matter is now water under the bridge and I do not intend to be sucked into Kuma’s strategy except to say that if indeed he was of the calibre described then why is it that the Sikua Government did not reinstate him to the post instead of appointing their own Party man to the Job?
Interestingly after outlining these irrelevant and disjointed facts, Kuma suggests that the compensation “…must come from Sogavare himself since he started the whole Moti saga…”.
I am not sure whether Kuma is in his right frame of mind in arriving at such a conclusion.
In case we forget, our laws did not have any problem with the entry of Moti into the country when he was engaged under EU funding to work for the Mamaloni Government in the early 1990s, nor does it have any problem with his entry into Solomon Islands in 2007 to work for the Sogavare Government, if that is what Kuma is trying to argue.
It is his illegal deportation from our country by a Solomon Islands Government that played puppet to the Australian Government that is the issue here.
For the information of Kuma and anyone else who is trying to mislead the people of Solomon Islands in this matter, it was the Sikua led CNURA Government that illegally deported the former attorney general of Solomon Islands.
Shouldn’t they be made accountable for this action? I have my own views on that but I will leave that discussion for another day.
Hon. Manasseh Sogarave
Honiara
