Isa gets additional jail term
A Guadalcanal man was jailed for 25 years for attempted murder in the High Court, Friday.
Justice Stephen Pallaras pronounced the sentence on Gedily Isa after the accused pleaded guilty to the charge.
Isa and others committed the offence on 27 May 2003 in Guadalcanal’s Weathercoast, less than two months before RAMSI arrived here on July 23.
This was during the tension period.
Isa has already convicted to life imprisonment for ethnic tension related murders.
School changes hands
Luesalemba Secondary School in Temtou Province will be taken over by the Anglican Church of Melanesia (ACOM) starting next year.
The school has been administered by the Temotu Provincial government over the years.
But the church has announced that Luesalemba will come under its authority as of 2015.
Signing of legal documents to transfer the school to the church will be done this week at provincial capital Lata.
ACOM runs a number of secondary schools in the country, including Selwyn College in west Guadalcanal, St Nicholas College in Honiara, and Pamua Secondary School in Makira-Ulawa.
It’s now St Nicholas College
ST Nicholas, one of the leading primary and secondary schools in the country, will now be called St Nicholas College.
The school unveiled its new sign board and name, Friday, during its end year graduation.
Owned by the Anglican Church of Melanesia, St Nicholas College started off as a kindergarten by the church’s Mothers Union.
It offers classes from kindergarten to form seven.
ACoM Education Officer (Formal) Desmond Waita said the name changed came about due to a lot of transitions of different stages the school had gone through over the years.
“The transitional stages the school went through were from primary, secondary, inclusion of Form seven foundation and hosting of USP SI Campus for its students to do their classes,” he adds.
Challenges of gender equality
The Ministry of Women, Youth and Children’s Affairs says mainstreaming gender equality is a major challenge in the country.
The country is a party to the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women and will be meeting the UN CEDAW committee in Geneva at the end of the month.
In 2012 the World Bank rated Solomon Islands as the worst country in the world for domestic violence, saying 64 percent of women reported experiencing domestic violence.
The Ministry of Women’s Gender Equality and Women’s Development Policy Coordinator, Vaela Devesi said there are gaps in the country’s laws, in terms of discrimination against women.
No tsunami alert
A magnitude 7.4 earthquake that struck 64km South of El Salvador in Central America mid last week failed to generate a tsunami.
The Met Service Honiara says there is no immediate tsunami threat to Solomon Islands despite the massive quake..
It added that no further updates will be issued unless the situation changes.
bemobile tower down in east Mala
bemobile says it should fix its tower at Baratalo in east Malaita, which was down for weeks, by this week.
That’s according to bemobile spokesman in Auki Mark Kwala.
Teachers in east Malaita who subscribe with bemobile said they were affected by the problems with the tower in the area.
And they called on the company to fix the problem sooner.
Kwala said the Baratalo tower was down due to minor problems experienced with its linkage with Tiuni tower in west Kwara’ae.
He appealed to their customers to be patience while they work on the problem.
Gov’t roadmap on finance
The Ministry of Finance says it has prepared a plan to improve the way it manages public finance.
Under-secretary Elizabeth Kausimae revealed this recently.
Kausimae said the plan is called the Public Finance Management Reform Roadmap.
“Maps as you know help us reach our destination. It shows us what route to take,” she said.
“But some may argue that there are many alternative routes to the same destination.
“That is indeed true. But we believe that we have chosen the most direct and less costly route to strengthening our financial management.
“This Roadmap has been approved by Cabinet and we launched it together with the 2015 budget in July this year.”
Women end programme
Mothers Union of the Anglican Fau’au Parish in Malaita ended their week-long programme recently.
The programme was attended by Mothers Union groups from nearby parishes.
Spokesperson Nelly Sani said the programme ended with the topic of holy marriage and presentation of gifts between secret friends.
She said women from other churches also participated in the programme.
The annual event will be hosted next year by a parish that is yet to be determined.
Goods, materials flood Auki
Goods and other materials are flooding into Auki from Honiara as the national prepares to go to the polls on November 19.
Our reporters in Auki said most of these were brought in by intending candidates.
Auki resident Jonah Myles said this is expected.
“We’ve seen this before so this is not unexpected,” Myles said.
“Every intending candidate is expected to distribute goods and materials to supporters in order to keep their loyalty.
“And in order to attract new supporters, they must use those goods to lure additional voters,” Myles said.
But he urged voters to take what is given to them, but vote for better candidates.
