One of
the letters in today’s Fiji Times - by Timoci Bure, has many sensible ideas in it.
ITaukei
reforms
WHEN parliament resumes we hope that the incoming government
will carry out a massive reform to the colonial made iTaukei administration
system. We need to remove the fear of
utilising our native land that has been given to us from God to be used and not
to be preserved. Remember the story about talents in the Bible.
Many times we claim that we
serve a powerful God but we lack the courage to utilise god-given resources.
Village life badly needs restructuring and chiefly institutions
need to receive government attention with job descriptions and allowances. Housing
schemes need to be accessible to village dwellers and native landowners should
be given liberty to decide how they wish to utilise land. More iTaukei
landowners are flooding squatter settlements while their land is idle for
decades. Some have left their villages to do canecutting contracts.
Traditional systems of
conducting functions such as weddings and funerals need to be restructured so
as to be simple, save money and time. Some of these systems have ruined our
effort of improving living standard and coming out of the poverty cycle that we
have inherited from our ancestors. So many young iTaukei couples are not able
to have legal marriages because customs and traditions norms are preventing
them from doing so. So many iTaukei are not attending funerals of their
relations because the customs and traditions expectations are preventing them from
doing so.
Village life needs to be programmed
and the role of village elders need to be strengthened as well as kinship.
These are the genuine iTaukei challenges waiting for the very
person who will lead this country after the September election.
He needs to be a reformist, a strong leader and an agent for
change.
TIMOCI
BURE
Taveuni
Taveuni
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