U.S. Congresswoman Uifa’atali Amata of American Samoa, right, with Marshalls President Hilda Heine and her husband, Tommy Kijiner.
WASHINGTON, D.C. (Office of the American Samoa Congressional Delegate) — A crucial House Natural Resources subcommittee hearing Thursday examining Congresswoman Amata’s bill to restore self-determination to American Samoa, was followed by a snowstorm grounding most flights out of Washington on Friday, which caused a delay to the start of Congresswoman Uifa’atali Amata’s long trip to Majuro. Connecting in Honolulu with an early morning departure to Majuro and crossing the International Date Line, she arrived in the Marshall Islands’ capital shortly after the ceremonies began for the inauguration of President Hilda Heine and her cabinet, and was delighted to attend.
Amata attended in her capacities as vice chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee’s Subcommittee on the Indo-Pacific, and as a member of the House Natural Resources Committee where she served as chair of the Indo-Pacific Task Force. She also is a co-chair of the Congressional Pacific Islands Caucus.
Upon arrival at the ceremony, she was announced by the President and greeted with warm applause by inaugural attendees.
Foreign dignitaries in attendance included delegations from Japan, Taiwan, Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia and the United States.
The U.S. delegation was led by Ambassador Chantale Yokmin Wong of the U.S. Asian Development Bank, with Assistant Secretary of the Interior Carmen Cantor, and White House Deputy Assistant to the President, Erika Moritsugu, who is Asian American and Pacific Islander Senior Liaison.
“This was a long trip for a short stay,” said Congresswoman Amata, “but it was important to me because my family lived in the Marshall Islands for four years in the early 1960s, when my father served as the first Pacific Islander appointed as head of government of the Marshall Islands in that period of its association with the United States. Indeed, I am a relative of the President by the marriage of her first cousin Elma to my oldest brother. So, the blood of the Marshall Islands flows through the veins of my nieces and nephew and their children, and I was honored and blessed to attend.”
Congresswoman Amata also expresses her condolences to the people of the Marshall Islands upon the recent passing of Iroij Ambassador Phillip Kemioañ Kabua, as she conveyed personally speaking to outgoing President David Kabua. The late Ambassador Kabua has served in several key positions and repeatedly as an ambassador for the RMI government.
