A high-level regional consultation has been organized by the Pacific Conference of Churches in Fiji on April 21-25 to discuss where to resettle members from Kiribati, Tuvalu and Marshall Islands, said PCC general secretary Fei Tevi.
“The preference of church leaders is to look within the Pacific Islands for solutions. We don’t want to find the ‘Pacific solution’ but look within the Pacific first for solutions to resettlement.”
Tevi said churches want their government leaders to begin to discuss the issue at the regional level.
“We would like our governments to begin to dialogue, even through the Pacific Islands Forum, to sit down and say what can we do with regards to Kiribati and Tuvalu?” he said.
“When this issue was first discussed by church leaders in Pago Pago last year, a church leader from Kiribati stood up and said, ‘We might not be here in 20 years time so we welcome any type of invitation.” In response, a church leader from Solomon Islands stood up and offered land saying you are welcome to come to my country. That is something church leaders can do that our governments cannot,” Tevi told Pacnews.
On whether the church has abandoned the option of talking to Australia and New Zealand, the PCC executive said his members want to discuss the issue within before approaching them for support.
“The hope is that Australia and New Zealand allow Pacific countries to devise a plan for the future of its brothers and sisters and then come in with the type of support that is needed,” Tevi said.
“The last thing that we want to see is to see our Pacific Islanders running away to Australia and New Zealand because that would create additional problems there.”
“We know of the situations of our Pacific Islanders in both Australia and New Zealand, where our people there have no employment and are left to do menial tasks. We don’t want that to happen,” Tevi added.
He said church leaders want to explore resettlement opportunities in the island first.
