Nata comments

Filipe Tuisawau

Nasali Rd, Rewa

I refer to your headline of September 16th, 2018 ie Nata told stop attacking poli­ticians.

This headline is misleading because the issues raised were after the meeting dur­ing the talanoa session with me in my traditional rôle on vanua protocols and appropriateness.

I stated that I would discuss the feed­back within SODELPA.

I did not tell Nata anything directly.

Our joint présentations with Mr Nata and Tanya Waqanika were well received by Lomanikoro.

Mr Nata made useful contributions and clarity.

The report also failed to mention my contributions on important issues such as the budget, cost of living and iTaukei governance reform.

VIP for a day

Vili Yaranamua

Nadi

I had the privilege to watch, walk the 18 hole golf course and see some top In­ternational golfers at Natadola Bay Golf Course for the Fiji International present­ed by Fiji Airways last month.

Free return bus shuttle to the tourna­ment was provided by TTF.

I was totally surprised to see that I was the only one from Nadi to go to Natadola.

What happened to all the golf lovers of Nadi?

The bus shuttle was air conditioned and the driver was my ”’turaga naita”’ from Tailevu who told me, ”naita this is your bus today enjoy your day”. How nice of him. We talked and laughed all the way to Natadola.

I had a good time and thoroughly en­joyed my day.

The bus dropped me back at home af­ter the tournament. Thank you so much Tourism Fiji for the free bus,Fiji Air­ways, Natadola and my “naita” for your wonderful driving.

I was indeed treated as a VIP for a day.

Drug problem

Narayan Reddy

Lautoka

I believe our Police department made extra effort in raiding small marijuana farms and small time drug peddlers and they forgot to concentrate on all the dif­ferent kinds of hard drugs that are avail­able on our streets.

Maybe the Fiji Police Force should form another unit just to combat the hard drugs issue,

Positive parenting

Dhirendra Prasad

Lautoka

It was very encouraging to read that there is an agency which takes child pro­tection seriously. (FS 14/09)

More so, this agency has policies which comes into force in cases of child abuse and corporal punishment whether in schools, communities or in families.

I also know that there is a helpline that can be used to report any such cases.

A colleague of mine some time ago called on this helpline and reported a case where a couple of children were be­ing beaten, verbally abused and threat­ened day in day out.

Two to three people attended to that call from the other side, but it ended up no­where.

Incidents such as this is impeding the empowerment status of the community.

In fact, this is a clear display of disre­spect and mistrust towards the person who has made a genuine call while giving his or her mobile number for further ref­erence later on.

In my opinion, instead of being reactive this section of the Ministry of Women, Children and Poverty Alleviation should be proactive.

All new parents should go through these policies and training before the child is released from the hospital upon delivery.

They should get a clearance from this unit that they have understood the posi­tive parenting initiative and the binding legal framework.

More community work should be car­ried out physically by this section of the said ministry instead of working through other means while at the office.

Calling the local office is also a huge problem.

Your phone would not be received from the other side. Where have the welfare of­ficers (or whatever they are called ) gone?

There are lots of other strategies that can be used to get this child abuse situ­ation under control if there is a will to work them out through genuine consul­tation and community partnerships.

I have plenty to offer if one wants assis­tance all in my genuine desire to assist the vulnerable children from any forms of abuse at such a tender age.

I am thinking of their future and their potential to become hard lined citizens later on if not taken care of now.

God bless our young ones and may He widen the horizon of logical thinking of our relevant service providers to en­compass better strategies to combat child abuse in any form.

No substitute

Dharmendra Kumar

Suva

It is so easy for us to become caught up in the things of life that we find our rela­tionship with God relegated to an after­thought.

Many people substitute a busy life for an abundant life. They have no time for personal, intimate fellowship with God as they rush from task to objective to pro­ject.

It makes no difference what these tasks that keep us from spending time with God are—whether they are secular or re­ligious—if we allow them to fill our days so there will be no time left to cultivate our relationship with God.

We all know that we will become like the people with whom we spend the most time with. The question for us then is, “Am I becoming like Christ by spending time with Him?”

When it comes to the matter of holiness, spending time with God is essential. Since He is perfectly and completely holy, separated from sin in every way, the time we spend in His presence will change our lives and let His holiness be more clearly seen in us.

Only through Jesus can we have eternal life; and only through cultivating our re­lationship with Jesus can we enjoy abun­dant life.

Between the Lines

Amenatave Yaconisau

Delainavesi

The above article by Maika Bolatiki is a campaign for FF party and it compro­mises others political rights(FS 17/9). It’s surely based on performance.

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