[Source: Government Press Secretariat]

Ahead of the Forum Leaders Meeting next week, the Secretary General of the Pacific Island Forum Secretariat Dame Meg Taylor and Deputy Secretary General delivered a briefing at the pre-forum media workshop. During their briefing on Pacific Regionalism, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management, Deputy Secretary General of the Pacific Island Forum Secretariat Cristelle Pratt applauded Prime Minister Tuilaepa’s reign as the Pacific Islands Forum Chair.

“Just listening to the evolution of the Narrative through the Forum Chair over the last twelve months has been quite inspiring. In fact when he spoke at Lowy Institute several days ago he was able to use the Blue Pacific Narrative in so many different ways as he wove his speech and his statement to those that were in the room. But he did make the point that we do need to think that we are big and we’ve been told by so many that we are small. So this idea of the Blue Pacific Continent gives us the sense that we are not insignificant in the world, that we are the largest continent on the planet. That we are the Blue Continent on the Blue Planet, and I think that in many ways he served the narrative well.”

Deputy Secretary General also touched on how Prime Minister Tuilaepa has encouraged the Forum family during his tenure as Forum Chair to come together and work together.
“One of the things that he’s also said quite a lot is that it really is very much about how we see ourselves when we come together as the Forum family. It’s about how we act when we come together as the Forum family and it’s about how we project ourselves when we’re with others as the Forum family and I think that it is very much the idea about when our leaders or when we from the Pacific sit around the table we actually realize that we are stewards of this incredibly important part of planet earth. And it really just flips this idea of constantly being told that we’re dependant and that we’re small and we’re insignificant. So I think more than ever it’s so important because suddenly there’s a huge interest in us again. But they don’t see this Blue Continent as belonging to anybody, and yet it’s ours.” Continued Cristelle,
“We all talk about it. But I think we really need to start to live and breathe it every moment of our lives. And some of our leaders, I think the Forum Chair Prime Minister Tuilaepa, really does. His works over the last have been incredibly impressive. We’ll commit to actually publishing those works or his speeches, because you’ll see in so many different ways how he interprets the Blue Pacific and what it means to him and what it means to us as the Forum and this big family that really has a huge responsibility for planet earth.”

Prime Minister Tuilaepa arrives today and is set to hand over the reins of Forum Chair to the President of the Republic of Nauru H.E. Baron Divavesi Waqa at the Official Opening Ceremony later in the evening.