Men of the village enjoyed a fun-filled grog session by the beach to celebrate the end of pre-polling voting at Tawake Village in Cakaudrove.
Tawake and five other villages belong to the district of the same.
But the incident-free polling was marred by the fact that many registered voters could not vote.
District chief, the Vunivalu of Tawake, Ratu Samisoni Levu, was concerned that 35 voters could not vote either because they lost their voter ID cards or couldn’t make it to the village on time.
Some voters who were due to vote were still travelling to Lagi Village by bus when voting stopped at 11am on Wednesday.
Villagers had to get off the bus at Lagi Village and walk for five kilometres on mountainous terrain before they reached Tawake.
Nevertheless, Ratu Samisoni said he was happy the whole exercise was over.
“I woke up, offered my usual morning prayer, had breakfast and prepared myself,” he said.
“I asked my Lord to give me wisdom so that I could choose the right leader and the right government.
“And to me, the right government for me, my family and my people in the district of Tawake, is one that has great vision and foresight.”
He said he would like the next government to ease the needs of rural people.
“In my village, we’d like to see the road get fully completed so that buses could come right to the village.
“As it is, we get off at the next village and walk over mountains for at least five kilometres. Before we used to call the road horse track.
“We also need a market where we could sell our abundant marine resources.
“We have a generator that was donated during PM Qarase’s term. It’s very old and it’s time to switch to electricity power.”
He said work stopped in the village because everybody just wanted to focus on elections.
First-time voter and former Nasinu Secondary School student Hei Pene Ramokoi, 21, said he was proud to be part of the 2022 election.
“I always heard that this was one of the most important jobs of citizens. Today, I got to do it and I’m happy I voted.
“What I want is a government that has the ability to rule with integrity and display good governance principles.”
Twenty-one year-old, Ulaiyasi Tawake Levu said he looked forward to seeing a government that made right decisions.
Both Ulaiyasi and Hei Pene are youth farmers and have dalo and yaqona farms.
Tawake has 120 registered voters.
