In 1989 The Fiji Times Ltd offered a $15,000 scholarship to send a local teacher to New Zealand or Australia for training in “special” education.
An article published by this newspaper on September 7 of that year stated the company managing director, Geoffrey Hussey, made the offer at a party at the Suva Civic Centre for 120 orphans and handicapped children organised by the newspaper to mark its 120th birthday.
“We at The Fiji Times Ltd thought it would be nice if a group of special children could share this special occasion with us,” Mr Hussey said.
He said that when arranging the party, they discovered there were many disabled and disadvantaged children in Fiji but not nearly enough “special” teachers were qualified to teach them.
“The education department has agreed to select the candidates from the scholarship applications which will be invited through The Fiji Times.
“The successful candidate will have to show a strong commitment to this type of training.”
The report stated children from St Christopher’s Home at Naulu in Nasinu and Dilkulsha Girls Home at Davuilevu, Fiji School for the Blind, Suva Crippled Children’s School, and the Suva School for the Intellectually Handicapped were accompanied by their teachers to the party.
Permanent secretary for Education Hari Ram was also a guest.
“Educating handicapped children is essential to enable them to enjoy their rights as individuals,” Mr Ram said.
He said such education required and relied heavily on assistance from charitable and commercial organisations.
Mr Ram said his ministry was grateful to The Fiji Times for awarding the $15,000 scholarship, tenable for a year, to enable a special education teacher to improve his or her knowledge and skills for which such children would be the ultimate beneficiaries.
The management and staff of The Fiji Times waited on the tables at the party.
While the children wore colourful party hats, face masks, balloons and paper whistles, Mr Hussey and Mr Ram officially cut a 60 by 75cm chocolate cake baked by the Fijian Hotel on the Coral Coast.
The cake, weighing about 40kg, was coated with cream icing with a model of a printing press with dwarfs and the figure “120” carved on it.
It took the Fijian Hotel’s head baker, M Saten Prasad, 18 hours to prepare the cake. Catering for the party was prepared by Milly Fong of Suva and the lucky children enjoyed cakes, pies, vegetable rolls, sandwiches, sweets, and soft drinks.
They later took part in some fun games, singing and dancing, closely supervised by their teachers.
