THE Tui Nayau, Ratu Tevita Mara has pleaded with Lau’s traditional leaders and provincial council representatives to consider the plight of the people when imposing financial obligations on them.
Responding to a request for the soli ni vanua (provincial levy), Ratu Tevita reminded the leaders at yesterday’s provincial council meeting in Suva life was getting difficult and that the people of Lau — living on the islands or elsewhere — faced all kinds of financial challenges.
He called on officials of the Yatulau Company Ltd and the provincial council to look at investment opportunities to help settle the provincial levy.
Ratu Tevita’s comments follow revelations from the provincial’s financial report which showed that over the past three financial years, the provincial levy (soli) had not been fully achieved.
Although members of the council discussed ways to better achieve this, Ratu Tevita told them it all boiled down to money.
“We are talking about money and this is a very important topic, meaning we need to fork it out of our pockets to soli to the vanua,” he said.
“These are difficult days we now face.
“For us in leadership, let’s look at this diligently.
“The vanua soli started in the colonial days and if we look at this very carefully, our people have other financial obligations such as soli to the church, education, yavusa, tokatoka apart from the yasana.
“So, in one year, these families have about six different financial obligations to give to and we need to consider this.”
Ratu Tevita said the levy would continue to increase, so it was only right for the provincial company to help out now.
