More than 300 students of Lekutu Secondary and District schools were without proper boarding facilities for three and half years, says Australia’s High Commissioner in Fiji Ewen McDonald.

Mr McDonald said this was a long time for students to be without boarding facilities.

“The boarding facility houses students from surrounding islands, villages and communities,” he said.

Mr McDonald said contractors worked tirelessly to rebuild everything the school lost during Cyclone Yasa in 2020.

“Local sourced materials were used to rebuild the houses and local people built them. For me personally, that’s extremely important for Australia. We are supporting and building back better with locally-sourced materials and local people.”

Mr McDonald said the newly-built boarding facilities were made available with the Vuvale Agreement between the Australian and Fijian governments.

“It’s a partnership built on mutual trust, respect and a deep commitment to working together to ensure a peaceful and prosperous region.”

He said they spent $57million in rebuilding facilities for the nine schools in the North which were impacted by the cyclone.

“We are achieving a lot this month. This was all part of the cyclone recovery program.”

Mr McDonald said the new facilities had been built to withstand a Category 5 cyclone.