A RETIRED teacher and Sigatoka resident has called for the return of ancestral human remains taken to New Zealand for study after a historical disaster stripped her family of their heritage.
Speaking at the proposed Sigatoka Iron Sands project public consultations on Friday, Lanieta Burasia Matavesi of Vunavutu Village recounted the dark history of the dunes and the lingering pain felt by her community.
“The hill where I live now, it was flatland and then in the 1800s, a tsunami struck the area down here, opposite Kulukulu Village on the hill. There was a sunken reef there, so it damaged the sunken reef,” she reminisced.
Ms Matavesi said some of her ancestors relocated to Draiba in Navosa, after the disaster.
In the aftermath of the catastrophe, human remains were unearthed among the shifting sand dunes.
Ms Matavesi said representatives from the local museum had approached her family with a promise to investigate the site and preserve its heritage.
“The museum told my father, we’ll take the human remains, we’ll take it to New Zealand for investigation, for studying, and then we’ll bring it back.”
Decades passed, but the promised return never materialised. Her father spent the remainder of his life waiting for the remains of his ancestors to be brought back to their native soil.
“My grandfather and father waited for it. They died and nothing came back, I want to mention that because that is very, very bad.
“We are waiting for our ancestral human remains.”
