“I DON’T have a home.”
Ironically, but only to a certain extent, the quip rings true for Peter Drysdale, considered an eminent hero to the country’s marginalised for housing displaced low-income earners in the Western Division.
Beneath the furrowed eyebrows, the sharp blue eyes dart restlessly, assessing people, numbers, plans and a countless spread of maps and figures pinned on the walls of his unassuming office at Marine Drive in Lautoka.
His windows sweep in a glorious view of Bekana Island and the emerald ocean that he’s typically too busy to notice, and he has instead set up base at the rear end of the office space, where his furnishings include a mattress, pillow and deadly supply of edibles that he proudly shows off.
“I work 13 to 14 hours a day, seven days a week, so it’s an obsession”
“You’re supposed to be retired,” I point out.
“Yes, I resigned from Williams and Gosling as a director last September but I’m still a board member and now full-time with Koroipita. I spent 22 years in the pine industry and my work at Koroipita has always been on top of my day job. This has always been my passion, my hobby. That is why I work these hours.”
Now retired, I ask if his hours have decreased, but of course they haven’t.
“No, no. Now I just spend it all here. I just like being with these people and I get a buzz out of it. It’s a dream ticket to do what you love doing, and I have to pay tribute to Williams and Gosling for being so supportive all these years.”
Loosely translated to Peter’s village, this model town of Koroipita is an ambitiously growing community of cyclone-proof homes for under-privileged families at Naikabula, outside Lautoka.
Mr Drysdale’s work though is a contrast to his beginnings, when as an 18-year-old and “bulletproof”, he was tasked with the eviction of hordes of squatter families from the hills of Nabou, Lololo and Tavakubu, to make way for pine.
He had just left Marist Brothers High School and it was his first job in the Colonial Foreign Service.
Although he didn’t realise it in his youth, he now admits that the experience did have some effect on him.
“We moved hundreds of families out of the hills. It probably did have some impact on me because in those days there was severe poverty and we didn’t muck around. We just destroyed the shacks. I was 18 and had lots of bodyguards, and it must have made an impression. At the time it didn’t and the irony is that years later, I’ve spent 30 years resettling squatters.”
As those who have visited may notice, Koroipita is not a typical settlement and is instead fully equipped with a municipal administration and services and nine pages of stringently enforced rules to adhere to.
The first home was built in 2003 and the area now includes 231 houses with a population of 750. Country-wide however, Mr Drysdale and his tireless Rotary team and volunteers have constructed 709 homes. These 940 homes have housed 4100 people from Rakiraki to Sigatoka, including those at Koroipita.
The residents vary and consists a large pool of former squatters, widows, abandoned single mothers, the elderly and nomads.
Mr Drysdale doesn’t downplay the vulnerable environment born out of their stress and from the disruption of repeat offenders, and has been attacked with a cane-knife four times.
However, the anxiety of poverty is a reality he contends with and coupled with a string of social support and educational programs, has witnessed many of Koroipita’s children excel academically, despite their circumstances.
“We have about 300 children, two kindergartens, a computer room and it’s incredibly inspiring to watch them excel at schools and come home with high marks.”
The provision of all these homes has been an ambitious fete and a poignant achievement that continue to gather momentum, for February marks the 30th anniversary of these Rotahomes.
The work hasn’t ended and a proposed third stage of Koroipita will be evaluated by the New Zealand Aid Program review team in March.
The idea of Rotahomes began in the 1980s. Fed up with the continual distribution of temporary shelter to cyclone-devastated families, he insisted on building houses.
“The tents we’d give them would wear out and then they’d build shacks, which would be destroyed by another cyclone. This was the early ’80s. So I suggested that we build a cyclone-proof home in January, 1985. I was told that the Rotary doesn’t build homes so I told them that we were about to start. They let me get on with it and in 30 years we’ve built 940 cyclone-proof houses, with about 700 funded by Rotary contributions.”
He was recently announced a Member of the Order of Australia on the Australia Day honours list, recognised for service to the international community through the provision of low-cost housing to disadvantaged Fijians.
A privilege indeed but he doesn’t seem fazed by the media attention, and didn’t bother with a celebration, not even a small one. It’s not his thing and he defiantly states he has absolutely no social life, adding with delight that his last viewng of live rugby was the 2003 Rugby World Cup in Sydney. Of course that was eons ago and even with the advancement of communication and social media, he still keeps a very low profile.
It seems surreal but is a small price to pay when compared with the sacrifice of his family.
“My wife Josephine and our children Tracey, Paul and Mark moved to Brisbane 17 years ago, mainly for their educational needs. My wife raised the children on her own. It’s been a tremendous strain for her and it really is the untold story.”
By now there’s an unmistakable tinge of sadness and a feeling of utmost gratitude hanging in the air.
“You know, there’s only a very small pool of people who will understand the sacrifices. I remained here, and their sacrifice allowed me to continue my career with Williams and Gosling and my work at Koroipita and with the Rotahomes.”
He admits there’s been a bit of resentment from his children, who have had to share their father with these strangers for close to two decades, but also understanding.
Prior to the move, Josephine Drysdale voluntarily ran the Lautoka office of Save the Children’s Fund for 14 years, and interestingly, through her work is better acquainted with many of Koroipita’s residents than her husband.
“It’s nice now that she’s able to come about a twice a year but oddly enough, when she comes, all she does is work on tribunals for Koroipita. But she feels that she’s contributing and feels close to the people, and that’s what we love doing.”
For all his life-changing work though, he insists his biggest life achievement was the 47,000 hectares of forestry planted over a 22-year career span in the pine industry.
“When I look back on my life, that is my greatest achievement by far.”
It was the industry itself that brought him and his wife together, as they met while Mr Drysdale studied forestry.
A local, he was born in Australia but moved to Fiji with his parents as a baby, with his siblings including former Air Pacific CEO Andrew Drysdale.
Their father Thomas arrived in 1932 and operated a sawmill in Buca Bay, Vanua Levu while his mother Helen was a war nurse dispatched to Waiyevo on Taveuni in 1940. They then ran the Southern and Northern Laundry at Walu Bay, Suva and Mr Drysdale noted that while both he and his wife experienced poverty while growing up, it has not driven their work for society’s underprivileged.
“I married Josephine and brought her to Fiji when she was 19, and we lived at Lololo, which I developed for pine. Back then there was nothing there, not even electricity and she was up there with me in the bush. Our daughter shakes her head and asks her mother how she has put up with me.
“But my wife is tough too. We did experience poverty as kids but that’s not what drives us,” Mr Drysdale said.
