Dear Editor, in response to your article published in Cook Islands News on Thursday, 28 April 2022 titled “PR application rules slammed ‘discriminatory’: Fiji NGO head”.

Yes, this was always coming and no matter how well it is couched in legal terms or special relationships, as a justification for giving New Zealanders preferential treatment, the fact is the supreme document for the founding of our nation, rests with the Constitution of the Cook Islands.

Add to this the Human Rights conventions we have signed up to on a global scale and Cook Islands Crown Law is starting to sit on shaky legal grounds and interpretation. This is another test case that may well end up in a Court of law and go all the way to the Privy Council in the UK.

At the end of the day, the cost will come from the public purse (again) and the private sector.

I understand that this is politicking gone mad, because our MPs want to sit at the gravy train table and if they don’t follow the wishes of their constituents, they will be gone.

We need strategic and level-headed people to make these decisions based on what is good for our country rather than what is good for those who only want the Cook Islands for Cook Islanders. We are living in an ever-changing world affecting, language, customs, culture, and intermarriage on a huge scale. But the Cook Islands is becoming richer for this integration and amalgamation, and it behoves Governments to develop, invest, support, provide and properly communicate how we as a people can take advantage of these changing times, and to use all necessary means to preserve the culture, the language, and heritage without creating a closed and gated community.

None of this current crop of MPs and the latest crop of prospective candidates has the wit to even consider this without getting into self-serving policies that are designed to discriminate. And that’s the very thing that goes against our Christian values and our Constitution which we need, to prosper and survive in the 21st century.

Te Tuhi kelly

---

PR stance ‘political stunt’: PM

I believe 65 per cent of the Fijian communities consist of Indians and who have the easiest access to become citizens. The irony is that their businesses and profits aren't invested back into Fiji – they go back to India.

Those NGO Friends - who are they to become dictators regarding the unfairness of permanent residency? The cheek of them.

Kathryn Ann Wheeler

---

$1500 donation leads to discharge without conviction

Again this is an example of the elite double standard of laws and enforcement worldwide.

If this was a regular person, the outcome would have been different. He belongs to the elite (the rich the powerful) so the punishment for anyone, in this case, is either no punishment or a tap on the wrist.

You see this everywhere now, the United States is a prime example.

If you are part of the rich elite, nothing sticks to you when it comes to punishment. This must change.

Edward Keker