Tonga opposition dumps members

The Democratic Party of Tonga has dumped four of its MPs just four months out from the election.

The Democrats, led by veteran pro-democracy campaigner, Akilisi Pohiva, have formed the opposition for the past four years in Tonga.

Pohiva told Radio New Zealand’s Dateline Pacific the four who will not stand under the party’s banner in November are Sitiveni Halapua, Sione Taion, Semisi Tapueluelu and Sunia Fili.

Efforts to find out why the party has dumped four of it members were met with a smokescreen of words from Pohiva.

While he acknowledged the four dumped MPs make up a big slice of his party he says he wasn’t the one who sought to rid of them.

“No, it’s not me who did the selection, the selection was done by a committee appointed by the party.

“I was also selected by the party to help the committee and to me that was a good thing, because I’m the one who knows more than anybody else about the current members.

“And what I did, when they asked me any questions regarding one of the members I had to express my independent, my personal opinion, or my personal assessment and it was entirely up to the committee to make the final decision, that’s what actually happened.

Dateline Pacific: These four have now been removed so are you happy to see them go or are you sorry that they’re going?

“Well it’s a pity but that was the selection done by the committee,” Pohiva answered.

Dateline Pacific: But what is it about these four that caused the party to effectively turn on them?

“Well, I just leave it to the people, at the end of the day it is the responsibility or the duty of the people to do it.

Dateline Pacific: Yes, but it’s probably not a good look for your party which has had a fair degree of unity over these past four years to suddenly, a few months out from the elections, losing a third of your MPs.

“Oh well, maybe if that’s how people look at it, they look at it from different perspectives because they know more.

“Tongan people know more about the current members because during the past three years I think they were in a much better position to assess the performance of the current members.”

Dateline Pacific: It’s all very well to say it’s up to the people to find out, but you’ve got to tell them as a party, you’ve got to show some transparency here don’t you, and tell the people why these four have been dumped?

“Well, it’s in the report, when the people did ask me and I told them ‘you better read the report’, all in the report especially in the case of Sitiveni Halapua, for example, the report, just anybody who reads the report, they will not have any problem at all after reading the report.

Dateline Pacific: All right, so four months to go till the election, are you going to become the government?

“Well, there’s still four months before the election, our party is working very hard to make sure that our party will takeover next year, that is my current position now and I think I share the same position with the rest of our members.”