ROME, 23 NOVEMBER 2016 (AAP) —Italy coach Conor O’Shea has made only one change to the team that stunned South Africa for Saturday’s Test match against Tonga.
Quintin Geldenhuys replaces the injured Andries Van Schalkwyk at lock for the game at Padua’s Stadio Euganeo.
The Azzurri are coming off a 20-18 win over the Springboks that captain Sergio Parisse called the greatest result in the history of Italian rugby.
“There are a lot of expectations surrounding us but we’re only focusing on winning and above all on our discipline and solid play. … The match with South Africa is finished. Now we’re looking ahead,” O’Shea said.
Italy opened the Test season with a 68-10 thrashing from New Zealand.
Tonga, who beat the United States 20-17 in San Sebastian, Spain, last weekend, is ranked 15th, two spots below Italy.
AUCKLAND, 21 NOVEMBER 2016 (SAMOA OBSERVER) —As the “tourism partner” of the Lupesoliai Laauliolemalietoa Joseph Parker v Andy Ruiz Jr World Heavyweight title fight, the government and the people of Samoa are fully behind their man.
The assurance was made by Prime Minister Tuilaepa Dr. Sa’ilele Malielegaoi in Auckland where he fronted a press conference with Segiali’i David Higgins of Duco to announce the Invest Samoa initiative.
Tuilaepa also told reporters he has personally invited Samoa wrestling and Hollywood superstar, Seiuli Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to attend the December 10 WBO title fight, as his personal special guest.
“He hasn’t responded to acknowledge he accepts the invitation,” he told the Samoa Observer.
“But he is always willing and able to support Samoa when he is able to.
“He is one of our sons and always acknowledges his commitment to Samoa.
“Joseph [Parker] needs all the support he can get to have a good fight so I see the opportunity there to have The Rock here.”
The government’s partnership with Duco will have benefits for “all involved,” said Tuilaepa.
For instance, Samoa will receive significant promotional tourism exposure in the live international broadcast to a probable viewership in the hundreds of millions.
“We are proud to be able to support our son Lupesoliai La’auli Joseph Parker in his quest to become the first Samoan world heavyweight champion,” Tuilaepa said.
“[We] believe he possesses the qualities required to succeed – strength of body, mind and soul.
“In addition to this, [the] event will be a great opportunity for Samoa to promote our beautiful country to what will be a massive international audience, demonstrating that Samoa is a great place to visit and do business.”
Duco Events director Segialii said he is extremely happy to continue the strong relationship between his company and the Samoan government that had been forged over the past 24 months.
“I would like to extend my sincere gratitude to the people of Samoa and the Honourable Prime Minister,” he said.
“I am sure the nation of Samoa will be happy with the return on investment this partnership will deliver over the coming years, putting Samoa on the map as one of the premier emerging markets for international businesses, as well as one of the best holiday destinations in the South Pacific.”
Earlier this year, the government supported Duco’s “Rumble in Paradise” in Apia, involving Parker.
Among the benefits of the partnership Invest Samoa will have branding rights to two corners of the ring canvas, receive the rights to display Samoan promotional footage on the big screens at the event as well as branding rights to two toblerones situated on the ring canvas – among other things.
Further, Invest Samoa will receive brand integration into media coverage and press conferences.
The Samoan government will also receive an allocation of corporate hospitality and general admission tickets to the event, for corporate networking and promotional purposes.
Part of the partnership package is that Tuilaepa will introduce the main event on fight night on the live international broadcast.
Tuilaepa said the partnership with Duco was a worthwhile project and that Samoa will reap the benefits.
Asked about Lupesoliai’s chances of being crowned world heavyweight champion, Tuilaepa fancied his chances.
He said Parker is the third son of Samoa to attempt the world heavyweight title, after David Tua and Alex Leapai.
“Parker has an advantage of being much taller than David and also has a longer reach.”
Tuilaepa has also extended an invitation to Pene Pati of Sol3 Mio to sing a rendition of the Samoan national anthem before the main fight.
Scroll down to watch videos in Tongan
A Tongan woman who claims she is the true Prophet of God and His new messenger has gained growing band of followers.
Esita Smith, who lives in Australia, began her religious mission about a year ago, but has been widely mocked on social media.
She told Kaniva News she was sick of being attacked by people who called themselves Christians.
Smith has gathered a strong following among people she calls her apostles.
These apostles imitate her video preaching style when they preach and claim God has made a change in their souls through the Prophet.
In a video she released on Facebook on November 10, Smith said she had received a new command from God to reveal to her followers.
“I am the new Word of God and the new Old Testament version,” she announced online in Tongan.
She said people believed in the Old Testament and the work of prophets like her, but had never seen them first hand.
“That is the difference between me and those prophets because you are seeing me and what I am preaching to you,” she said on the video.
The Tongan Australia resident has faced strong criticisms from a Tongan church minister in Australia and some Tongan Christian followers on social media.
Rev. Semisi Kava of the Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga in Australia lashed out at Smith and labelled her as
Rev. Sēmisi Kava
“manufekai” (beast) “fie-Kalaisi” (Anti-Christ) and “vale” (ignorant).
When asked about the motives behind his reaction against Smith, Rev. Kava said it was because she departed from the teaching of the Bible and claimed she was Christ.
Rev. Kava claimed he discovered through his Facebook messenger that some Free Wesleyan Church members have left the church and followed Smith.
He did not give the exact number of those people.
However, he claimed they included a church steward couple who had separated from their children after they chose to follow.
Rev. Kava said the couple had left Christ and moved into fire.
In an emotional statement he called on all Christians to stand together for the real Jesus the Christ.
Response
Smith told Kaniva News she was fed up with people who regarded themselves as Christians and at the same time they showed hatred against her and swore at her and her followers.
She said she ignored them because what she did was what God had told her to do.
“Remember our people, they do not want others to have anything better,” she said.
“I told you they could not defeat me”, Smith said.
Some of the Tongan community said they found Smith’s preaching and behaviour unusual.
She did not wear pastoral or formal attire, but instead dressed casually.
In one of her videos she wore a singlet and while preaching she referred to her golden necklace and ring.
She said she told her followers to make sure they appeared clean and beautiful whenever they preached online.
The language she used was very informal and she did not appear to have based her preaching on a religious book or referred to church teachings.
She did not preach using references to the Bible but on one video she strongly criticised church leaders for collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars from their poor church members.
She told church leaders God wanted them to stop it immediately.
The following videos were recorded by some of Smith’s apostles
The apostles openly declared how they believed in Smith’s preaching and teachings. Some of their videos viewed more than 20,000 times and shared more than 200 times on Facebook.
The main points
A Tongan woman who claims she is the true Prophet of God and His new messenger has gained growing band of followers.
Esita Smith, who lives in Australia, began her religious mission about a year ago, but has been widely mocked on social media.
She told Kaniva News she was sick of being attacked by people who called themselves Christians.
Smith has been criticised by Rev. Semisi Kava of the Methodist Church in Australia, who has labelled her as the “anti-Christ” (fie Kalaisi).
The Mo’ui Fo’ou ‘ia Kalaisi Fellowship (Mo’ui Fo’ou) has been ordered to hand back property to the Tokaikolo church from which it broke away in 2013.
The president of the Land Court, Mr Justice Paulsen, ordered the Mo’ui Fo’ou to hand back property in Ha’ateiho in July 2013.
“I have rejected all the defences of Mo’ui Fo’ou,” the judge said.
He ordered that Mo’ui Fo’ou, its agents, employees and servants leave the property within 30 days.
However, he also said that Tokaikolo should have tried to reclaim the property earlier.
At the time of the split, Tokaikolo members who would not join Mo’ui Fo’ou were told to leave.
The court president said Mo’ui Fo’ou knowingly and unlawfully took the Ha’ateiho property from Tokaikolo. It never had any right to the property.
Work on the original Ha’ateiho property began in 2000 with work on building the church and residence. They were ready for dedication by December 2003.
A school building, school toilets, showers, play ground and fence were built between 2004 and 2007. The school building opened in 2008. The church hall was built between 2008 and 2010.
The court president said Mo’ui Fo’ou knowingly and unlawfully took the Ha’ateiho property from Tokaikolo. It never had any right to the property.
Mo’ui Fo’ou did some work on the property and continued even when it was aware that Tokaikolo wanted to reclaim the land.
In his judgement, Mr Justice Pauslen said that Tokaikolo was entitled to possession of the Ha’ateiho property and was the lawful owner of the buildings and improvements on the property.
He ordered costs against Mo’ui Fo’ou ‘ia Kalaisi Fellowship.
He ordered the Minister of Lands to register the lease of the Ha’ateiho property to Tokaikolo.
The main points
The Mo’ui Fo’ou ‘ia Kalaisi Fellowship (Mo’ui Fo’ou) has been ordered to hand back property to the Tokaikolo church from which it broke away in 2013.
The president of the Land Court, Mr Justice Paulsen, ordered the Mo’ui Fo’ou to hand back property in Ha’ateiho in July 2013.
He also ordered that Mo’ui Fo’ou, its agents, employees and servants leave the property within 30 days.
The property included a church, hall, residential and school buildings.
The Tongan Police had destroyed large quantity of marijuana seized in ‘Eua, today.
The dried leaves of 458 plants were burned at the Tapuhia waste management facility.
Police have released still photos and video of the largest single amount of cannabis to ever be seized by Tonga Police.
Last Thursday, officers from the Police Tactical Response Group and Drug Squad teams uprooted and seized 458 illegal cannabis plants during a search warrant in ‘Eua.
The large-scale Police operation continued on Friday, when officers seized a further 58 cannabis plants (34 growing, 24 already uprooted), 2 sacks filled with cannabis leaf, a bottle filled with cannabis seeds and a packet of dry cannabis leaf.
Two men have been charged in relation to last week’s record seizures and are before the courts on drugs and firearms-related charges.
Previous cannabis seizures have involved less than four hundred plants, which were not fully grown. The drugs had an estimated street value of more than TOP$200 000.
They were destroyed earlier today at Tapuhia under strict conditions, witnessed by several independent persons.
Representatives from the Office of the Auditor General and the Ministry of Health attended, as did the Kolofo’ou District Officer and the Kolomotu’a Town Officer.
The cannabis was removed from the shipping container and transported via two Police vehicles to Tapuhia, where it was destroyed.
“The social harm caused by drugs to the community is immense. Drugs don’t just harm the users, but their families and their communities. It’s the money that was spent on drugs, that was supposed to buy food and clothes for a man’s family. It’s the person who has their possessions stolen by someone who wants to swap them to buy drugs – the harm caused by drugs affects us all” says Commissioner Caldwell.
“The destruction of these drugs should send a clear message to anyone involved in the cultivation, supply and distribution of illegal drugs – you will be caught. We are committed to disrupting illegal drug activity in Tonga – there is no place for this in our country” he says.
Anyone who has concerns or suspicions about illegal drug activity in their town is encouraged to report this to the Police Drug Squad on 26497 or 23083.
Information can also be given anonymously to the Police Intelligence Unit on 23197.
The Auditor General’s office has recommended that the ‘Unuaki ‘o Tonga Royal Institute be referred to the police after massive discrepancies were found in its accounts.
The Institute, which began operations in 2004, was set up by disgraced former politician and Minister for Infrastructure, Etuate Lavulavu.
The Auditor General’s office said hundreds of students supposedly attending the private school could not be identified and that the Institute should repay TP$553,800 to the Technical Vocational Education and Training fund (TVET).
The report said some of the information used to create students’ identities appeared to have been taken from students who attended training programmes at the Ministry of Infrastructure, Lavulavu’s former portfolio.
The TVET payments had been made based on claims made by the Institute.
The Auditor General’s report said the Institute claimed to have lent students TP$670 for their fees, when these were only TP$100. It also claimed to have offered places in exchange for food and labour, but no proper records were kept and the report concluded these claims led to a significant overpayment of TVET funds.
It said the government should ensure that the Institute and its courses were properly approved before any further payments were made.
The report said a total of 915 students supposedly attending the school, and for which the Institute as receiving funding, could not be identified.
Of these:
38 said they had no idea how their names came to be on the school lists
234 were found to have either not paid fees or attended the school
643 names appearing the Institute records, but could not be located. Residential addresses were wrong or non-existent, some had migrated and some were Mormon missionaries.
Lavulavu told Kaniva News he rejected the report and threatened to take legal action against the Auditor General.
Lavulavu said he was “disappointed” the Auditor General’s office did not give him and his school a chance to discuss the report.
The current director of the school is his wife, Akosita Lavulavu, who was elected as MP for Vava’u No. 16 seat after he lost his seat.
In 2003 Matangi Tonga reported that the Institute would offer Form 5 level English graduates the opportunity to either study Foundation Level, Form 7, or to take a technical course at the Institute.
In September this year the ‘Unuaki ‘o Tonga Royal Institute finally complied with a court order to move out of the Tonga National Cultural Centre from which it had been operating for several years.
Head of the Cultural and Youth Division of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Pulupaki Ika, told the Tonga Broadcasting Corporation the ministry was trying to recover pictures and artefacts that had been removed from the former museum.
In 2009 Lavulavu signed an agreement for the privatization of the Centre and began running the Institute out of it, along with several tourism businesses.
The Government eventually ordered the ‘Unuaki ‘o Tonga to vacate the centre, but had to resort to legal action.
As Kaniva News reported in February, Tonga’s Supreme Court convicted him of bribery and spending over the legal limit on his 2014 election campaign.
The conviction cost him his Parliamentary seat for Vava’u No. 16.
In his summary of the case, Lord Chief Justice Paulsen said Lavulavu was not a credible witness and that his evidence was implausible, evasive and untruthful.
The main points
The Auditor General’s office has recommended that the ‘Unuaki ‘o Tonga Royal Institute be referred to the police after massive discrepancies were found in its accounts.
The Institute, which began operations in 2004, was set up by disgraced former politician and Minister for Infrastructure, Etuate Lavulavu.
The Auditor General’s office said hundreds of students supposedly attending the private school could not be identified and that the Institute should repay TP$553,800 to the Technical Vocational Education and Training fund.
Lavulavu told Kaniva News he rejected the report and was “disappointed” the Auditor General’s office did not give him and his school a chance to discuss the report.
