There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest. — Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the holocaust.

TA’I’S TAKE this week is about injustice and its consequences if it is allowed to fester without some positive action to counter it.

It is unfortunate that some injustice is caused unintentionally. For example, the name ‘Afega’ is used often in news reports about the problem with Leauva’a without explaining that only part of Afega is involved; the part led by Maulolo Tavita Amosa, M.P, and others.

This week in marking World Press Freedom Day one would expect front-page coverage of the Prime Minister’s call for journalists and news organizations to rethink their role and purpose with a sense of urgency to adapt to the changing landscape of media and information dissemination.

While the landscape may be changing the media’s role remains constant - to inform the people; to hold the leaders accountable; to speak truth to power. In doing so, their reports must be accurate, brief and concise – the ABC of reporting.

The more serious injustice, I want to highlight also involves Maulolo, MP, legislator.

In a court decision delivered on Friday this is part of the judge’s introduction:

2. E faalua ona faatulaga Fono-faa-Faamasinoga o le aso 28 Mati ma le 4 Aperila 2024 e tusa o le vaega 33 o le Tulafono 2020 mo se teuteuga o lenei mataupu. Peita’i, e lei auai Maulolo Tavita Amosa. O le faamatalaga a Maulolo, e lei logoina ia i le Fonotaga muamua. O le Fonotaga o le aso 4 Aperila 2024, e vili atu le Ofisa o loo auai atu i le Supreme Court i le mataupu a Afega ma Leauva’a.

Two Judicial Settlement Conferences required by section 33 of the Land and Titles Act 2020 were set; one for 28 March and another for 4 April 2024. Maulolo did not turn up for either. His first excuse was that he was not informed and the second one was that when the Office rang he was on his way to the Supreme Court for the matter between Afega and Leauva’a.

Yet that these were the details in the SAVALI of 28 October 2023.

AFEGA XXVI LC5657 P28 – Suafa FATA SEUSEU o Afega N 38.     LC 5657 P28    Seuseu Fata Pito faasaga ia Maulolo Wairaki ma Maulolo Tavita Amosa.              Ia faamaonia loa le soloia o le nofo a Roy Lucky Joseph Pesamino i le suafa Fata i le    Fuaifale o Seuseu e pei ona faasalalauina i le Savali 28 Iulai 2023.

ASO/TAIMI FONOTAGA: Aso Tofi 28 Mati 2024 – 09.30 ile taeao. ASO/TAIMI FAAMASINOGA: Aso Lulu 17 Aperila 2024- 9.00 ile taeao.

Not only were the names in CAPITALS but were also in bold type; and so were the dates and times of the first Judicial Settlement Conference that Maulolo Tavita Amosa, MP, swore he was not informed about.

I suppose Maulolo Tavita Amosa, Member of Parliament, is quite entitled to expect to be personally informed but the whole purpose of carrying the details of Conferences and Hearing not once, not twice but three times in the SAVALI is so that the Office does not have to personally inform litigants of cases in the Land and Titles Court.

Be that as it may, the Judge accepted Maulolo Tavita Amosa, MP’s, explanation of his absence but the Land and Titles Act gives the Judge discretion to order costs for non-attendance at these conferences emphasizing the need to obey the law. And attend.

The question that arises is if the judge allows Maulolo Tavita Amosa, MP, a legislator, to get away with not following the law, would that be the court’s attitude to ordinary Pai and Lafai?

The details of the case on Friday raise other points of interest in that the title was conferred in 2015 but it was only advertised in the Savali in 2023, eight years later. What happened to the responsibility of the Sui o le Nu’u, the old Pulenu’u, to forward detail's within a certain time, fourteen days, under section 24?

The panel of judges, Leaupepe Fatu Pula, Masoe Tovia Tufuga, and Afemaleta Alesana Lafi, make   other findings and drew certain conclusions from a survey of previous decisions in the matter of the title Fata of the branch of Seuseu that need further scrutiny.

For now, that is TA’I’S TAKE, a protest against injustice.

Happy Press Freedom Day 2024.