Pacific workers are being urged to chase up “many millions” in lost superannuation from their stints in Australia, with that problem also leading to calls for reform.
Difficulties navigating Australia’s complex tax system, particularly for foreigners, mean Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) workers often leave their hard-earned super languishing.
During a nine-month stint in Australia at the guaranteed base wage levels, PALM workers typically accumulate around $3,800 in pre-tax superannuation.
Like other guest workers, PALM workers can apply to access those funds once they’ve left the country, but most either do not – or can not.
All guest workers can apply to access their superannuation once they’ve left, but many do not. (University of South Australia/AAP PHOTOS)
“PALM workers are collectively leaving many millions of dollars in superannuation unclaimed,” Robert Whait, University of South Australia senior lecturer told AAP.
The PALM scheme has expanded in recent years to average around 30,000 workers from 10 Pacific nations in Australia at any one time, doing jobs that employers cannot fill.
Industries includes agriculture and food processing, but also aged care, hospitality, tourism, and even a pilot in early childhood education.
Dr Whait manages the UniSA tax clinic, which offers advice “to help vulnerable Australians with their taxes”, and on the foreign affairs department’s suggestion, widened to take in PALM workers.
“PALM workers have the same rights we do … but the main issue is that under the current law, they can only access that superannuation when they leave Australia and their visa is canceled,” he said.
“Either they’re not aware of it, or the process to put in the forms is difficult because of various barriers, so lots of money is left unclaimed which they could be taking home with them to use, directly with their families and helping out their lives.”
Barriers include the unavailability of key forms in languages other than English, the reliance on internet and computer access, and verification.
PALM workers also get slugged with extra taxes that effectively claw back half of their earnings: the 15 per cent tax on contributions and a 35 per cent “departing Australia superannuation payment” tax.
The messy situation has led Dr Whait, with Connie Vitale from Western Sydney University, to author a paper looking at policy reforms, especially given super primarily exists to fund the retirement of Australian workers.
Options canvassed include adding super into their take-home pay (as occurs in New Zealand) or sending it to a super fund in the worker’s home country, either as they earn, or when they head home.
Dr Whait believes the latter options would better serve the primary of purpose of super – to assist workers in retirement – and allow Pacific super funds greater pools of funding to invest at home.
“The money from PALM superannuation could be used to help infrastructure in their countries and help their communities, so that was probably the tipping point in in recommending that approach,” he said.
Pacific media outlets In-depth Solomons and Inside PNG face existential threats, while Benar News has already gone under, as America withdraws from the region.
America’s retreat from foreign aid is being felt deeply in Pacific media, where pivotal outlets are being shuttered and journalists work unpaid.
The result is fewer investigations into dubiously motivated politicians, glimpses into conflicts otherwise unseen and a less diverse media in a region which desperately needs it.
“It is a huge disappointment … a senseless waste,” Benar News’ Australian head of Pacific news, Stefan Armbruster, told AAP after seeing his outlet go under.
Benar News, In-depth Solomons and Inside PNG are three digital outlets which enjoyed US support but have been cruelled by President Donald Trump’s about-face on aid.
Benar closed its doors in April after an executive order disestablishing Voice of America, which the United States created during World War II to combat Nazi propaganda.
An offshoot of Radio Free Asia (RFA) focused on Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Benar kept a close eye on abuses in West Papua, massacres and gender-based violence in Papua New Guinea and more.
The Pacific arm quickly became indispensable to many, with a team of reporters and freelancers working in 15 countries on a budget under $A1 million.
“Our coverage of decolonisation in the Pacific received huge interest, as did our coverage of the lack women’s representation in parliaments, human rights, media freedom, deep sea mining and more,” Mr Armbruster said.
In-depth Solomons, a Honiara-based digital outlet, is another facing an existential threat despite a proud record of investigative and award-winning reporting.
Last week, it was honoured with a peer-nominated award from the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan for a year-long probe into former prime minister Manasseh Sogavare’s property holdings.
“We’re just holding on,” editor and co-founder Ofani Eremae told AAP.
A US-centred think tank continues to pay the wage of one journalist, while others haven’t drawn a salary since January.
“It has had an impact on our operations. We used to travel out to do stories across the provinces. That has not been done since early this year,” Mr Eremae said.
A private donor came forward after learning of the cuts with a one-off grant that was used for rent to secure the office, he said.
Its funding shortfall – like Port Moresby-based outlet Inside PNG – is linked to USAID, the world’s biggest single funder of development assistance, until Mr Trump axed its multi-billion dollar budget.
Much of USAID’s funding was spent on humanitarian causes – such as vaccines, clean water supplies and food security – but some was also earmarked for media in developing nations, with the aim of bolstering fragile democracies.
Inside PNG used its support to build an audience of tens of thousands with incisive reports on PNG politics: not just Port Moresby, but in the regions including wantaway province Bougainville that has a long history of conflict.
“The current lack of funding has unfortunately had a dual impact, affecting both our dedicated staff, whom we’re currently unable to pay, and our day-to-day operations,” Inside PNG managing director Kila Wani, told AAP.
“We’ve had to let off 80 per cent of staff from payroll which is a big hit because we’re not a very big team.
“Logistically, it’s become challenging to carry out our work as we normally would.”
AAP has confirmed a number of other media entities in the region which have suffered hits, but declined to share their stories.
The funding hits are all the more damaging given the challenges faced by the Pacific, as outlined in the Pacific Islands Media Freedom Index.
The latest report listed a string of challenges, notably weak legal protections for free speech, political interference on editorial independence, and a lack of funding underpinning high-quality media, in the region.
The burning question for these outlets – and their audiences – is do other sources of funding exist to fill the gap?
Inside PNG is refocusing energy on attracting new donors, as is In-depth Solomons, which has also turned to crowdfunding.
The Australian and New Zealand governments have also provided targeted support for the media sector across the region, including ABC International Development (ABCID), which has enjoyed a budget increase from Anthony Albanese’s government.
Inside PNG and In-depth Solomons both receive training and content-focused grants from ABCID, which helps, but doesn’t fund the underpinning costs for a media business or keep on the lights.
Both Mr Eremae, who edited two major newspapers before founding the investigative outlet, and Mr Armbruster, a long-time SBS Correspondent, expressed their dismay at the US pivot away from the Pacific.
“It’s a huge mistake on the part of the US … the world’s leading democracy. The media is one of the pillars of democracy,” Mr Eremae said.
“It is, I believe, in the interests of the US and other democratic countries to give funding to media in countries like the Solomon Islands where we cannot survive due to lack of advertising (budgets).
As a veteran of Pacific reporting, Mr Armbruster said he had witnessed US disinterest in the region contribute to the wider geopolitical struggle for influence.
“The US government was trying to re-establish its presence after vacating the space decades ago. It had promised to re-engage, dedicating funding largely driven by its efforts to counter China, only to now betray those expectations,” he said.
“The US government has senselessly destroyed a highly valued news service in the Pacific. An own goal.”
With the withdrawal of much of USAID’s presence from the Pacific, I quietly hoped that the region could absorb it — maybe even take it as the jolt needed to “go all in on betting on ourselves”. We are building resilience to this donor merry-go-round and, if history is any guide, it will likely cycle back at some point.
What stands to have lasting long-term impact is US President Trump’s Executive Order 14285, aimed at fast-tracking deep-sea mineral (DSM) exploration in the Pacific, outside the oversight of the International Seabed Authority (ISA). It potentially opens the door to a “critical minerals race” fuelled by geopolitics, with the Pacific Ocean at its centre, sidelining Pacific nations who have registered through the ISA. Beyond the clear subversion of international law, the implications for the Blue Pacific’s marine biodiversity and future generations are profound.
If DSM ventures proceed outside ISA oversight, it provides yet another example of why it is so important for the Pacific nations to begin framing a rules-based order to protect the Blue Pacific Continent.
But this urgency raises a more uncomfortable truth — one that continues to undercut Pacific efforts — that, at its core, the problem is not external actors. It’s not the US. It’s us.
At its source, Pacific regionalism is about enabling Pacific nations to work better together. While it is important to acknowledge the many challenges that confront regionalism, we must also recognize that we are not immune from ourselves.
Despite our aspiration of what Pacific regionalism “ought” to be, we remain embedded in a Euro-centric model — one in which we are shaped, not by what we choose to be, but what we are paid to become.
Our region has, for decades, been carried by a vision of solidarity and collective action. Epeli Hau’ofa gave us the metaphor — our sea of islands — and we speak often of the Blue Pacific Continent and the 2050 Strategy for it as an expression of agency and collective sovereignty.
And yet, without solidarity, these narratives ring hollow. When it comes to some of the most pressing challenges of today — ocean governance, regional security, human rights — we are divided, hesitant or silent enablers.
A Pacific High-Level Talanoa (dialogue) on Deep Sea Mining was convened in February, with officials tasked to develop options for a regional approach for Forum Leaders; consideration in Honiara later this year. But DSM is not merely a regional or legal issue. It exposes deeper political, structural and cognitive fractures within the region, revealing the fragility of consensus-building, dollar-diplomacy and internalised dependencies. In this respect, regionalism is not failing because of external pressure; it is eroding under the weight of our reluctance to make hard, collective choices.
This is not about attributing blame. Rather, it’s an opportunity to reflect.
Having spent most of my career working in and around national governments, I’ve been part of the very machinery that enables these dynamics. At the moment, it feels like we’re advancing national interests, responding to pressing needs or navigating political realities. It feels like we’re working together. But are we truly collaborating or are we simply managing each other?
When you step back — and especially from a distance — the picture sharpens. There’s a certain perspective that comes when you step outside the system as I have. A part of you has never really left yet you’re removed from the grind. That’s where reflection lives, I think — somewhere between hope and cynicism, believing in the idea of Pacific-led regionalism in a reality ripe with the limitations of process, power and political motivations.
In 2019, Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) leaders endorsed a comprehensive review of the regional architecture in Tuvalu, aligning it with the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent. The regional architecture here refers to the Pacific nations, external partners, regional institutions, processes — and most importantly — Pacific people who give life to Pacific regionalism. It was an important moment — an attempt to take stock and reimagine — but, six years on, the review is ongoing.
A new High-Level Panel established by PIF Troika Leaders has begun its consultations across the region on the regional architecture. The now-former Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa of Samoa recently said that the consultations seeks to answer three questions: Is Pacific unity still there? Do we still want it? If we do, what do we want it to look like?
The review will consider options for the rationalisation — or amalgamation — of regional institutions, amid growing concern that there are simply too many. Yet the regional architecture is now more complex, fragmented and contested than perhaps at any other point in its history. Compared to six years ago, the region is navigating a far more strained geopolitical landscape. Pacific nations have become more vulnerable — economically, environmentally and strategically — at the very time when external engagement has become more heavy-handed. This has contributed to a deepening over-reliance on Australia, New Zealand and, increasingly, China.
Nowhere is this more evident than in the Pacific’s regional security architecture. The Boe Declaration on Regional Security, endorsed in 2018, was intended to re-centre the region’s security needs squarely on climate change, human security and sustainable development.
But as external powers seek access and influence in the Blue Pacific Continent, the region has become heavily securitised and militarised — further complicating efforts to foster regional unity and cooperation. This has led some Pacific academics to call for the demilitarisation of the region.
Initiatives like AUKUS, expanded military partnerships and intelligence-sharing arrangements mask a creeping model of regionalism that appears to be preparing itself for future conflict. We are told this will keep us safe — but at what cost to our sovereignty, and to our future generations?
And this takes us back to the question that continues to plague Pacific regionalism: Who is driving regionalism, if not us?
Outside of process-oriented solutions, we tend to avoid holding heart-to-heart political talanoa on confronting and divisive issues including the influence of Australia, New Zealand and external partners, the China-Taiwan issue, DSM, regional security, and the place of territories within our shared future. It has long been argued, for example, that decolonization and regionalism are inseparable.
It would be a mistake, however, to assume that regionalism lives and dies at the hands of political leaders alone. Political will does not exist in a vacuum. It grows (or withers) within an ecosystem of public expectations, institutional interest and electoral cycles.
The end-game of regionalism is not the communique delivered at the annual PIF Leaders Meeting. It is a set of practices, compromises and choices that we, collectively, either uphold or allow to erode. Without conviction — without a shared belief in the value of standing together — these gatherings risk becoming rituals of aspiration with little action.
I firmly believe that Pacific regionalism is ultimately about people and relationships. But relationships are extremely difficult to manage, especially in a region as diverse and dispersed as ours. Sub-regionalism, domestic pressures and competing priorities all take their toll. And then there are the silences — the moments when we choose not to speak, not to take a stand, not to challenge each other when the stakes are high.
There is no single fix for the problems of Pacific regionalism. But perhaps the shift we need is not just structural reform — but a relational shift as well — from fragmented interest to a sense of shared purpose — moving beyond the talk. And it begins not with external forces, donors or declarations, but with us.
That’s the hardest part. It requires sacrifice, trust, willingness to endure short-term pains for longer-term gain. Hopefully, the current review of the regional architecture can encourage us to take that leap.
If we don’t, someone else will happily do so. And we will continue to follow.
Written by: Sione Tekiteki
Joel Nilon is presenting a paper on the Blue Pacific rules-based order co-authored with Sione Tekiteki at the 2025 Pacific Update which will be held on 3-5 June at the University of the South Pacific’s Laucala Campus in Suva, Fiji. Visit the event webpage for more details on this free event and the livestream of keynote sessions.
This article appeared first on Devpolicy Blog (devpolicy.org), from the Development Policy Centre at The Australian National University.
Sione Tekiteki is a senior lecturer at the Auckland University of Technology. He previously served at the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat in three positions over nine years, most recently as Director, Governance and Engagement.
This month’s Australian elections brought many surprises. One of them was that Labor, once returned, decided to separate the Pacific and international development ministerial portfolios for the first time (for any government) since 2007.
Then it was Duncan Kerr for the Pacific and Bob McMullan for aid, both parliamentary secretaries. Now we have Pat Conroy as Minister for Pacific Island Affairs and Anne Aly as Minister for International Development.
This might simply be a sign that Pat Conroy is overworked. After all, as Minister for Defence Industry, he is overseeing a massive and highly problematic scale-up of the defence budget.
But the optimist in me hopes that it might also be a sign that the Labor government is going to take aid more seriously, and think more globally, in its second term.
Yes, other countries around that world have recently cut, if not slashed, their foreign aid. But Australia was simply ahead of the curve by slashing aid a decade ago. Those cuts have never been reversed, and Australia is as a result today one of the world’s most miserly donors. We shouldn’t be! With Labor claiming to be the guardian of the fair go, one can only hope that it will increase aid in its second term, and not just for the Pacific.
Bringing a broader perspective to aid, one that looks beyond the Pacific and strategic competition with China, would be a forward step. It is incredible that in a world of unprecedented crisis Australian aid is justified not by its provision of support to relieve global suffering but by its further concentration on what is already the most aid-dependent region in the world. I was shocked to read in the most recent aid budget that Australia justified its support for the World Bank by the fact that the Bank worked in the Pacific. Talk about the tail wagging the dog.
I am a supporter of aid, but too much focus of aid on the Pacific not only distorts Australia’s priorities but is also bad for the Pacific. Australian aid has engendered a culture in the Pacific of workshops, training, much of it overseas, and t-shirts.
If aid is not the way forward for the Pacific, migration is. The first term of this Labor government was historic in its achievements for Pacific migration but, even though Labor made no new Pacific commitments going into this year’s election, there is plenty left to be done in its second term. This is especially so in a context in which the Pacific is increasingly demanding freer if not free movement within the region.
Most importantly, Labor has three years to bed down its ambitious new Pacific Engagement Visa (PEV). If the Coalition had been elected it is quite possible that they would have abolished the PEV. After all, they voted against the PEV legislation. Now Labor has three years to bed it down. The PEV represents a completely new approach to migration — it is the only visa we have that is not employer-sponsored but which has an employment requirement — and it will take some time to bed down. It is definitely facing teething problems.
The key difficulty has been for offshore PEV lottery winners to get the onshore job required for them to convert that selection by lottery into an actual visa. One possible reform would be to give those selected in the annual lottery a six- or 12-month employment visa to visit Australia and find a job. Another would be to drop the work requirement altogether.
Second, Labor in its first term introduced family accompaniment for the Pacific temporary migration program (PALM), but only on a pilot basis. Progress has been glacial on this key human rights reform, and the key priority here has to be to go from pilot to mainstream. (Labor’s 2022 commitment had no mention of any pilot.)
Third, PALM itself needs to be rescued. Multi-year (long-term) PALM visa numbers are flat over the last year, and multi-month (short-term) numbers fell by 10% over the same period.
Survey data tells us that the schemes are viewed by both participants and non-participants as highly beneficial. PNG, Timor-Leste and Solomon Islands in particular all want to send a lot more workers. This simply won’t be possible if the scheme continues to be over- regulated, causing employers to continue to turn their backs on the opportunity to bring out Pacific workers to do seasonal farm work, preferring to hire from the much less regulated backpacker workforce instead.
Fourth, PALM continues to suffer from the overlapping problems of too many workers absconding and claiming asylum. Bad employers who break migration rules — most of them operating outside the tightly regulated PALM — need to be cracked down on and the time taken to process asylum applications greatly reduced.
Fifth, Labor in its first term only made a nod in the direction of the critical issue of backpacker visa reform. The unions, unable to recruit backpackers, turn a blind eye to the high levels of exploitation they suffer. In June 2024, Labor set up a review of regional visa settings, including the backpacker visa. That review never concluded. But Labor should follow through on the advice of its own migration review. As the Fair Work Ombudsman has said, the “work- for-visa” link embedded in the backpacker visa (with visa extensions granted if particular types and amounts of work can be demonstrated) is broken. All backpacker visas should be issued for three years, with no limits on or incentives to work. This would not only greatly reduce workplace exploitation; it would also reverse the PALM decline.
Sixth, new initiatives should be adopted. New Zealand has just announced that anyone from the Pacific with a valid Australian work, tourist or study visa will be given entry to New Zealand. New Zealand will also increase the duration of its short-term visitor visas for the Pacific from 12 to 24 months. Australia should do the same. Australia should also support the Pacific proposal for an APEC-type business card that would allow free business travel within the region.
And there is more. Superannuation for PALM workers needs a legislative fix. Regional PALM work restrictions make little sense. And the pathbreaking Australia-Tuvalu Falepili Union agreement could be replicated with other interested Pacific nations.
There is a lot to be done. So much so that I hope that, at the next election if not before, whoever is in government creates a Pacific migration portfolio and assigns a dedicated minister to it.
Written by:Stephen Howes
This is the first part of the Pacific Family Matters blog series which explores priorities for there-elected Labor government’s engagement on development issues with the Pacific Islands region. The series draws on the expertise of the Pacific Research Program, a consortium led by the Department of Pacific Affairs at the Australian National University (ANU), in partnership with ANU’s Development Policy Centre and the Lowy Institute.
Disclosure: The Pacific Research Program is an independent Pacific-focused research program that supports evidence-based policy-making in the Pacific and collaborative research relationships across the region. The PRP is co-funded by the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the consortium partners’ parent bodies. The views are those of the author only.
This article appeared first on Devpolicy Blog (devpolicy.org), from the Development Policy Centre at The Australian National University. Stephen Howes is Director of the Development Policy Centre and Professor of Economics at the Crawford School of Public Policy at The Australian National University.
Developing nations, including those in the Pacific, will pay China $A34 billion this year as Beijing comes calling for repayments on project funding.
China is now “the world’s largest single destination for developing country debt payments” and outstripping the whole of the West, says a new report shows from Australian think tank The Lowy Institute.
Under its Belt and Road Initiative, China has rapidly increased investments in infrastructure since 2013, partnering with dozens of nations primarily in the developed world.
In more recent years Beijing has changed tack, providing a heavier portion of grants – which do not need to be repaid – into its mix of development assistance.
However, with standard lending terms including the delay of payments for several years before a maturation of loans at 15-20 years, it appears crunch time has arrived for repayments.
“China’s earlier lending boom, combined with the structure of its loans, made a surge in debt servicing costs inevitable,” report author Riley Duke said.
“Because China’s Belt and Road lending spree peaked in the mid-2010s, those grace periods began expiring in the early 2020s. It was always likely to be a crunch period for developing country repayments to China.”
Mr Duke says some of the world’s poorest people are likely to bear the brunt.
“The high debt burden facing developing countries will hamper poverty reduction and slow development progress while stoking economic and political instability risks,” he said.
The analysis is incomplete, given data is only available for 54 of 120 developing countries and China does not routinely disclose funding.
Mr Duke says this means his figure of $US22 billion ($A34 billion) to be repaid in 2025 to China and its many state-controlled lending arms is likely an understatement.
It is also unclear whether China would defer debt repayments as it did during the COVID-19 pandemic, when it joined with G20 nations to provide relief.
That move was helpful at the time, according to Mr Duke, but the effect was to mount costs into a heightening of the current repayment spike.
Several countries across the Pacific, which have benefited from Chinese investment in infrastructure, are likely to be among the countries affected.
The report comes ahead of a significant summit between China and the Pacific in Xiamen, beginning on Wednesday when Foreign Minister Wang Yi hosts representatives of 11 nations.
Kiribati Prime Minister Taneti Maamau and Niue Premier Dalton Tagelagi will join with the foreign ministers of Tonga, Nauru, Micronesia, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Cook Islands, and representatives from Fiji and Samoa for the two-day meeting.
“There will be an in-depth exchange of views on interactions and cooperation between China and Pacific island countries (PICs) in all aspects and international and regional issues of mutual interest,” China foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said.
“China highly values its ties with PICs and hopes that this meeting will help drive the implementation of the important common understandings reached between leaders of the two sides, enhance solidarity and coordination, unite efforts for development and prosperity, and galvanize an even closer community with a shared future.”
The 11 nations attending the summit make up the entire Pacific Islands Forum membership, excepting the three countries with diplomatic ties to Taiwan, the two France-aligned nations, Australia and New Zealand.
THE people of Samoa will go to the polls to elect a new parliament after former members of Fiame Naomi Mata’afa’s FAST party joined with opposition MPs to defeat her government’s budget.
Fiame won a groundbreaking election in 2021, ending four decades of rule by the Human Rights Protection Party (HRPP) and becoming the first woman head of government in Samoa.
The long-serving politician and high chief struck trouble in January when she demoted minister La’auli Leuatea Schmidt, the FAST party chairman, from cabinet after he was charged with criminal offences.
While ministers and MPs followed La’auli to the crossbench, Fiame’s government’s survived two no-confidence motions earlier this year.
Her government did not manage a third escape act, with La’auli-aligned MPs joining with the Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi-led opposition HRPP to defeat her budget.
The Samoa Observer reports the vote was 16-34, and marks the first time a government budget has failed in 40 years.
The vote is set to trigger an election inside 90 days, which would mean a polling day before late August.
A new development pact between Vanuatu and Australia is in the works, with Vanuatu’s prime minister urging Anthony Albanese to visit and sign the deal in September.
Jotham Napat has revealed discussions on the “Nakamal” agreement, taking in infrastructure planning, economic development and climate planning, are in the final stages, after meeting with Foreign Minister Penny Wong in Port Vila.
“We are hoping that we will sign this Nakamal agreement this coming September, and I’m hoping that the prime minister of Australia would fly over so that we can sign this agreement,” he said.
The agreement takes its name from the Bislama word “nakamal”, which means a traditional meeting place, such as a house, in Vanuatu.
Mr Napat said the bilateral relationship had “unshakable foundations”, a fitting phrase given Vanuatu’s attempts to rebound from December’s devastating earthquake.
Senator Wong announced $6 million towards engineering support and rebuilding schools damaged in the 7.3 magnitude tremor.
“Some 45 schools and over 100 classrooms have been damaged and we want to help rebuild them,” she said.
Australia – which has given financial aid and technical support following that disaster – is Vanuatu’s top development assistance partner by a distance.
Australia spent $US1 billion ($A1.6 billion) on projects in Vanuatu in the 15 years to 2022 according to the Lowy Institute, more than double the second-most generous nation, China, with $US449 million ($A697 million).
Senator Wong foreshadowed talks to take place on the partnership before she left on her three-nation tour of the Pacific this week, including stops in Fiji and Tonga.
There was no mention of a stalled security agreement signed between Mr Albanese’s government and a prior Vanuatu administration, headed by Ishmael Kalsakau, in late 2022.
Vanuatu has opted against ratifying that deal, with subsequent governments believing it compromises its non-aligned strategic outlook.
Senator Wong also travelled with the First Nations ambassador Justin Mohamed and met with the National Council of Chiefs.
“What I would say to the leader of Vanuatu, to the prime minister and to his cabinet, to the chiefs and to the people, is that ‘we are a steadfast partner. You can count on us’,” she said.
“You can count on us to act on climate change. You can count on us to help rebuild. You can count on us to work with you as we walk together.”
Mr Albanese already has two Pacific diplomatic engagements this September: the 50th anniversary of Papua New Guinean independence, and the Pacific Islands Forum leaders’ summit in Solomon Islands.
As the wait continues for official results in the Vanuatu elections, one outcome is clear: women will be severely under-represented in the next parliament.
Vanuatu is an outlier even in the Pacific, the region that elects fewer women than any other.
Just six women have been elected to the 52-seat parliament since independence in 1980, and just one in the past 15 years: Gloria Julia King.
Ms King earned the support of voters in the Efate constituency in 2022, and is running again in this year’s snap election.
Speaking in the village of Mele, north of Port Vila, after casting her vote, she told AAP she was feeling “a lot more relaxed” second time around.
“In 2022 it was just a lack of knowledge with the whole political process of campaigns. I was a bit overwhelmed. This time I’ve grasped it a little bit better,” she said.
The factors behind the male-dominated parliament are multi-faceted, but tackled in a recent report by Pacific women’s advocacy group Balance Of Power, titled ‘Unspoken Rules of Politics‘.
Funding a run for office can be harder, with fewer women enjoying financial independence, producing fewer candidates.
There are just seven women among the 217 candidates in this year’s poll.
The electoral system – a single non-transferable vote, electing multiple members in constituencies – heavily favours incumbents, who are almost wholly men.
Voting in Vanuatu is also subject to intense community pressures, particularly to support incumbent MPs who are seen as delivering for their communities.
Police escort a prisoner (in orange) to vote at a polling station in Blacksands, a village to the north of Port Vila Mele, north of Port Vila, Vanuatu Thursday, January 16, 2025. (AAP Image/Ben McKay)
That occurs through the shady use of constituency funds: public money given directly to each MP to spend in their electorate, which often indirectly or directly buys votes.
Ms King said a lot of her effort in this campaign was aimed at freeing women of these pressures to think and vote independently.
“My primary goal was just to get more women to vote, and get them to understand their democratic power enhances the whole voting process,” she said.
“For a long time, I knew that women were intimidated by men when it comes to voting, so we had to change the campaign messages to make them more approachable, educational, empowering.”
The Balance Of Power report found men believed female MPs might be controlled by their husband, while women – drawing on their own experiences – also felt they may not be able to act autonomously.
ANU Pacific Affairs fellow Kerryn Baker said research showed men supported greater representation, but held unflattering perceptions.
“There’s strong in-principle support (to elect more women) but then when you ask, ‘are men are better at political leadership than women?, a majority agree,” she said.
Ni-Vanuatu are also cautious of external powers – including Australia, which has made gender equality a priority of its development partnership – tilting the scales in favour of women.
“There is an awkwardness around efforts to get more gender representation in parliament, it can be seen as outside interference,” Dr Baker said.
Dr Baker said that women arguing for women to be elected, such as Ms King, can also be seen as “self-interested or self-serving”.
“It’s a lot harder for women to generate the political capital to make change in this space and women politicians, of course, must endure the double burden of representing both their constituencies and ‘women’ as a broad social group,” she said.
Ms King, who expressed delight the campaign was over after an exhausting effort, agreed with that sentiment.
“The last legislative was very dominated by men and everyone wanted me to get up and speak all the time,” she said.
She is confident her work will pay off at the polls.
“I’ve done the work, done the yards, I’ve done the sacrifices,” she said.
“I have a lot of faith in the women of Vanuatu. This has been my message for the last two years: if you want women to be represented, you have to vote for the women.”
Vanuatu has made fresh requests for help from Australia and other development partners, as community tensions mount around the pace of Port Vila’s recovery from last month’s earthquake.
The 7.3 magnitude tremor on December 17 killed at least 14 people, injuring hundreds and displacing many more.
Vanuatu officials concede that may not be the final death toll.
A month on from the quake, the response has moved from a life-saving and humanitarian effort towards a rebuild.
There is much to do, with technical structural assessments of key pieces of infrastructure – including the wharf, roads and bridges – being prioritised.
So too is the hardest-hit area, the CBD and picturesque city waterfront, which remains off-limits, barricaded by police checkpoints until it is cleared as safe.
John Ezra, chairman of the Recovery Operations Centre (ROC), told AAP that work requires outside help, and Vanuatu had made formal requests of countries including Australia.
“We would like this rapid structural assessment to be completed soon,” he said.
“We would like Australia to assist us to complete a structural assessment, New Zealand, we would like them to support us in demolitions of the identified buildings … and we would like Japan to assist us in a geotech survey, especially in the Port Vila area.”
AAP was granted access to the town centre to review progress, finding a deserted precinct that would usually be full of life and economy-boosting tourists.
At the centre is the wreckage of the Billabong store, the site of a life-saving rescue operation, but also deaths.
It has been reduced to rubble, tidied but left in situ, with other businesses mostly shuttered, waiting for the return of customers, or left decrepit.
“It’s a ghost town,” Ballarat-born CBD cafe owner Ivan Oswald tells AAP.
Mr Oswald has operated the Nambawan Cafe for two decades, and while understanding of the obvious difficulties, is frustrated with a lack of activity.
“The sooner we can get buildings which need to be condemned for public safety need to come down, the better … Vanuatu obviously doesn’t have the manpower ability to do it easily and safely,” he said.
“We need to get the assessments finished, buildings pulled down, and town needs to get back to some sort of normality.”
Mr Ezra offers no timeline for the reopening of the CBD or the wharf, with landslips affecting key access roads, but concedes under questioning it is likely to be “months”.
Official situation reports show 219 buildings have been assessed to date, with 22 “red-stickered”, requiring demolition, and 51 “yellow-stickered” and needing repairs.
The Vanuatu Daily Post reports hundreds of people have been rendered unemployed by the CBD closure.
Mr Oswald is attempting to keep up cash flow and his employees in work by setting up shop in Saralana Park, where local women have also set up stalls selling traditional arts, craft and dresses.
Others business owners have been less constructive.
Over the course of an hour at the ROC hub, which itself is operating out of marquees as government buildings await assessment, several people arrive to vent displeasure at officials.
Some business owners want to reopen, some want fast-tracked assessments for insurance claims, others want relief from landlords.
The lack of timelines in the wake of the disaster has the rumour mill churning, with some fearing a higher-than-disclosed death toll.
Mr Ezra confirms the search for bodies has ceased, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t be found during excavations.
He said a forthcoming meeting with Vanuatu’s regional council of chiefs may confirm additional fatalities.
“We would like to say that 14 is final but there could be a few other deaths,” he said.
Voting is under way in Vanuatu’s snap election, which is remarkably going ahead despite the turbulence of a severe earthquake one month ago.
Thursday has been declared a public holiday in the Pacific nation, when voters will elect their next parliament.
On Efate, and further across the archipelago, voters defied the hot sun to do their democratic duty.
In Mele, north of the capital, voters began waiting outside their local polling station well before its 7.30am opening.
There are few signs of electioneering, given the formal campaign period wrapped up on Monday.
Polling stations are open until 4.30pm, when the challenging counting process will begin.
Given there are 352 polling stations, staffed by police and electoral workers, with ballots brought to Port Vila to be counted and officially ratified, an official outcome is not expected for days.
Ni-Vanuatu in Australia, New Zealand and other regions can cast proxy ballots.
Then comes all-important negotiations among parties to form a coalition government, given Vanuatu’s tendency to elect a multitude of parties.
The election is taking place almost two years ahead of time.
In November, Prime Minister Charlot Salwai opted to dissolve parliament rather than risk a no-confidence vote in his fractured coalition government.
While the December 17 earthquake upended Port Vila, killing 14 people and injuring many more, the election is going ahead as Vanuatu’s constitution requires an election to be held within 60 days of the dissolution of parliament.
The date selected – January 16 – is the latest day possible allowed by law.
Vanuatu’s Electoral Office has worked around the clock to secure the necessary polling materials, train workers, and send ballot boxes across the archipelago.
VEO principal electoral officer Guilain Malessas confirmed two ships were dropping off the tools of democracy with nature’s assistance.
“We are grateful for the good weather conditions currently in Vanuatu. The deployments are proceeding safely and on time,” he told the Vanuatu Daily Post.
Mr Salwai opted for the election after a number of issues eroded confidence in his leadership, including a proposal to double an already-dubious constituency funding program and give every MP $A130,000.
Graeme Smith, senior fellow at the Australian National University’s Pacific Affairs department, said voting patterns suggested particular villages and towns often stuck with the same party or candidate.
“It’s quite similar to to a lot of Melanesia in that there is a fair bit of expectation based on where you are, what village you’re from, what clan you’re from, and who you will then vote for,” he said.
“So certain candidates who are locked in, and we’ve seen some of them rotating as prime minister.
“What’s interesting about Vanuatu, as opposed to PNG and Solomon Islands, is that you do have some politicians that are just there time after time after time, and it doesn’t seem there’s any easy way for them to be dislodged.”
A number of candidates are former prime ministers, including Vanua’aka Party leader Bob Loughman, UMP leader Ishmael Kalsakau, and Sato Kilman, who has held the post four times while People’s Progressive Party leader.
The Leaders Party’s Jotham Napat has been tipped as a possible prime minister, while climate advocate and Land and Justice Party leader Ralph Regenvanu is also interested.
The government will be decided after the vote, when party leaders jockey and negotiate for positions in coalition negotiations.
There are 217 candidates vying for win seats, including just seven women.
Vanuatu has historically elected the fewest women in the Pacific region: just six since independence in 1980.
Gloria Julia King, the sole woman in the last parliament, is hoping to win election in Rural Efate, as is high-profile candidate Marie Louise Milne, Port Vila’s deputy lord mayor.
