Sunday, November 29 2009

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ON WAY OUT: Vanuatu Prime Minister Edward Natapei...

VANUATU Prime Minister Edward Natapei runs the risk of losing his hold on power when he returns to his island state after this weekend’s Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Port-of-Spain, following international media reports that he lost his seat in parliament last Friday, due to a simple paperwork error.

It has been reported that Prime Minister Natapei forfeited his seat after missing three consecutive sittings of Parliament without notifying that country’s House Speaker George Wells, a blunder one analyst called “flabbergasting” and which has thrown the tiny Pacific nation’s politics into turmoil.

“It was a standing order,” an official at the speaker’s office told AFP. “If you miss three consecutive meetings, your seat will be declared vacant.”

While his cabinet was in emergency talks on the weekend on the way forward out of the political chaos, Natapei was attending the CHOGM in Port-of-Spain which ends today.

Addressing a news conference last night at the International Financial Centre in Port-of-Spain, Guyana President Bharrat Jagdeo said Natapei’s situation was not discussed by Commonwealth leaders yesterday. “That was not discussed...that (Natapei’s forfeiting of his parliamentary seat) is news to me.”

Asked last evening if an interview could be arranged, aides to Prime Minister Natapei said he was resting after having attended a meeting of leaders yesterday morning. Aides also stated they had no comment to make on the report that Natapei may no longer be Prime Minister of his country.

According to Derek Brien of the Pacific Institute of Public Policy think-tank, Vanuatu will be ruled by a caretaker government until parliament elects a new prime minister some time next week.

To retain his seat, Natapei needed only to hand in a signed explanation for his absence to the speaker, reports said.