Effect of the outcome-base education

I would like to raise some important aspects of the ‘Outcome-Base Curriculum’ or Outcome Base Education (OBE). Let me begin, by saying, large numbers of children in developing countries, including Solomon Islands receive little or no formal education. Solomon Islands is categorized as one of the developing nations in our world today. Likewise, Papua New…

Fourth Estate relations

LAST week, I spent an hour with journalism students at the University of the South Pacific during their Friday Forum session; a talanoa session during lunch-hour. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) works mainly through its programmes with 14 Pacific island countries but this was an invitation we wouldn’t have missed. We anticipated sharing our…

Royal visit is next

The Festival of Pacific Arts has gone. The 70th anniversary of the Battle of Guadalcanal has just ended. These two international events brought a lot of visitors to our shores. Now we look forward to the visit of Britain’s Prince William and his wife Catherine. The royal pair are expected here on September 16 for…

Gold ridge: A saviour or nighmare?

It was 6pm on a day in March 1996. And Kevin Riria Malopo, a landowner at Gold Ridge, Solomons’ only commercial gold mine outside the capital Honiara, remembers it well. He along with another landowner, Stephen Moffat, were the last hurdle in the development of Solomon Islands’ first commercial gold mine. Up to that point,…

Deep sea mining — a dangerous experiment

Deep sea mining (DSM) is the new frontier in extractive mining. For the companies involved, as well as the governments that own the mining rights, it offers substantial profits. However DSM is still experimental in nature, with potentially vast adverse environmental effects. It also makes use of new technologies that have yet to be tested.…

Whose voice are you tuning on to?

As a regular writer of this page, I too would like to acknowledge and commend our government, including the various ministries and members of the parliament who were directly involved in this festival, chairperson and members of the organizing committee, other subsidiary committees and their members, the police department and officers, the different groups of…

Visitors commend festival, SI

Self commendation is no praise, but for the Festival of Pacific Arts (FOPA) Organizing Committee to have a sense of gloom and doom and constant self-condemnation; with a sense that they have failed the Region, Solomon Islands and our people by not producing the best, may have been just becoming paranoiac on the part of…

An anti-corruption success story

Transparency Solomon Islands (TSI) in its ongoing efforts to raise people’s awareness on corruption would like to share a success story of a complaint handled by the TSI Advocacy & Legal Advice Centre (ALAC). John was very worried when his wife, Mary, was ordered to resign from her work as a shopkeeper and they were…

The festival fever heats up-lets get ready

The excitement about the 11th festival of pacific arts (FOPA) is mounting. Honiara city over the past weeks and months has been busy preparing for this biggest regional cultural show. This is the first time Solomon Islands will be hosting this important event on our shores. As final touches are being made to the festival…