It is 5 am Saturday morning. Except for a few dogs shouting good morning to each other from afar, it’s quiet and serene. This is how I start my day, every day. First, a cup of Moccona coffee before my mental aerobics, The New York Times Wordle puzzle. I’ve played 520 games so far and my stats: Winning – 98%. Maximum winning streak 126. (Not bad for a near-octogenarian.) Then it is on to the news: opinions and Op-Eds in The New York Times, Washington Post and The UK Guardian, and lastly, Old Grandma NZ Herald.

Following the 7.00 am 2AP news, I’m outside collecting my breakfast – ripe paw paws and bananas from the trees around the property to go with my Weetabix. (My children’s palagi friend who visited with them for Christmas asked them: “Why did you guys moved to New Zealand when you have paradise here - avocado trees, mangos, bananas paw paws, vegetables and herb garden?)

However, for the last 2 weeks, since our very efficient EPC destroyed my Made-in-China radio with their irregular power surges, and without a TV, I now get my news mainly from the print media. And occasionally, the taxi drivers. (I once heard the late David Lange, former Labour Party Prime Minister of New Zealand saying that he always prefers taking a taxi from Wellington Airport to Parliament than being driven in his government-provided limousine because taxi drivers are a particularly good source of information. What you gleaned from them gives you a good idea about the pulse of the nation. It is more reliable and accurate than what you get from your advisers sometimes or the polls.)

So, all last week, ever since Prime Minister Fiamē Naomi announced that she would hold a press conference every week, I waited with keen interest for an announcement of what exciting government policy has in the pipeline. None came, well, except for a press release from the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries via this newspaper headlined: “Feral pig traps a success.” Can you imagine how ecstatic I felt when I saw that headline? Actually, I often do whenever I see the words ‘pig’ and ‘success’ appearing in the same phrase. I jumped up and down squealing like a .., well you know. Do you know the feeling you get when you finally achieve something after everything you tried or thought about trying turned to hog waste? That you can now truthfully tell the public about? Great achievement indeed.

We should celebrate by declaring a public holiday.

According to the report, “feral pigs pose a significant problem for many famers … and there are 26,776 household growing [taro] crops.” This figure according to my calculation represents 86% of the total Samoa Household of 31,137 (2021 Census Report). I am probably included in these figures of taro farmers as I have 15 taro crops growing next to my fence that I use for my Sunday palusami-pot.

The Ministry’s report says: “The severity of the issue [feral pigs] has elevated discussions to higher levels including Cabinet meetings.” Well, that’s amazing. I asked myself, “If the Cabinet had to spend time discussing ‘feral pig traps’ at its meetings, then the issue must be an extremely serious one like the measles and covid-19 outbreaks a couple of years ago?” More serious than sexual assault on women; the ever-increasing cost of living; the never-ending power surges; the corruption; theft and break-ins into homes and businesses; the widespread drugs and substance abuse we’re experiencing; physical abuse of children or falling export revenue.

Meanwhile and of a more serious note, judges of the Supreme Court in the last 2 weeks expressed their concerns with restrained anger, understandably, when sentencing defendants who appeared before them in different cases. One in particular, was a 19-years-old male charged with burglary and the other was a forty-year-old father for sentencing for rape and incest.

Justice Lei’ataualesa Daryl Clarke in sentencing the 19-year-old defendant lamented the fact that none of his parents or any adult from his family was there to support him when he first appeared to answer the charges. “Too often judges see young men appear before the courts completely alone with not soul to support them…This is all too common and speaks volumes about what is happening in your life,” he said. But when he invoked that old dictum that, “It takes a village to raise a child,” Justice Clarke wasn’t speaking to the defendant only. He was also speaking to all of us – the lawmakers, village elders, church ministers and most importantly, parents that that is everyone’s responsibility to ensure that our children are raised in a caring and loving environment where they learn to grow up as responsible adults. “[T]he key pillars of fa’a-Samoa are the church, village, and family,” he added.

The other concerns a forty-year-old father sentenced to 15 years in jail for repeatedly raping his daughter when she was 13 years old, and who “had once dreamt of becoming a lawyer.”

In sentencing the offender, Justice Vui Clarence Nelson cited rape and sexual-assault statistics of women and young girls as a national shame. He called it an epidemic worse than dengue fever and other diseases that come and go because “it continues to hold this country in its grip.”

Like Justice Clarke, Justice Nelson also makes reference to the “three pillars of Samoa’s society; the family, culture and religion” and urged everyone from the grassroots level up “to play a part in ridding our society of this scourge.”

I got a bit teary-eyed reading this case and writing this piece. (I’m a softy in case you don’t know.) But where did we go wrong and how did we get to this shameful state?

I can relate well to the Justices’ comments about the village, church and family playing a role in our lives, especially those of our young people. I was born and bred in Lepea until I was 13 when my catechist parents got posted to another village. Lepea was one big extended family, and I cannot recall the many telling offs or smacking on the behind from other adults for misbehaving; they would later march me home where I would receive a another telling off if not a smacking.

I wasn’t the most subservient of children around despite my father repeatedly saying following a smacking: “O oukou o fagau a le fesoasoagi. O Oukou e fai ma fa’aka’ika’iga i kamaiki o le gu’u.”  You are the catechist’s children. You are the role models to children of the village,

We as a country should heed the Justices concerns and act, from the grassroots up.