It will be January next year when a replacement vessel for the Nafanua II will arrive from Australia.

Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mataafa confirmed this last week when receiving the patrol boat funded by Japan.

“As you are aware the Australian funded Nafanua II Guardian class Patrol boat ran aground on the Salelologa reef in August 2021,” she said.

“We have since had to rely on a range of partners to assist with maritime surveillance and monitoring activities in our waters as well as promote maritime domain awareness to help protect national borders.

“In this regard, I also wish to acknowledge the help of all our partners in undertaking these important tasks to ensure maritime security particularly in this space when we have been without a patrol boat.

“Whilst we are, in the meanwhile, expecting a replacement vessel for Nafanua II – to arrive in early 2024, the Samoan Government and the Ministry of Police in particular acknowledge with gratitude the opportunity to have another vessel to assist with maritime surveillance activities.”

Nafanua II was a Guardian-class patrol boat built in Australia for Samoa. It replaced the original Nafanua, supplied to Samoa three decades earlier. Her crew were drawn from the Samoan Police Force.

Australia supplied 22 Pacific Forum-class patrol boats to 12 of its smaller Pacific Forum allies when the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea established that maritime nations controlled an economic exclusion zone 200 kilometres  off their coasts. 

Manufacturer Austal handed Nafanua II over to Samoan representatives at its plant in Henderson, Western Australia, on 16 August 2019.

Samoa agreed that Nafanua II would cooperate under the Niue Treaty Subsidiary Agreement to conduct fishery surveillance as it transited Australian waters, on its first voyage to Samoa, even though she had yet to be officially commissioned. Nafanua II arrived in Apia on 4 October 2019.

On 5 August 2021 the vessel ran aground on a reef near Salelologa wharf while transporting police officers to Savai'i to manage a protest. It was successfully salvaged on 15 September and loaded onto a barge for transport to Australia.

The commander of the vessel, Superintendent Taito Sefo Hunt, was subsequently charged with five counts of misconduct. A hearing into the charges by the police disciplinary tribunal began on 4 November 2021.

On 21 December 2021 the officer-in-charge of the ship at the time of the accident, Superintendent Hunt, was found guilty on three charges of negligence by a police disciplinary tribunal.

On 4 January he was fined $2,000 tala and demoted from superintendent to corporal.

On 5 March 2022 the Samoa Observer reported that the vessel was "beyond economical repair". Current Australian Foreign Minister announced during her visit last year that they would be providing a replacement for the vessel.