The Minister of Finance and Samoa National Provident Fund (S.N.P.F.), Lautimuia Uelese Vaai has clarified that the Christmas lights could not be continued this year due to two reasons, recovery from COVID-19 and in exchange for the dividend payout in January.

In a press conference last week, Lautimuia stressed that a Cabinet Directive in 2020 approved the Christmas lights despite its cost to lift the spirit of the nation from the impacts of the pandemic.

"In terms of the lights, we conducted the Christmas lights at the time because of the lockdown due to COVID-19 and it was something to lift the spirit of the nation which was an approved directive from Cabinet and I know because I was a C.E.O at the time," he said.

"It's a means to lift the spirit of people from COVID-19 impacts, especially for the lives that were lost and it was compulsory at that time because of the Cabinet Directive but the government has allocated this to the ministries because we've recovered from the COVID-19.

"The committee and the C.E.O have also advised me that it will also cost us a lot on the electricity cost and if you look at it, it's the money from the Fund that pays for these so the advice was to not continue the Christmas lights but do a dividend payout instead which is from our contributions and which is a very smart decision."

The chairman of Fund, Papalii Panoa Moala added that the cost of the Christmas lights excluding the cost of the electricity was $80,000.

"These are the contributors' money and if you add the cost of electricity together, we consider the people with our decision-making and what will we get from these lights which will (possibly) cost another $10,000," Papalii said.

He also stressed that the cost of electricity has drastically increased which could've been another impact to the Fund.

Despite this, the Samoa Tourism Authority (S.T.A.) is continuing their Christmas lights this year in front of the government building and at the cultural village in Apia with families and tourists making most of the lights on a nightly basis.