THE government of Western Province is very concerned with the manner the national government had handled covid-19 national pandemic protocols by concentrating only on the Western frontier and the general laxity or ignorance in the manning of the Eastern frontier.
This system failure is going to affect national government budget and cause further unforeseen chain reactions nationwide. Even provincial government depend on grant subsidy to run provincial governments.
Being an island nation with cultural connections in the Western and Eastern frontiers, border crossing had been a cultural practice since time immemorial.
But “one person’s meat may well be another’s poison” – and that is the reality now about cross-cultural ties.
National containment measures for the covid-19 pandemic have been compromised with cultural connections at the cost of national health and soverignty issues. The nation had focused on the West-Choiseul border alone and neglected the South-eastern boarder. Now an already impoverished island nation joins the trans-national listing of infected countries.
Our immgration law must be tough these days with stringent punitive enforcement measures sufficient to deter border-crossers. Cross-border cultural ties have become a curse than a blessing.
Foreigners or aliens must now respect our sovereignty and must never by-pass immigration laws. Defactor relationships affecting cultural ties across-the border must be severed by enforcing citizenship law.
Legalised marriages protect families and safeguard child rights and national security. All denomonations in this nation need to take punitive actions and discourage defactor marrital relationships with non-citizens.
Utilizing its community policing networks the national government must step in and check on passports of all over-staying foreign nationals who come in one way or another and embark on repatriations or deportations for all non-citizens.
We must build a better and more resilient nation than living in a nation weakened by cross-border cultural ties. We are now paying a high price by ignoring our weak points.
The Malaita Outer Islands (MOI) group had evaded national anti covid-19 protocols and had become a weak point at the weakest time of the ailing national economy after the November 2021 riots that had caused havoc to the economic muscle of the nation.
The taxation revenue loss caused by the national capital calamity cannot be solved overnight and the nation now faces a bleak future with the strike by covid-19 at last.
What all this boils down to is that the mismanagement of border security arrangement protocols against the war on coronavirus must now call for a military kind of strategy for Solomon Islands in manning the international sea-frontier. The covid-19 pandemic mitigation is a different kind of war actually.
The Western Province international border with Bougainville-PNG must now have military type long-range radars stationed at strategic points at such places as Ovau, Kulitanai, Tuluve and Taro area in Choiseul Province.
The same goes for the south-eastern maritime border. It needs a military type radar with long range capability installed at an appropriate strategic point. Maritime border security monitoring and surveillance by the police force is essential on the long run and specialized training in this must be put in place.
Among the best known military long range radars are those of the British and US navies. We need these to scan the coastal waters and the maritime boundaries.
It is best to utilize military radar which has long range scanning capability and to respond to suspicious sightings as and when they appear on the radar.
The use of military radar should complement the use of drones. The patrol boats and fast crafts may soon run out of fuel in the long run. There may not be money enough to cruise around after the November 2021 national capital calamity.
Also human trafficking and other transnational crimes are on the rise and this nation needs to ensure the security of its citizens and its deterrancecapability must assure territorial integrity.
Our police force deserves upgrading in monitoring and maritime technology surveillance to compliment other front-line service personnel.
Deterrence is the first line of defense we had ignored.
SOURCE: The Office of the Premier/Western Province
