Editorials—Details

Tsunami Memorial All Washed Up

07/17/2010

Governor Togi has announced plans to build a memorial to honor the vicitims of the September 29th tsunami in... are you ready for this? Vaitogi. Not in Leone, where significant portions of the village were washed away or in Pago Pago, where damage to the harbor area was extensive, but in Vaitogi, which escaped the tsunami unscathed. Indeed, land clearing is already underway at the proposed site, with one local family claming it's their land and they've not granted permission and the ASG claiming it to be government land. (Oh what a tangled mess our archiac land ownership laws weave, but that's another story for another time). 

Like anything else Togi makes his mind up to do, the monument will be built where HE says, over the objections of at least one Fono member and the general public. After all, he is the dictator. Oops, I mean governor.

The memorial would be best suited for somewhere in the Pago Harbor area, where tourists (if and when we ever get any, but that too is another story for another time) are more likely to find it, rather than in Vaitogi.  But, as long as Togi is on this goofy mission, why not dig up the Flag Day 1980 Crash Memorial from atop Solo Hill and move it to the village of Aoa on the far northeast coast of Tuitila? That makes about as much sense as putting the Tsunami Memorial in Vaitogi.