Letter: Democracy in action! – Cook Islands News

Dear Editor, Kia Orana. Democratic principles used to mean that the people told their elected MPs what they wanted, and that worked. Recently, “the people” presented a petition to Parliament signed by many people, telling the government that they did not want to see mandatory water meters and charges… Simple! Democracy in action!

Prime Minister Mark Brown immediately responded by telling people that not only was the petition suspicious as he claimed many outsiders/unqualified people had signed it, but that water charges would continue in some form regardless. Wow! This is the Prime Minister dictating to the iti tangata what they will get! No ifs, no buts. Not much choice for the Democratic Party!

What the Prime Minister also wilfully forgets is that he and his predecessor were largely responsible for the entire fiasco that the Rarotonga water “improvement” plan was supposed to address. There was little oversight of the work and standards of the original contractor. Some well-meaning local whistleblowers who tried to tell the government what was wrong were told off and even threatened with expulsion from the island. He (the Prime Minister) will of course blame his various ministries; however, the fact is that the government signed an initial contract worth about $30 million…which suddenly ballooned to about $60 million, then $90 million, and now about $120 million (the Chancellor would probably try to dispute that). And it’s still far from done. Yes, as the Prime Minister points out, the water is clean, but it’s not yet potable.

So Mr. Prime Minister, you who are largely responsible for this mess are now trying to shift the cost of this disaster directly onto the taxpayers who, according to the government’s own Texas consultants, are already paying for it through their taxes.TTV started out with a small army of office staff but has now swelled to god knows how many employees and an absurd number of vehicles, most of which were donated to TTV by generous but blind and possibly misguided donors.

So, the whole issue was caused by the government and its ministries who were not paying attention to what was happening and were sitting back and collecting huge salaries and now, things have come to a head and the arrogant PM wants the poor people to pay for all the mess that is happening in the government.
If an election were called now, Mark Brown would be voted out of office.

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