SOLOMON Islands police chief Ian Vaevaso has been suspended after a long-running dispute over a methamphetamine case which exposed cracks in the country’s anti-narcotics response and raised new questions about police oversight.
Vaevaso was suspended on Wednesday by Governor-General David Tiva Kapu, acting on the advice of newly appointed Solomon Islands Prime Minister Matthew Wale.
The move comes months after OCCRP and its member centre In-depth Solomons reported that an internal investigation found Vaevaso had destroyed drug evidence, intimidated officers who challenged him, and lied to investigators.
Wale, who had previously called for Vaevaso’s removal while in opposition, is now moving to reopen a case that authorities appeared unwilling or unable to resolve before the commissioner took office.
Vaevaso was appointed head of the 3,000-officer force on April 24, despite allegations that he had ordered subordinates to hand over confiscated methamphetamine and then dumped it into the sea.
The new suspension highlights a wider institutional failure. Prosecutors had already recommended that Vaevaso be suspended and questioned ahead of possible criminal charges, but the case stalled in a bureaucratic clash between prosecutors, the police department and the Police and Prison Services Commission. By the time the dispute froze the file, Vaevaso had not been interviewed, suspended or charged.
Now, the government says the matter will move before an independent tribunal. The governor-general’s office said the suspension “serves to facilitate a thorough and impartial inquiry” into “the improper management of methamphetamine narcotics in 2024, alongside concerns regarding his selection for the role of police commissioner.”
Prime Minister Wale’s press secretary, Douglas Marau, said the decision reflected the fact that “several of the allegations in question were not raised prior to Vaevaso’s appointment.” Marau said the tribunal would give the commissioner “a fair and transparent opportunity to clear his name.”
Vaevaso, who denies wrongdoing, rejected the allegations in a message on Thursday, saying he “fully respected and will fully support this process of the constitution. I am ready to face these made-up allegations raised against me.”
The case lands at a dangerous moment for Pacific policing. Small island states such as the Solomon Islands have become increasingly vulnerable to transnational drug trafficking, with the region emerging as a transit corridor for narcotics moving toward Australia and New Zealand.
Officials say at least seven so-called narco-submarines have been found in the Pacific over the past two years, four of them in the Solomon Islands.
