“We gave the world a bit of a shake on the 15th of January this year,” Moana Kioa from Tonga’s National Emergency Management Office (NEMO) told the Global Platform for Disaster Risk resilience in Indonesia in May.
“Often our issues back home can be overlooked in big meetings like this,” she continued, noting that Tonga is the second most vulnerable island country in the world when it comes to risk ratings. “Having said that, I am sitting here in front, but I feel so small…so I ask you please to hear us out.”
Kioa followed that appeal with a call for support for robust, early warning systems to be installed in island nations such as Tonga.
The response evolves
“It’s a huge responsibility”, said NEMO Director, Mafua-‘i-Vai’utukakau Maka at the meeting of the efforts following the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai eruption and tsunami.
The NEMO team was kept busy during the immediate aftermath, coordinating the relief effort, “not only the food and non-food items, but at the same time, coordinating the flow of personnel, especially to the community impacted community,” said Director Mafua.
However he said the existing cluster system meant response mechanisms were already in place to coordinate “first responders, the armed forces, the police, Tonga fire and emergency services, the NGOs, Red Cross, and even the private sector.”
As NEMO Deputy Director, Kioa said after initial distribution of food relief and pre-positioned supplies, there were some challenges. “After a month, a lot of the donors, a lot of the countries still say that they’re sending us food. My boss and I were having a hard time because we don’t have the capacity for storage…[or] to distribute and disseminate those resources, It’s not in our mandate.”
The NEMO’s focus has now shifted to relocation of families displaced by the eruption and tsunami, Mafua said.
“Staying in an evacuation centre, it’s very difficult, very difficult, because of the privacy and all those issues…What they really need now is a home. Despite the fact that the older ones, they prefer to go back to the island, the young generation, I think they are keen to stay in a new environment.”
Mafua said arrangements have been made to settle about 30 people from Mango Island, which was badly affected by the eruption and tsunami, on land in ‘Eua. Land has also been secured on Tongatapu. “It’s a land issue now,” he said. “We’re looking at trying to settle everything before rebuild houses and facilities to cater for each family.”
In addition, one house has been built, with five more to be built on the Nukualofa area.
Communications blackout
The communications blackout between Tonga and the rest of the world when the undersea cable was damaged in January has been partially resolved, although communications to outer islands is still difficult.
SpaceX establishing a station in Fiji that has helped reconnect Tonga through SpaceX satellites. VSAT terminals are now being installed in Vava’u, Ha’apai and other locations to connect residents to communications, although Mafua noted, it is “now it’s a matter of when we are going to continue using that luxury of having SpaceX in Tonga.”
“It has reminded us, the whole of the region and the world, of the vulnerability of our communication system relying on underground sea cable,” said Kioa. She cites this as the major challenge to establishing an early warning system in the Kingdom, saying, “even in normal times, a mobile network and connection is always problematic within the outer islands.”
She said it may take 8-9 months to repair the cable to outer islands, and that while strengthening telecommunications “may be not much return on investment, it’s the life of the human is important.”
Localisation and local knowledge
Both Mafua and Kioa stressed the need to draw on local resilience and knowledge in responding to events such as the January 15 eruption and tsunami.
“As we continue to rely more on technology, there is also a need to boost traditional knowledge and blend with modern technology for clear messaging,” Kioa said.
“It will be better to teach how the traditional ways and how we manage to survive in those days, by looking at the natural signs,” Mafua said. He would like to see traditional knowledge documented “for the future generations”, understanding that climate change is affecting some traditional practices, such as the location of planting or seasonal cues.
Similarly, the need to continue to localise disaster resilience was consistently raised in Bali. Mafua supports that view, and the importance of drawing expertise and support from other countries in the Pacific Islands region, as was demonstrated by the ability of Fiji’s National Disaster Management Office to connect to Tonga soon after the eruption using high frequency radio.
“Our culture that shows that, that we can do it amongst ourselves here in the Pacific,” Mafua said. “If I deploy a team, from Tonga to Fiji, they survive, they can survive in Fiji because they know the style of life and same as if I deploy a team from Fiji to Tonga, they will survive as well, and even Solomons and Samoans.”
He would like to see the private sector more closely involved in disaster response and risk reduction, saying while the Hunga Tonga-HungaHa’apai eruption and tsunami saw a “whole of government” response, it can be very hard to involve private sector.
The need for better private sector involvement in DRR was a common theme at the Bali conference, but there were no private sector representatives in the Pacific delegations, a reflection of how far we have to go in our region to better integrate them.
“I think it’s a matter of trying to persuade them, and trying to bring them in by looking at what they really need from us, but not what we really need from them…[then] I think they, they will come to the table with something,” Mafua said.
“We still need integration and integration that perhaps we can customise so that it works for us for a small island such as Tonga and our island neighbours in the Pacific Islands region,” Kioa added. “Longer term engagement and further collaboration between nations and stakeholders and governments is very much needed.”
She said interoperability of systems in Tonga is also critical.
“A lot of times we tend to say ‘lessons learned’. I for one do not believe in lessons learned because when disaster happens, we still fall into the same trap. We still do the same similar mistakes. So I think if we identify the best practices [we can] see how we can move things forward.”
This article first appeared in the May-June 2022 issue of Islands Business magazine.
