News in Brief

Credit rating lowered
Melbourne, Dec. 15, 2011—Standard & Poor’s Rating Services said today that it had lowered its long-term local and foreign currency sovereign credit ratings on the Cook Islands to ‘B+’ from ‘BB-’. At the same time, we affirmed the short-term credit rating on the Cook Islands at ‘B’. The outlook on the local and foreign currency ratings is stable. The transfer and convertibility assessment for the Cook Islands remains ‘AAA’, which is the same as for New Zealand because of the Cook Islands’ use of the New Zealand dollar.

TAU joins solar family

On Thursday, the Te Aponga Uira(TAU) had a gathering to celebrate the commissioning of its new Solar Power facility. The Minister for TAU, Hon Mark Brown flipped the switch to turn on the power. TAU at last becomes part of the renewable energy family through the Solar Project which had been in planning for almost a year.
“A great display of design and construction which has been both done by locals,” Commented the who was the main speaker of the day. - Tiare Ponini

Free breakfast marks Volunteers Day

Early Thursday morning the Cook Islands Red Cross along with the Cook Islands Youth Council and the Cook Islands Women’s Council, jointly celebrated “International Volunteer’s Day.”
Anyone driving on the backroad of Takuvaine must have noticed the big sign of Free Breakfast and the warm, friendly smiles of the volunteers. “Today we are making and giving away free breakfast packs, of pancakes and tea, to anybody wanting to have breakfast.” The breakfast was set up on the deck of the Cook Islands Women Councils headquarters, and made by a team of volunteers from all over the Cook Islands.
“The volunteers for today who are from Rarotonga and the outer islands, are here for a training program that we are carrying out at the Cook Islands Red Cross,” said Red Cross Officer Danny Vakapora.
The breakfast project was just for Thursday only, but there will definitely be more projects by this team to celebrate Volunteering.
“We are trying to encourage and promote volunteering, in the youth and the community,” said Vakapora. The Free Breakfast started at 7am and ended at 9am. -Tiare Ponini

Domestic Violence Workshop
On Friday the Rotai’anga Men’s Support Centre in conjunction with Cook Islands Red Cross held a Domestic Violence Workshop at the AOG Church hall in Takuvaine.
The workshop was attended by NGO representatives and members of the public who were interested in learning about the topic.
Key note speaker from New Zealand, was John Robinson, PPDVP who spoke on the topic of men’s feelings and reasons why they resort to violence. Personally, Robinson saw culture and religion as being among the main reasons men thought they could resort to violence however, some attendees had a different point of view.
“I have spent 10 years studding Christianity so I do not speak in ignorance, when I say that religion is definitely not a reason why men should use violence to discipline,” said Robinson.
Robinson said there were many men who thought they could get away with manipulating the words of the bible to their own use, and that is definitely wrong.
Local Police Officer Senior Sergeant Rebecca Ellis, talked about Domestic Violence Statistics in the Cook Islands.
There was a good turn- out of participants. The workshop started at 8:30 am and closed at 4pm.
“In the last four weeks,” said Patrick Lynch President of the Rotai’anga Association, “we have been getting men coming in voluntarily to take part in counselling which is a very positive thing for the organisation. We can only do so much, but if we all joined together and helped we could accomplish a lot.”
The Rotai’anga Men’s support centre is there to establish, equip and empower all men, in their relationship with their families and community through biblical principles. -Tiare Ponini

Why I’m so happy…
In the morning my nana came to pick me up at eight o’clock and I was still to sleepy from picking up one of my aunt’s from New Zealand at the airport at 12 o’clock in the morning. We went to shop for Christmas gifts for her friends. At 2:00pm my parents are coming from the environmental conference in Durban, South Africa!!I’m so happy but the only problem is that my mother is going to make me do tons of JOBS ahhhh!!! The best thing about them coming is that she’s going to bring …BURGER KING!!!...I’m going to be so happy about that! Then we’ll go home talk for a while then go down to my nana Lingi’s house for a HUGE feast that will blow us away. The next day I hope that one of my favourite uncle’s in the world would come over to visit his brother (my father) and I. - Mareva Cameron

Headlines : Times 290 02 March 2009
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