Journal 8/16/1985

P1 Time to move Urban renewal is coming to the downtown area of Majuro with the government announcing its plans to remove the dilapidated buildings knowns as the “Labor Camp” from the central business district in Uliga. The wood and corrugated metal roof barrack-style buildings have been a fixture in downtown since they were put up in the early 1960s to house workers who constructed government buildings and other facilities in Majuro. Today, about 24 families live on this crowded 100-yard strip of lagoon bordering the lagoon. They’ve been asked to move “immediately” and offered loans to build houses in other parts of the island.

P3 Malnutrition high In this UN Year of the Child, the Marshall Islands is confronted with a startling and alarming fact: Severe malnutrition has hit the islands with as many as 36 percent of the children in some areas suffering from lack of adequate nutrition. The highest recorded malnutrition rate is in Laura were 36 percent of boys surveyed under the age of 15 were suffering serious nutritional deficiencies. Food Services Nutritionist Ione Heine did the preliminary survey in her spare time. After Laura, she found Ebeye had the next highest overall malnutrition rate of nearly 15 percent, with a high of 23 percent among Ebeye elementary school children and a low of five percent among Head Start children.

Journal 8/15/1997

P1 N-waste in national interest Majuro Senator Wilfred Kendall said that the Marshall Islands should pursue nuclear waste storage regardless of opposition such as the recently passed Honolulu City Council resolution because it is in the national interest. But Jaluit Senator Alvin Jacklick congratulated the Honolulu City Council for its action, and said he has “high hopes that this project is heading toward its graveyard.” “They have the right to say whatever they want to,” Kendall said of the city council’s resolution opposing nuclear waste storage in the Marshall Islands. “But the bottom line is  — is nuclear waste in our national interest? Yes, I believe it is.”

P3 Senator Kendall promises fireworks Expect fireworks during the next session of Nitijela which starts August 18. “We’re ready to go to war,” is the way Majuro Senator Wilfred Kendall described his plans for the session. He said he wants the leadership to tell the Marshallese people what kind of an agenda it has for the future of the Marshall Islands, and how the government is going to deal with economic problems facing it.

P3 Who said there’s no big fish? Ben Reimers, Arlington Samuel and Gary Roberto showed off a 350-pound marlin they caught last week Friday.

P8 Rainfall hits all-time low Rainfall for Majuro set an all-time low for the month of July, according to a Majuro Weather Station report. Just 4.93 inches of rain were recorded at the Weather Station, the lowest for July since statistics began being collected in 1959. The previous low for July was 5.34 inches in 1961.

Journal 8/15/2008

P2 President praises Finance on audit The Ministry of Finance was recognized by President Litokwa Tomeing for its best audit performance ever in 2007. The RMI government received an “unqualified” audit from the Deloitte auditing firm, which in audit language means the report was complete. This means for the first time, every entity of the government was auditable. Former Finance Minister Brenson Wase, whose term covered the 2007 period, praised former Finance Secretary Saeko Shoniber for her work in helping fix the financial records of state owned enterprises and component units of government such as Air Marshall Islands, Ebeye’s power company KAJUR, and others so it was possible to audit them. Shoniber, who now works for the Marshalls Energy Company, has helped numerous government component units improve their financial record keeping since she left Finance three years ago.

P3 UNICEF: Child deaths high A UN Asia Pacific children’s health report lists the Marshall Islands as a low-performing country in the “child survival” category. The 2008 report released last week also says that the RMI is one of the five countries in the Pacific  including Papua New Guinea and Kiribati — that are not on track to meet so-called Millennium Development Goals to reduce child deaths by half by 2015. UNICEF said that although deaths of children under five have dropped from 92 to 56 per 1,000 live births in RMI, this remains a major problem and progress to reduce child deaths has slowed.

P4 Jared gets best time ever Jared Heine, the first Marshall Islands Olympian to compete in the Beijing Olympic Games, finished third in the men’s 100-meter backstroke, touching in 59.68 seconds — his best time in competition ever. “Jared had a great swim,” said Swimming Federation President Cris Lindborg from Beijing. “He shaved more than a second from his previous best time, a good way to end his swim career.” 

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