Calendars have become irrelevant in today’s Samoa, only two weeks ago the country welcomed the 1st of July which was supposed to mark the start of a new fiscal year.

Public servants in the Fiame Mataafa Faumuina Mulinuu II building at Matafele and the Tui Atua Tupua Tamasese Efi Building at Sogi probably don’t bother checking their calendars and wall planners any more, as the XVII Parliament didn’t convene to bring down and pass a budget, as any normal democracy would do.

Consequently, there is no money plan for all the Government’s Ministries and State-run corporations and agencies for the next 12 months – and the governance framework that should be used as a guide for the formulation and implementation of a government’s policies has become irrelevant – as it expired when the Human Rights Protection Party (H.R.P.P.) was pipped to the finish line by the Fa’atuatua i le Atua Samoa ua Tasi (F.A.S.T.) in the April poll with a 26–25 simple majority.

The governance vacuum explains the rationale behind the recent decision by the Land Transport Authority to put on hold all locally-funded projects and delay their implementation, until it is clear when proper budgetary support would become available. 

Unless technocrats, in their wisdom, opt for the templates that the previous 2016–2021 Human Rights Protection Party-led Government used following the party’s landslide election victory over five years ago?

It has become obvious that the caretaker Prime Minister Tuilaepa Dr. Sa'ilele Malielegaoi and his lieutenants are unable to get over the shock of F.A.S.T. party’s win at the April election.

And the party’s leadership wants everyone, including the 32,510 eligible voters who chose Fiame Naomi Mata’afa and her F.A.S.T. Members-elect, to remain in this state of despair and reminisce on the glory days of the H.R.P.P. and what could have been.

Even as the earth turns on its axis, ardent party supporters remain oblivious to the world outside their bubble, who continue to be swayed and become susceptible to propaganda nicely packaged as human rights messaging.

Such as on Monday when over a thousand men and women fell for that form of messaging – when they marched from the Government building at Eleele Fou to Mulinu’u to condemn violence against women – despite a TV3 and Radio Polynesia freelance reporter confessing only hours earlier, that she misled the nation when she succumbed to the tactics employed by a veteran politician, to ask him questions during a televised program based on false sexist comments.

For a nation that is 12 months away from celebrating its 60th anniversary as the region’s first independent state, it is a worry many amongst the H.R.P.P. accept and trivialise Tuilaepa’s breaches of the law (in defiance of the Supreme Court’s orders) to maintain the status of his caretaker Government.

Cannot they tell wrong from right and a constitutional breach from constitutional compliance? 

The fact that many of them are highly educated and include current practicing lawyers makes one gobsmacked.

So where is your respect for the rule of law and a Constitution that has defined us as a nation and as a people over all these years?

So while the protest march on Monday had the hallmarks of a H.R.P.P. political rally, despite the important anti-violence messaging it attempted to promulgate, we give credit to citizens in the community who make it their business to call out the actions of our politicians.

It is these peace-loving law-abiding citizens who continue to pay homage to our 59-year-old Constitution and the nation’s founders through their actions.

It has become abundantly clear that the work of the Supreme and Appellate Courts in recent months, which has ensured that the wheels of justice continue to turn despite the trying circumstances, is the shining light of our democracy going forward.

The acknowledgement of the work of the Chief Justice, His Honour Satiu Sativa Perese by the chiefs of Tapa’au and Salelologa on Tuesday confirms the respect that the Courts have in the community.

And more people are speaking out in support of the Judges across the length and breadth of this nation as the constitutional crisis enters its third month; citizens frustrated at the relentless attacks on the Judiciary and the refusal by one man to let a woman take office as Samoa’s first woman Prime Minister in line with the results of the 9 April general election.

At the end of the day it would come down to you and your choice, and whether you are for or against the Courts, that ultimately represent the interest of the people and are winning praise and support from the international community.