A flight to return Samoan university students studying in Fiji and workers employed in the country has been scheduled for 9 December, Prime Minister Fiame Naomi Mata’afa has confirmed. 

She said that the flight’s schedule depends on the availability of our quarantine sites and for the Government ministries spearheading to ensure they are well prepared.

“There are ongoing flights departing the country weekly which includes our seasonal workers for Australia and New Zealand,” Fiame said during her weekly programme last Friday. 

“And New Zealand has opened trips for people in Samoa that have New Zealand citizenship and also those with Australian citizenship have also been permitted for travel.

“The repatriation flight that was scheduled for the 27 November has been rescheduled to the 4 December.”  

The Prime Minister said that the flight that was due for 11 December but will be postponed to 18 December. 

“This will be the last repatriation flight of our people returning from Australia or New Zealand for this year,” she said. 

“However, one flight to bring our people who are in Fiji will include the university students and those employed in Fiji will return on the 9 December.

“We have been preparing for this to happen especially putting into consideration the [COVID-19] situation Fiji has been under with the spread of COVID-19 and that was part of why we were being cautious in terms of preparations for the return of our people who are in Fiji.”

She also revealed that there are plans for further repatriation flights next year.

Fiame said the Cabinet had held talks with the National Emergency Operations Centre  about the extended period of national lockdown due to the global COVID-19 pandemic since last March and asked about facilitating the return and quarantine of citizens overseas.

“It is not a small amount of money [to process this] and the Government is looking at, if we continue the quarantine of incoming passengers and will discuss matters pertaining to this in terms of money and how to continue this,” she said. 

“Also it has been such a long time since our front line workers have been tasked in various areas relating to [enabling] the return of our people and they have played a big role and contributed a lot and they are working on the same salary.

“Therefore, the committee is thinking and the Cabinet is also looking at how to address the long hours that front liners have worked…there are many factors that could put their health at risk…and looking at [how we can] reward them for this service they deal with.”

Fiame said that these are part of preventative measures that are being taken to complement the mass vaccination campaign. 

She said that the Cabinet has been advised that another mass vaccination for COVID-19 scheduled for 19 November aims to close the gap between people who are yet to receive their second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine. 

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister said that the rollout of Pfizer vaccinations for children aged between 12 to 17 years old is going well. She thanked the collaboration between the Health Ministry and Education Ministry and support from parents in bringing their children in to be vaccinated for making the programme a success.