Audrey Young: A minister on foreign territory

Winston Peters was given a reality check yesterday on the last day of his visit to Fiji as Foreign Minister.

Forty minutes away from the grandeur of the Sheraton Fiji Resort Denaru where he was wined and dined by his Fijian counterpart the night before, he was taken to inspect a small squatter settlement just outside Lautoka.

It could not have been further removed from the glamour and romance associated with Foreign Affairs.

A one-roomed pink tin shack the size of a small New Zealand lounge houses 10 people. A hut on piles just beyond had housed two families, one in the house and one underneath.

Underneath this one was a mangy dog and a chicken.

A subdued Mr Peters had a polite glance inside the house where five wee kids carried on playing, oblivious to the foreign inspection.

The mother welcomed everyone with a "bula". She had just used a garden hose to fill up their outside water tank, an open-top 40-gallon drum.

Nearby is a rubbish dump where they scavenge for what they can get.

Rubbish was strewn all around but it is not theirs. Lautoka caught the edge of Cyclone Jim last week and the garbage had been washed downstream from a much larger settlement of 500 people who pile up their rubbish next to the river.

It's a huge problem in Fiji, with an estimated 82,000 people living in 182 such settlements.

Lautoka is virtually ringed by them and many of them are merging, Mr Peters was told.

The problem promises to worsen with the expected downturn of the sugar cane industry.

At present, New Zealand has given just over $2 million for two pilot projects to get the squatters into more habitable housing.

New Zealand has told Fiji that within five years, 70 per cent of its funding will be directed to such poverty alleviation.

Such visits may become regular features of Mr Peters' duties as Foreign Minister. Under the arrangement struck between Mr Peters and Prime Minister Helen Clark, the Foreign Minister has regained oversight of New Zealand aid. Marian Hobbs, who held it for the past three years is, on the back bench.

Five minutes away Mr Peters' four-wheel-drive vehicle was taken over a rough-as-guts road, Naikabula, to a pilot model village, Koripita, to inspect a village which she had agreed to part fund in conjunction with Rotary.

It literally means "village of Peter," a reference to evangelistic aid worker Peter Drysdale, a private citizen, whose mission in life is to rehouse everyone in western Fiji's squatter settlements.

So far 82 small, neat, safe homes have been built in the village housing 300. A further 100 are planned.

The women of the village turned out in force with garlands, cakes and Indian delicacies.

It was only 11 am but in the very hot village kindergarten-cum-community centre - estimated 30C - Mr Peters received a 25-minute PowerPoint presentation on the project. Then followed two presentations from non-government organisations about their involvement in the community, making chutney and cards to sell and suchlike.

In another life, Mr Peters may have called these people hand-wringing do-gooders.

Yesterday he sat and listened, fanning himself throughout, and throwing back the orange cordial when it finally came.

The New Zealand High Commission NZAID manager, Kirk Yates, thanked the village on behalf of Mr Peters, who offered no view on Mr Drysdale's fundraising suggestion that guests at the Sheraton might be brought over to the village as tourists.

* The funding injection of $2.2 million announced by Mr Peters this week means New Zealand is set to become Fiji's third largest donor on $8.7 million annually, based on 2004 figures. The EU gives $20.7 million; Australia $13.8 million, Japan $6.9 million and China $5.1 million.