Prime Minister promotes MDGs
In another inspirational move during what has been a memorable 2007 South Pacific Games, the Honorable Prime Minister of Samoa, Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, promoted the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) during the final days of the Archery competition.
The Prime Minister is one of 189 world leaders who signed the Millennium Declaration at the United Nations General Assembly in September 2000. As a leader known for his “hands on” approach, he has demonstrated yet again that personal commitment and action can bring global commitments home to the Pacific and to Samoa.
After receiving his MDG T-shirt earlier in the day from the UN Multi-Country Office in Apia, he not only wore it during most of the competition, but also asked for MDG T-shirts for his entire Archery Team, so that they too could spread the MDG word.
Happy to oblige, the United Nations Resident Coordinator Ms. Naheed Haque, delivered the shirts, and watched as the Prime Minister and the Samoan Archery Team won two silver medals – an excellent score for a team that had only recently taken up archery and had trained for only five months.
After the win, the Prime Minister said to her “I took up archery to show that anyone can participate in sport, and hope the medals will inspire a new generation of Samoans to take up archery – a new sport for Samoa”.
The team went on to win a gold medal and bronze the next day.
So what are these Millennium Development Goals the Prime Minister was so keen on promoting?
The Millennium Development Goals are a set of 8 global time bound and measurable goals that all 192 United Nations Member States, including Samoa and 13 other Pacific Island Nations, have promised that they will work towards by the year 2015.
Every five years, all UN member countries report to the UN General Assembly on how each country is progressing towards the 2015 “development dream”. Samoa, Niue, Cook Islands, Tonga, Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea have already submitted their first 5-year MDG reports to the United Nations.
Overall, the Polynesian countries are faring better than their Melanesian counterparts on the MDGs. A Pacific Regional MDG Report published by the Secretariat of the Pacific Community SPC and UNDP in 2005, indicated that apart from Sub-Saharan Africa, the Pacific is the next region where achievement of the MDGs will be a challenge.
More information on the MDGs can be found at www.un.org/millenniumgoals/
