Day: April 24, 2024

Manasseh Sogavare, the pro-Beijing prime minister of the Solomon Islands, commands the largest bloc in Parliament after elections last week, but fell short of a majority and faces several rivals for leadership of the Pacific island country.

A consecutive term for Sogavare is a possible flashpoint for the economically struggling country where many voters are frustrated by stagnating living standards. The outcome is also being watched by governments from China to Australia and the United States as they jostle for influence in the Pacific.

Sogavare’s Ownership Unity Responsibility Party, known as OUR, won 15 seats in the 50-member Parliament, state media and election commentators said Wednesday – well short of the numbers needed to elect Sogavare prime minister after independents and opposition parties unseated some of his loyalists. 

“At a minimum the message is pro-change,” Jaydee Nomisasa, a commentator on Solomon Islands politics, told RFA-affiliated news organization BenarNews. 

“Predominantly it’s the dissatisfaction with the way things have been going economically – a 20 kilo bag of rice, which was costing 90 [Solomon Islands] dollars, 100 dollars five years ago, is now something like 200 dollars.”

The Apr. 17 election in the country of 700,000 people was the first since Sogavare switched diplomatic recognition to China from Taiwan in 2019 and signed a security pact with the superpower. Dissatisfaction with the diplomatic switch culminated in economically ruinous riots in the capital Honiara in late 2021. 

Sogavare retained his East Choiseul constituency in a close first-past-the-post race. His share of votes in the seat was down more than 10 percentage points from 2019, official results show. 

He acknowledged his “very small” winning margin, in an interview broadcast by Solomon Islands news site Tavuli News on Wednesday, and appeared to blame the U.S. and its allies for the decline in his support.

“There have been a number of decisions [by the Cabinet] that did not go down well with the international community, especially the Western allies led by the United States of America,” he said.

Campaigning in the constituency included claims the U.S. “would be doing a lot of things for East Choiseul, would be building this, building that,” Sogavare said.  

Despite the apparent backlash against the government, Sogavare still seems in a strong position to be prime minister again, said Nomisasa, who estimates he already has at least 19 members of Parliament in his camp. 

Mihai Sora, a Pacific analyst at the Lowy Institute think tank, said Sogavare, former prime minister Gordon Darcy Lilo – who won the Central Honiara constituency with a landslide majority – and Sogavare’s Foreign Minister Jeremiah Manele are considered contenders to become prime minister. 

Matthew Wale, who was opposition leader in the last Parliament, and Peter Kenilorea Jr., son of the Solomon Islands’ first independence-era prime minister, are also in the picture, he said.

“If opposition figures like Peter Kenilorea Jr. or Matthew Wale are successful in forming a government, there is some scope to slow or reverse the trend of increasing Chinese influence in the country. But in some ways that horse has bolted,” said Sora. 

“Much still depends on how the new government is formed, who takes the top job, and what promises were made along the way.”

Wale’s Coalition for Accountability Reform and Empowerment, known as CARE, has 13 seats in Parliament and Kenilorea’s United Party won seven. Both parties substantially increased their share of the vote from the 2019 election. 

Independents hold 10 seats and the remainder is shared among smaller parties.

There are no figures from the 2019 election for the OUR party. Sogavare was elected as an independent in 2019 and subsequently brought together independents and others to form a majority under the banner of OUR, which was registered as a party following the election.

Going into last week’s polls, voters interviewed by BenarNews in Honiara and other areas of Guadalcanal said they were frustrated by the government’s ineffectiveness in providing basic services and preoccupied by the daily struggle to earn enough to get by.

Crumbling roads and run down health clinics were a common complaint as were high prices in mostly Chinese-owned shops in Honiara. In a village kilometers from the capital, one resident said he hoped the community could get bore water and proper toilets rather than having to dig pits in the ground.

Anti-China sentiment appeared to be a factor in voting in Malaita, the most populous province, where a prominent Beijing critic, Daniel Suidani, was reelected to the provincial assembly after being ousted as premier last year.

Hundreds of police and troops from Australia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea and New Zealand provided security for the national and provincial elections, which were also monitored by nearly 400 independent observers. 

Based on past experience, there could be prolonged negotiating and horse trading among members of Parliament to choose a prime minister and form a government, analysts said.

“At this very early stage in the political bargaining process, it’s still anyone’s game to win,” said Sora, a former diplomat in the region.

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated online news organization.

A North Korean delegation led by the cabinet minister for international trade is visiting Iran, the North’s state-run media reported on Wednesday, amid suspicion Tehran used North Korean weapons technology for its attack on Israel.

The minister for external economic relations, Yun Jong Ho, left Pyongyang on Tuesday by air leading a ministry delegation to Iran, the Korean Central News Agency said, without providing further details. 

Yun, who previously worked on ties with Syria, has been active in North Korea’s increasing exchanges with Russia, this month leading a delegation on a visit to Moscow, KCNA added. 

The North’s announcement comes after some experts raised the possibility that North Korean parts or military technology could have been used by Iran against Israel, following the launch of more than 300 drones and missiles on April 13. The experts cited close military cooperation between Pyongyang and Tehran.

South Korea’s spy agency, the National Intelligence Service, said last Wednesday it was looking into whether the North’s weapons technology was used in the ballistic missiles that Iran launched against Israel. 

“We are keeping tabs on whether the North Korean technology was included in Iran’s ballistic missiles launched against Israel, given the North and Iran’s missile cooperation in the past,” the NIS said.

Separately, Matthew Miller, a U.S. State Department spokesperson, said last Tuesday that the United States was “incredibly concerned” about long-suspected military cooperation between North Korea and Iran.

Having established diplomatic ties in 1973, North Korea and Iran have long been suspected of cooperating on ballistic missile programs, possibly exchanging technical expertise and components for their manufacture.

A 2019 report by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency showed Iran’s Shahab-3 ballistic missiles were developed based on North Korea’s midrange Rodong missiles. 

The Khorramshahr missile that Iran has developed is also believed to be technically linked to North Korea’s Musudan missiles.

North Korea has also been suspected of involvement in arms trade with Russia, although the two countries have denied that transfers have taken place.

The NIS has said that since August, North Korea has made 10 weapons transfers of an estimated one million shells to Russia, according to the NIS, which is widely seen as an attempt by North Korea to boost its sagging economy amid aftermath of COVID-19 and international sanctions. 

Other reports have suggested North Korea has delivered ballistic missiles to Russia’s military, citing U.S. satellite images.

Edited by Mike Firn.