Opinion

Ruta Mave: ‘You can only help those who want to help themselves’

If you love something, set it free. If it comes back, it is yours. If it doesn’t come back, it never was. The narcissist version is if it comes back, it is yours, if it doesn’t then go out and hunt it down because if you can’t have it then no one else can either, writes Ruta Mave.

Virtues in Paradise: Virtues retreat for helpers

Are you a community leader, a counsellor, police or probation officer, teacher, orametua, physician or nurse? Are you one of the frontline folks who help paddle the vaka of social services in our Cook Islands community? writes Linda Kavelin-Popov.

Thomas Tarurongo Wynne: Honouring the unsung heroes of home

For the many at home who keep the fires burning, who keep the economy going, and who maintain the family homes and land – clean, trimmed, and functioning – I just want to say meitaki maata, meitaki ranuinui, atupaka, korereka, ngao, and atawai wolo, writes Thomas Tarurongo Wynne.

Letter: Paruru i to tatou moana

E tika rai, na te Atua te’ia au mea katoatoa i anga. Te vaira ta te Atua i tuku mai kia ta anga’anga tatou.

Letter: Muffin eaters

Diane Charlie-Puna’s carefree insult to the idea that no one is above the law brings to mind the persistent story that the National Environment Service, under husband Ngatokorua, ran up a tab at a certain popular Arorangi café in the tens of thousands of dollars.

Letter: Vodafone ‘seize the opportunity’

Dear Editor, Starlink is here officially, YAY! And of course it is the most expensive in the Pacific, yet still better than Vodafone Cook Islands. Not yay!

Letter: Vote buying and corruption

Dear Editor, I am deeply moved by a letter to the editor and an opinion column by two brothers, Te Tuhi Kelly in the CI News on 9 September and Steve Boggs in the Cook Islands Herald on 4 September.

Kata: Corrective Services

Pet Talk: Helping your pet stay calm during stormy weather

Stormy weather can be a terrifying experience for many pets. The loud noises, bright flashes, and changes in atmospheric pressure can trigger anxiety, leaving you cat or dog feeling stressed and scared, writes Dr Rose Hasegawa, medical director Te Are Manu Vet Clinic.

Letter: Deep sea mining consultation

Dear Editor, I recall a public consultation in Mauke. There were two motions for consideration.

Michael Tavioni: The high cost of unhealthy choices

Some years ago, I was admitted to hospital because my right leg was swollen and painful. I was made comfortable and Dr Deacon came to assess my condition. Before he left, the doctor took a black marker pen and made a line across my thigh just above where it had turned red, writes Michael Tavioni.

Letter: Alcohol is the problem

Helmets – The problem is not the helmet. Statistically helmets save only 40 per cent of lives and that counts those left in wheelchairs or worse.

Letter: Misplaced priorities

The test of any government is how it deals with day-to-day issues that affect all of a population.

Letter: Pokoinu littering

Dear Editor, For months/years I and other neighbouring properties on the back road in Pokoinu, have had to put up with residents from a side road that is not serviced by the weekly rubbish collectors, leaving their domestic (and sometimes other rubbish) on the intersection of Aremaki Road and the Back Road, in Pokoinu.

Kata: Prison work scheme

Kata: Water tariffs

Ruta Mave: When kindness becomes a responsibility

Charity should begin at home but often the poor ones give the most help, and the rich ones use it as an election campaign, writes Ruta Mave.

Letter: ‘Vote buying at every election’

Dear Editor, Here’s a question that I keep asking myself, why is it that we seem to be vote buying at every election and despite several court cases, the evidence has been found wanting. Yet we know damn well that it goes on. I have personally experienced this myself in my last campaign in 2022.

Kata: Popular café

Thomas Wynne: Two faces of power

I was fortunate to sit on two paepae this week – one for the funeral of the Māori King, Tūheitia Pootatau Te Wherowhero VII, whose daughter, Ngā Wai Hono i te Pō, was crowned with a Bible soon afterward, and another for those who were abused by another crown, where the Bible was sometimes used not to bless but to curse, writes Thomas Tarurongo Wynne.