Vanuatu tourism office "tanna" islandThe outrageous manner in which Vanuatu authorities have handled the rape of a 70 year old American tourist in September 2007 sends quite a different message: No woman is safe in the Pacific where macho "chief" mentalities still rule. Forget it if you're a woman and a foreigner to boot in paradise in the middle of the sea. The magistrate Court has just released on bail a man accused of raping the woman on the island of Tanna. Under new revised statutes on "forceable sex without consent" he could face life imprisonment. Despite the nature of his crime he has just been released into the community because living conditions in the Tanna jail are substandard (!) He is to appear for arraignment on October 27th. According to Vanuatu police superintendent John Taleon, he was released on condition that he agree not to leave the island and interfere with prosecution witnesses. One could argue that if his comings and goings are monitored, he is unlikely to go anywhere. But that's hardly the point. Violence against women is an everyday occurrence in Vanuatu as it is throughout the Pacific. The Vanuatu Women's Crisis Center has been clamoring for years for a change in attitudes among authorities that tend to hold women responsible for crimes committed against them. Now the problem has been internationalized and Vanuatu still doesn't get it and chances it won't. Why anybody should want to spend money in Vanuatu is anyone's guess. Why they shouldn't couldn't be any more obvious.
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