“Crime and Punishment" Tongan Style ^Featured

The PM’s recent decrepit try to restore public trust at the wake of Min. Lavulavu’s corruption guilty revelations (PM Retains Corrupted Cabinet Minster…27 Nov 2015) reminds me of the famous Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment (1866).

The “Gang of 12” who had forgiven Lavulavu from Parliamentary impeachment − including PM Pōhiva – certainly acted under the twisted belief that their “crime” against the laws of the country was “permissible in pursuit of a higher purpose.” These are con-men’s pursuits.

I believe it is crime because the Gang of 12 went against the Parliamentary tribunal findings of Lavulavu’s legal guilty status. He committed crimes against His Majesty’s Government, which in any Commonwealth Countries would have a sitting Member of Parliament impeached and imprisoned.

Two-time Ex Convict Retains Cabinet Post

Min. Lavulavu is an ex-convict who was arrested on 11 felony charges in the United States in 2003, and convicted on forgery crimes. This ordeal was reported by the Salt Lake City, Utah, Deseret Morning News, and also published by Matangi Tonga Online while Mr. Lavulavu served as a MP at the time in Tonga. He is now a Cabinet member in Prime Minister’s ‘Akilisi Pōhiva’s government.

He collected $1,200 from each of 70 U.S. immigrants from Tonga in return for forged American birth certificates to prove U.S. citizenships. Mr. Lavulavu forged Mormon Blessings and Baptism records, which his brother delivered to a fellow Tongan woman accomplish at the Utah Vital Statistics Department to forge formal documentation. They were also convicted and served prison time. Mr. Lavulavu fled to Tonga but was arrested at Salt Lake City International Airport upon returning to the U.S. after seven years of evading the law.

Interviewed by the Deseret Morning News, he and his U.S. legal representative claimed Mr. Lavulavu was only trying to help his fellow Tongans immigrate to America. He did not feel that taking $1,200 from fellow Tongans to obtain fraudulent U.S. citizenships fraudulently was a crime. Even after the U.S. Immigration & Nationalization Service tracked down some of those people and deported back to Tonga, Mr. Lavulavu had vanished with their money. He designed a fraudulent method to extract money ($84,000) from desperate Tongans to come to the U.S. illegally. In Crime and Punishment he justified his actions (taking money from people; and forged Mormon Church records) in pursuit of a higher purpose.

Above Law and Morality For a Higher Purpose?

In my view, Crime and Punishment committed at the highest level of the Tongan Government is justified in the minds of criminally insane people. For example: When asked by a media representative about the eight (8) lives lost in the burning of Nuku‘alofa (2006), Prime Minister Pōhiva replied it was meant to be. Were they sacrificial lambs for a higher purpose, to put Mr. Pōhiva in the Prime Minister’s Office? What a price to pay for those believed they were contributing to the general good of society.

Insane that may sound, it’s the mob mentality; burning the city was for a higher and justifiable purpose. Even if it includes burning innocent people’s properties, and innocent people lost their lives in the process. It’s terrorism at best, to frighten people into giving up their rights to run a legitimate business and live in peace. This has risen to immoral heights in Tonga; at the highest level of government. They are even despising the law, and spitting on our Constitution.

Like the character Rodion Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment. He justified in his mind, thus he had the right to act upon committing a crime (murder), for it is permissible in pursuit of a higher purpose. Unfortunately, the higher purpose is always for the self-enrichment of perpetrators scheming to profit personally from the public coffer.

(Sione A. Mokofisi is Director of English-Journalism & Languages Tonga International Academy/Moana University. E-mail: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).