23 May 2006

Tongan political party fears government could pay too much to get back power company

8:17 pm on 23 May 2006

The People's Democratic Party in Tonga says it fears the the government could pay millions of dollars too much for the power generation assets of the Shoreline Power company.

Shoreline has offered to return it's power generation assets to the government, following calls by the PDP to do so, if they receive a return on their investment.

The Prime Minister Dr Feleti Sevele, has denied local reports that Tonga will borrow 60 million pa'anga or nearly 29 million US dollars to finance the buyout.

But the PDP president Sione Teisina Fuko says he has heard the figure and he fears the government may pay too much beause of the relationship between Dr Sevele and the Crown Prince Tupouto'a who is a shareholder in Shoreline..

"We would have to make sure that the government has the money to pay them back but certainly not 60 million[Tongan] dollars. We fear that that kind of figure played around with Dr Sevele, seems very worrying because Dr Sevele seems close with Tupouto'a."