Pensioners in the Cook Islands vow to protest

Transcript

Pensioners in the Cook Islands have vowed to protest on the first day of parliament to demand that taxes back-paid to the government are refunded immediately.

About 260 Cook Islanders receive the New Zealand pension, and last year the government began taxing them for the first time, and ruled that they should pay two years worth of tax arrears, about US $3,600 per person.

Grey Power says after it protested the move, the government later admitted it was wrong to ask for back-taxes and promised to reimburse the 66 pensioners who had paid.

Its vice-president, Dennis Tunui, told Leilani Momoisea they've been waiting nine months for their refunds, and as soon as the new government is confirmed, they'll be marching on parliament.

Dennis Tunui: They admitted they shouldn't have raided our bank accounts and told us that they cannot directly pay the full amount back, it has to go through parliament. A law has to be drafted and approved by parliament, but on the very day that law was supposed to be passed, the government was dissolved, on the very day, so there is no law, they cannot do anything.

Leilani Momoisea: And that's why you've chosen the first day of parliament? Do you want that to be their first act, to put that into law?

DT: That's the idea, we're going to tell them to pick up where they left. We're going to tell them to honour their promise. And then we're going to demand immediate payment, because they've been giving money away left right and centre, to all the different events that's been happening here, money just went just like that. Thousands of dollars, and here we are deprived of what's ours.

LM: It's still somewhat up in the air as to which party is going to rule. Does it matter to you which party is going to come in, do you have faith in either party, that they will follow through on this previous promise?

DT: In our eyes, both parties have mistreated us. The Cook Islands party, and the Democratic party didn't do a thing to help us. They [the Democratic party] should have forced the CIP government to enforce the law before they were dissolved. That's why I'm saying both parties are in the wrong and irrespective of who will be the government, we will be standing right in front of them. We are prepared to do it a whole week, one day after the other, until they do something about it.

Dennis Tunui says he is expecting up to a hundred people will protest, and Grey Power will be holding fortnightly meetings until parliament reconvenes.