New Kiribati coalition celebrates presidential victory

Transcript

Members of the new ruling coalition in Kiribati celebrating the election of their presidential candidate say the result is a cry for change from the people.

Taneti Maamau was officially declared the new president this morning by the Chief Justice Sir John Muria in a nationwide broadcast.

A senior member of the new ruling coalition Teburoro Tito told Koroi Hawkins he was not surprised by the win.

TEBURORO TITO: When the main island's results had been released then we knew that our candidate was winning the election. But even before that we had our own predictions.

KOROI HAWKINS: Now the feeling on the ground what are the people saying, what are people you are talking to, what are you hearing in terms of the outcome of this?

TT: Well people are smiling all over the place and greeting and cheering me and cheering members of my party and to get on the broadcasting to send our greetings to our president who is on the outer island on his home island. And so meeting people with smiles and with handshakes and congratulatory messaged to our party is really a great feeling.

KH: In terms of the numbers, I understand you have won the presidential election but you may need some numbers from other parties is that the case?

TT: Yes we certainly need more numbers we now have 20, once we appoint our attorney general it will be 21 against 25 on the other side. We know that we may not have to work to hard to attract some of these people from the other party because they have already made invitations when we appointed the speaker, when the election of the speaker was conducted some weeks back. So we think it is not going to be an insurmountable task for us to get numbers over on our side.

KH: History was made today, 12 years of the BTK party ruling now that you have come back in power how does it feel?

TT: Well I think this is a milestone achievement for the people of Kiribati, being able to determine their future after being served by a 12 year old administration which you know, which has been holding onto power which has been trying to hold onto power despite the many complaints and grumbles that people had. And people of course were struggling trying to free themselves and now I can say they are free. And I think this is a great achievement. I think we can now move one step or several steps ahead as a result of this achievement.