Transcript
MAVERICK MAHARAJ: It's a five-day course whereby we just go get it done in five days and then we lodge our application with MSAF.
ELEANOR WENMAN: OK
MM: The Maritime Safety Authority of Fiji. We lodge our application and then they'll renew it and they'll give us our new licences.
EW: So how are you feeling about this?
MM: Oh, I'm excited, I'm really happy about it.
EW: It's a bit of a relief is it?
MM: Yeah it has been a big relief. I've been sitting at home for the past four months waiting to find employment and now that they've sort of said or confirmed that they'll be running the course on the 19th, it's a big load off my shoulders.
EW: I imagine most people are frustrated this didn't come earlier.
MM: Oh yes. Most of us, we've been waiting from the beginning of the year.
EW: Do you know what kind of changes the organisations themselves would have to make, like the FMA and the MSAF?
MM: Personally I don't know, because from the beginning of the year they haven't been clear with us on what was happening, when it was happening. We would go to MSAF and ask them when would they run the course.
EW: How many times did you personally go and ask them and raise these concerns?
MM: Half a dozen times.
EW: Were you always by yourself or did you bring other people with you, other concerned seafarers?
MM: Here in Fiji the seafarers, everyone did their own individual thing. So I went down by myself, my colleagues went down by themselves and then we'd meet up later, we'd post on Facebook that we went down and nothing. No new developments.
EW: And from your experience did you see that most of the people you would work with did go?
MM: Oh it was huge, it was overwhelming. A lot of my friends and colleagues went down asking about the courses. So several of them, they could afford it so they went overseas and got it done. They were captains, they were chief engineers and they needed to start work immediately so they had to go and do everything, courses up in New Zealand and Australia.
EW: So if these courses hadn't come about, the ones coming up later this month, at the end of this year what would have happened? Would you just not have been able to apply for jobs at all because immediately you would have been ruled out?
MM: Yes. Since we would never meet the IMO's standards, the new conventions they put in place, we would have all been unemployed. There would have been all the Fijian seafarers sitting at home.
