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Keeping the sabbath holy, keeps Tonga ahead of the rest of the Pacific and the world in the political game says Senituli Penitani in a letter in the Tonga newspaper Matangi Tonga.
In May the government of Tonga banned the sale of bread on Sundays.
In this most recent round of the ongoing Sunday Bread War the Senituli says, “Tonga is unique in its history, culture, church, and politics. While the world trashed monarchy as evil, and idolised democracy as the best form of government, Tonga proved otherwise.”
His letter is a response to another letter published in the newspaper on 17 July from Sione Mokofisi, in which he claimed “There’s enough historical evidence to show that the joint Church religious influence and Government political authority corrupts.”
“Obviously, history denials and those who wish to re-write history are ‘doomed to repeat it.’ They want to take us back 400 years before the “Reformation” (Mr Penitani denies it ever took place) when poor people served the Church and the State simultaneously. That is the backward direction Tonga is heading,” says Sione.
On the other hand Senituli claims that, “with such uniqueness, we need to carefully assess our history according to its time and context without unfairly bashing our past with our 21st century Westernised and Americanised eyes as Sione Mokofisi does, if we want to build a better future.”
Senituli says, “the benefits we get from this decision (to ban the sale of bread on Sunday) trump all the objections that Sione Mokofisi has suggested.” He provides a list of seven benefits.
“Just because everyone else say that democracy is the best form of government means that we should believe their solution.”
“Just because France and atheistic Americans of the 20th century believe in building a wall of separation of Church and State so Tonga must do what they believe.”
“Tonga can move forward politically with her own political solution, custom made in Tonga, by Tongans, for Tongans.”
Source
- matangitonga.to
- matangitonga.to
- Image:looppacificassets.s3
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News category: Asia Pacific.
