Tonga's Taimi Media Network says it plans to take over Tonga's oldest language newspaper on Friday.
"The network won the contract for the running of the 44-year old government-owned weekly Tongan language newspaper the Tonga Chronicle , and has plans to make it an English publication."
The Publisher of the Taimi o Tonga newspaper Kalafi Moala, says he's excited that under its new management the newspaper is likely to be more popular as more people can read it.
I think one of the biggest changes we will do is that we will make it Tonga's first English language newspaper. It's a paper that comes out weekly. We're just excited about the potential there as we're going to be reaching a whole new market there. At least 5000 people aren't Tongan speakers. And we're finding out more and more people would rather read in English than in Tongan. So its a whole new ballgame for us.
Kalafi Moala says in 1989 when Taimi o Tonga started, he had first approached The Tonga Chronicle for help but was told he'd only last for a few months and 20 years later the Taimi has now taken over.
The duration of the contract is for three years and Tonga's Government retains ownership of the paper and it's current circulation of 2000 copies will be distributed in Tonga, America, Australia and New Zealand.
