Lord Fakafanua is Tonga's 20th prime minister. Photo: RNZ Pacific / Teuila Fuatai
Prime Minister Lord Fakafanua says Tonga's newly formed government is focusing on "hundreds of outcomes" in its "ambitious first 100 days" in office, aiming to create "a more effective, lean and efficient public service".
Lord Fakafanua, 40, was elected as Tonga's 20th prime minister on 15 December, before being officially appointed to the role by King Tupou VI three days later.
Speaking to Pacific Waves from Nuku'alofa, he said his administration was "really internalising our focus on increasing service delivery" to ensure it is working as effectively and efficiently as taxpayers deserve.
"It's all about maximising the outcomes and outputs and having a smoother and more efficient public service in terms of what the public expect," Fakafanua, who is a former speaker of parliament, said.
"We're trying to shorten the queues. We're trying to shorten timelines to getting products and services across to the public, and that depends on each each ministry."
The government is looking at broadening the country's tax base by capturing more of those who should be paying taxes, Lord Fakafanua said.
"We're looking and focusing on low-hanging fruits, key policy decisions that were half-cooked or uncompleted or neglected, but are still effectively good policies that we just need to pull through the last the last mile.
"And also getting a more efficient system so that our private sector are happy with with the way that they're interacting with the government."
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Lord Fakafanua said the Tongan government plans to implement a monitoring and evaluation framework, so that at the end of the 100 days, it can prepare and deliver reports with specific outcomes.
He noted that his five-week old government has an "all of country approach".
"Finding a common goal for us to work together on rebuilding the economy, rebuilding trust in our institutions, rebuilding trust in our government and parliament, and in our constitution as part of that unity process.
"I guess the proof will be in the pudding. We'll see how it goes. It's still early days, but I believe that if we can have everyone work together."
US visa ban 'unfortunate'
Addressing concerns about the United States government's decision to put travel restrictions on Tongan nationals, the prime minister said it was an issue "that's front of mind" for his administration.
"It's obviously of deep concern to Tongans, especially with our large diaspora living in the United States. The connectivity with families back at home and those who are who are residents in the United States, living legally is very important to us."
He said Tonga was "prioritising negotiations" to find a solution around US visa access.
"It's unfortunate that Tonga is included in the visa ban list by the White House, which began from the first of January this year," he said.
"But we were encouraged that conversations and high-level negotiations are definitely happening between Tonga and American officials, so we're looking to resolve this as soon as we can."
