Pregnant Salusalu prays missing partner is alive
Dranikula villagers search for Nemia Cakauvatu who failed to return after fishing trip
Cameru Salusalu of Dranikula Village, Galoa, wants nothing else but to see her partner alive.
Nemia Cakauvatu, 22, went out fishing on Wednesday but did not return with his mates.
Ijust want him back alive. That’s the prayer that pregnant Cameru Salusalu hopes will bring her partner back home, alive and well. “I don’t want to be a widow and I don’t want my unborn child to be fatherless,” cried Ms Salusalu, of Dranikula Village in Galoa, yesterday. The 18-year-old, who is two months pregnant with their first child, said her partner, Nemia Cakauvatu, 22, went out fishing on Wednesday with the other villagers but they returned without him. This was the same fishing grounds they go to every day. “I was sitting at home when I was told about my husband. I was speechless,” she said. Mrs Salusalu said she was angry at first but then burst out crying for him to return. “I am too young to be left alone and what will I tell my unborn child if she/ he asks for his/her father,” she said. “I pray God will bring him back to me alive,” she said. The missing Mr Cakauvatu had been the man of the family after his father died a few years ago. He is a fisherman by trade and always sold fish and bech-de-mer in Lami at least twice a week to support and help out with the family needs. They stay with Mr Cakauvatu’s family including his mother and three younger siblings.
He is the second eldest of five and his elder sister is in Lautoka searching for a job. When the Fiji Sun team arrived at the village yesterday, families and other villagers were crowded at the beach to search for Mr Cakauvatu.
Four boats also left the village early in the morning to continue their search out at sea. “I am expecting good news from those who are out there at sea when they return. “I know he is out there somewhere,” she said. Mr Cakauvatu’s mother, Asivina Raikube, 47, was also part of the search.
“I told him not to go out fishing but he insisted and he told me that he needs to get us fish and also some bech-de-mer to sell,” she said. Mrs Raikube has been getting pensions every month as her late husband was in the Republic of Fiji Military Forces, but apart from that she depends on his son most of the time. “I want him home because I am missing my son,” she said. The search for Mr Cakauvatu continues today. Police have yet to comment on the incident.