Pastor wins race to be Vanuatu’s new president
Vanuatu has elected pastor Tallis Obed Moses as its new president after the sudden death of leader Baldwin Lonsdale last month, local media reported.
Moses, a presbyterian, was sworn in as head of the Pacific nation after winning 39 votes against former prime minister Maxim Carlos Korman’s 17 votes, the Vanuatu Daily Post told AFP.
“It came right down to the last vote,” the Post’s Dan McGarry said of the nail- biting finish, which followed three rounds of voting and involved 16 candidates.
“The new president received exactly the number of votes required in order to be elected president of the republic.” The electoral college consists of 52 members of parliament and six provincial presidents. Voting in the fourth and final round included one absentee and one invalid ballot.
Lonsdale, an Anglican priest who was elected to the presidency in 2014, died of a heart attack in mid-June in the capital Port Vila.
Although the role was considered largely ceremonial, Lonsdale became a symbol of hope for Vanuatu when Cyclone Pam caused severe damage in early 2015.
Six months later he steered the country through a political crisis when half the government of prime minister Sato Kilman was convicted of corruption, making them ineligible for office.
McGarry said support for Moses, who has been a clergyman most of his life, stemmed from a desire to give the role to someone who could provide similar ‘moral leadership’.
Religion plays an important role in Vanuatu, whose 270,000 population is largely Christian, with the majority Protestants and about 12 per cent Catholic.
“He is well-regarded within his community and within the church. He is somebody to whom the nation will be looking for a degree of moral leadership,” he said.
“Our constitution says that the office of the president symbolises the unity of the people ... and there are occasions when that becomes a very important issue.”