The Regional Governance Advisory Group has been established to advise the project on priority governance issues in the region and to encourage the implementation at the national level of appropriate regional declarations and commitments.

At the Regional level, the first meeting was held on December 12-13 2002. During this meeting, the Terms of Reference for the RGAG were established and a work plan for 2003 was developed.

The Regional Governance Advisory Group, whose members will work in their individual capacities, includes:

Mr. Gregory Lawrence Urwin (Australia)

Mr. Gregory Lawrence Urwin has worked in the Department of Foreign affairs and Trade for a number of years and during his assignments, he has served as Australian High Commissioner to Kiribati, Vanuatu, Fiji, Tuvalu and Nauru and as Permanent Representative to the Forum Secretariat. He was also Deputy High Commissioner to New Zealand. He is a member of the Forum Eminent Persons Group. He participated as a member and leader of the Observer Mission in the Fiji and Solomon Islands general election in 2001 and the Vanuatu general election in 2002. He is now working as a consultant based in Samoa.

Most Rev Sir Ellison Pogo (Solomon Islands)

Most Rev Sir Ellison Pogo is Archbishop of Melanesia, which covers the Anglican Church in the Solomon Islands, the Republic of Vanuatu and New Caledonia. For many years, he has been involved in Pacific affairs – as an executive member of the Pacific Conference of Churches and as Commissioner in the Pacific Ecumenical Regional Group of the World Council of Churches, and currently as Chairman of the Pacific Theological College Council and Executive.

Dr. Robert C Kiste (USA)

Dr. Robert C Kiste is an Adjunct Senior Research Fellow, Pacific Islands Development Program, East-West Center and former Director, Center for Pacific Islands Studies, University of Hawaii. He has conducted research and published on the contemporary affairs of the Pacific as well as the history and anthropology of the region. He was a co-founder and chair, editorial board, of The Contemporary Pacific: A Journal of Island Affairs.

Ms. Motarilavoa Hilda Lini (Vanuatu)

Motarilavoa Hilda Lini is a chief of the Turaga nation of Pentecost Island in Vanuatu. She was instrumental in Vanuatu’s struggle for Independence as Editor of their newsletter and Coordinator of the Women’s Wing. She is a graduate in Journalism from the University of Papua New Guinea.

She became the first Program Officer of the SPC Pacific Women’s Resource Bureau. She is a founding member of the Vanuatu National Council of Women. She was the first woman elected to Parliament in Vanuatu after independence in 1980, and served as Minister for Health and Minister for Justice. She is currently Director of the Pacific Concerns Resource Centre (PCRC) in Suva, Fiji.

Mr. Michael Powles (New Zealand)

Mr. Michael Powles is currently a Human Rights Commissioner in New Zealand. He is also a Visiting Lecturer in International Relations at Victoria University of Wellington. He currently chairs the Preparatory Conference of the Western and Central Pacific Fisheries Convention, involving conferences in 2001 in Christchurch, New Zealand, and in 2002 in Madang, Papua New Guinea, and Manila, the Philippines. Previously, Mr. Powles worked extensively in international relations. He was New Zealand’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations from 1996 to 2000.

Before that he was New Zealand’s Ambassador to China and Indonesia and High Commissioner to Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru and Tuvalu. He has taken a special interest in the South Pacific, having spent much of his childhood in Samoa and later serving as High Commissioner in Fiji. Currently, he is Chair of a Steering Group, which is forming a Pacific Cooperation Foundation in New Zealand.

Charles Vatu (Vanuatu)

Stewart Tabo (Solomon Islands)

Patricia Imrana Jalal (Fiji)

Paul Manueli (Fiji)

Taufa Vakatale (Fiji)

The Advisory Group will meet regularly under the chairmanship of Mr Rex Horoi, Executive Director of FSPI.