Marshall Islands entering pageant for first time

MISS Pacific Leoshina Kariha is in the Marshall Islands to witness the Miss Marshall Island pageant.
The winner will represent the Marshall Islands at the regional pageant in PNG in November.
This is the first time Marshall Islands will be represented at the Miss Pacific Islands pageant.
A small PNG community in Marshall Islands was delighted to meet Kariha and arranged a welcome breakfast at the Marshall Islands Resort.
The communality was led by Ludwig Kumoru, and his wife Demiana, of Siwai in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville (AROB).
Kumoru is the CEO of the Parties of Nauru Agreement (PNA) in Marshall Islands.
He and his family have been in Marshall Islands for three years and are an integral part of the small PNG community there.
Kariha is part Bougainvillean.
She said she was overwhelmed by the warm welcome of the Marshall Islanders, especially by the singing by the 24 pageant contestants representing each of the atolls in the aslands. The islands main concerns, she said, were climate change and the atomic bomb legacy; the aftermath of United States explosion of its nuclear bomb in the atolls in the 1950s.
Meanwhile, the Heilala Festival Committee and Tonga Tourist Association have alleged bullying and racist reaction hurled by an individual during its crowning night in Nuku’alofa, Tonga last week.
The committee and association said it does not condone any form of bullying or racism and took the allegation “very seriously”.