NAVEI - Ha'apai Rugby Tournament
Introduction
Sport brings people together. Sport teaches life skills such as honesty, team work, discipline, hard work, amongst many others. Rugby is one of the sports that allow people, especially young ones, to learn a lot of those life skills. Here in Tonga rugby is the national sports where most young Tongans aspire to be good rugby players and may be one day become professional earning a livelihood in doing so.
The problem
While rugby as a sport goes from strength to strength in other parts of Tonga, the Ha'apai Islands group has not had a rugby competition at any level for more than three years. The Ha'apai rugby committee dismantled for an unknown reason a few years back, and as a result rugby ceased to exist in the Ha'apai Group.
Generally there is a lack of good social activities for the young people of Ha'apai to be involved in. That causes boredom which can lead to criminal activities.
Ha'apai, as group of islands, has always found difficult to organise anything in a committee-type structure because of the demographic issue. It is a series of small islands dotted around in approximately 110 sq km, where it is logistically expensive to get from one island to another. So, for a committee to come together to organise anything, it can be too much of an exercise and become very costly for the locals.
It is the hope of NAVEI Inc to find way to help organise a rugby tournament for the Ha'apai Islands group.
The need
1. Money
The initial pilot tournament to be launched in the last week of August, 2007 is estimated to cost in the region of between TOP$4,800 - TOP$5,000. Find below an estimated break-down of the costs.
2. Rugby Balls
Table of Financial Estimates
| Prizes: division A | |
|---|---|
| 1st | $1000 |
| 2nd | $700 |
| 3rd | $500 |
| Total | $2200 |
| Prizes: division B | |
| 1st | $700 |
| 2nd | $500 |
| 3rd | $300 |
| Total | $1500 |
| Other expenses | |
| Referee fees | $500 |
| Field maintenance | $400 |
| Miscellaneous (drinks for officials & guests …etc) | $400 |
| Total | $1300 |
| Total estimated expenses | $5000 |
| Predicted Inflow from registration | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Registration fee ($) | Estimated No of teams | Accumulated Inflow($) | |
| Division A | 100 | 6 | 600 |
| Division B | 50 | 8 | 400 |
| Total | 1000 | ||
Beneficiaries
i) Ha'apai youth: rugby teams are mostly young people of each villages/islands. Rugby training helps keep youth healthy. It also gives youth that do not have jobs something active to do. It provides young people a sense of involvement, and for some of these young people a good opportunity to experience leadership responsibilities.
ii) Adults: most rugby teams rely on responsible adults in the particular village/island to organise and bring everyone together. Not only that but keeping teams together requires enormous commitment in a village context, which is mostly relied upon adult to carry out such responsibilities. This helps develops a closer relationship between the older generations and the young people in villages and islands, where culturally it is crucial that such relationship is healthy and strong.
iii) Local Communities: rugby teams do carry out some sort of services in their local villages. They would do activities such as, cleaning up and tou-ngaue – group farming - in order to generate some kind of income to meet small expenses acquire in running teams. They also do service to local communities as a mean of contributing to local community-related projects. Such sports competition can lift the spirit of a community. The winner of such popular sports competition would hold a community celebration where all the villagers join in to share the joy.
The challenge
Your Help – Navei Inc exists to help make a difference! We try to support young people in Tonga through creating or initiating projects in local communities where we believe it transforms their lives and encouraged personal development.
With your help we can provide a project which encourages positive development for the Ha'apai rugby players, their supporters, and the local communities.
Contact details:
Dr Viliami Latu (NAVEI Inc)
Tel: +676 78344
E-mail: vlatu@pmo.gov.to
Tongatapu
Viliami Fakahua (Project/Tournament Manager)
Tel: +676 13066
E-mail: vfakahua@gmail.com
Pangai
Ha'apai