The building housing New Zealand’s High Commission and other diplomatic missions was damaged in the quake.
Photo: Dan McGarry
The current focus in Vanuatu remains on finding any signs of life under the rubble, but it will soon move to rebuilding, New Zealand’s High Commissioner Nicci Simmonds says.
Simmonds told Midday Report the death toll from Tuesday’s earthquake remained at 16, but people were being found alive.
Simmonds said there had been improvements to water supply, power and communications, but the services remained unstable.
“Port Vila is the capital of the country, it’s the economic hub, so we need the airport, the sea port, the domestic shipping, we need buildings to be able to work out of, and we need tourism back up and running.”
There had been concerns about rain, and even a potential cyclone, but that had passed and the weather was clear, she said.
The Defence Force flew out 93 people on a Boeing aircraft last night, including 81 New Zealanders.
“That was a huge effort and amazingly done in such a short amount of time, 24 hours before we’d only been able to contact eight Kiwis.”
New Zealand was the second largest development partner for Vanuatu, after Australia, and would play a key role in the recovery, Simmonds said.
“Right now the government here is focused on the immediate response.”
She expected that to change in the next week or two.
The New Zealand High Commission building was one of those damaged by the quake.
“My home is now the office until we find some other place to work out of.”
The more than 50 additional New Zealand public servants were working out of the High Commissioner’s residence, she said.
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