Nauru

Island country in Polynesia, southwest Pacific, west of Kiribati.

Government
The constitution dates from independence in 1968. It provides for a single-chamber parliament of 18 members, elected by universal suffrage for a three-year term, and a president who is both head of state and head of government. The president and cabinet are elected by parliament from among its members and are responsible to it. The size of the country allows an intimate style of government, with the president able to combine several portfolios in a small cabinet of only six. Voting in parliamentary elections is compulsory.

Traditionally, members of parliament have been elected as independents and then grouped themselves into pro-and antigovernment factions. In 1987, however, the Democratic Party of Nauru was formed by the then opposition leader Kennan Adeang. There have been two other active political parties, but still most deputies are independents. Nauru has a police force, but no armed forces. Under an informal agreement, defence is the responsibility of Australia.

History
The first Europeans, Britons, arrived in 1798 and called it Pleasant Island. The German empire seized it in 1888. Nauru was placed under Australian administration by the League of Nations in 1920, with the UK and New Zealand as cotrustees. Japan occupied and devastated Nauru 1942–45, destroying its mining facilities and deporting two-thirds of its population to Truk Atoll in Micronesia, 1,600 km/1,000 mi to the northwest. In 1947 Nauru became a United Nations trust territory administered by Australia.

Independence
Internal self-government was attained in 1966, and in 1968, on achieving full independence, Nauru became a ‘special member’ of the Commonwealth, with no direct representation at meetings of heads of government. The chief of Nauru, Hammer DeRoburt, was elected president in 1968 and re-elected until 1983 with one interruption (1976–78) when Bernard Dowiyogo was president.

During 1922–68, Nauru's former trustees (Australia, New Zealand, and the UK) removed nearly all the island's phosphate-rich soil, leaving it barren. Nauru received $2.5 million for phosphate worth $65 million and had to pay Australia $20 million to keep the remaining soil. In 1967, Nauru purchased the assets of the British Phosphate Commissioners, and in 1970 control passed to the locally owned Nauru Phosphate Corporation. In 1993 Nauru issued a lawsuit against an Australian firm of solicitors for the recovery of $14 million of the island's trust fund. In 1989, a claim against Australia for compensation for 60 years of environmental destruction was also made at the International Court of Justice. Nauru's residual phosphate supplies, which were earning $80 million a year, making it (per capita) one of the richest countries in the Pacific, were due to run out in 1995 and an economic diversification programme had been launched. In 1994 Australia agreed to an out-of-court settlement of A$107 million, to which Britain and New Zealand agreed to contribute A$12 million dollars.

Political instability
Since the mid-1980s the country's declining phosphate reserves led to economic decline which in turn brought increasing political instability, with more than 20 different governments to 2003. The 1986 elections resulted in a hung parliament. In the 1987 elections, DeRoburt secured a narrow majority. This prompted the defeated Kennan Adeang, who had briefly held power in 1986, to establish the Democratic Party of Nauru as a formal opposition grouping.

In 1989 Adeang engineered the ousting of DeRoburt on a vote of no confidence and Kensas Aroi became president, with Adeang as finance minister in the new government. According to Australian government sources, Aroi was DeRoburt's ‘unacknowledged natural son’. Four months later Aroi resigned on the grounds of ill health and in the subsequent election was defeated by Bernard Dowiyogo, who was re-elected in 1992.

In November 1995, Lagumot Harris replaced Dowiyogo as president, but after an early general election, Dowiyogo was back in charge within a year. But he was soon ousted on a confidence motion. Further attempts to form stable governments failed and a new general election was held in February 1997. This brought the veteran Kiza Klodimar to power as president. He formed a cabinet which included the former presidents Dowiyogo and Kennan Adeang.

In June 1998, Klodimar, who had promoted economic reform, lost a confidence motion and Dowiyogo returned briefly as president, before being replaced in April 1999 by Rene Harris. In 2000, Dowiyogo was re-elected as president for the sixth time. He was beset by allegations of corruption, and criticisms that Nauru was being used for money laundering. Despite pledging to reform the offshore banking industry to end money laundering, in March 2001 parliament ousted Dowiyogo and re-elected Rene Harris. Dowiyogo returned to power in January 2003 and died in office in March 2003. He was replaced as president by Ludwig Scotty who held power to August 2003 (when he was replaced by Rene Harris) and from June 2004 to December 2007, when he was succeeded by Marcus Stephen.

Nauru has become increasingly reliant on economic aid from Australia and from 2001 acted as a detention centre for asylum seekers to Australia.

After nearly a month at sea, the first of 433 Afghan asylum seekers turned away by Australia set foot on dry land on 19 September 2001, when the HMAS Manoora arrived in Nauru, where the asylum seekers' applications to live in Australia would be considered. In return Nauru received A$10 million worth of fuel, and A$3 million for new electricity generators. By May 2005, 1,230 asylum seekers had been processed on Nauru.