Bwiji stars in ’94 and ’05

Journal 3/30/1982

P1 Japan to pay $1,250,000 for fishing rights The Republic of the Marshall Islands and Japan recently signed a new fisheries agreement that will be in effect for one year beginning April 1. Under the terms of the agreement, Japanese fishing boats will be licensed to fish in Marshallese waters in return for $1,250,000. This is an increase of $250,000 over last year’s fishing rights.

P5 Marshallese to have their own Bible (Honolulu Star-Bulletin) Perched high in the tower of Korean Christian Church, Alice Buck and Jernadrik Jelke are making corrections on galley proofs of the first complete Bible to be printed in the Marshallese language. The translation, in the works for 15 years, is a project of the United Bible Societies and is funded by the American Bible Society, Kwajalein Protestant Chapel and Churches of the Marshalls — the Catholic, Seventh-day Adventist, Assembly of God and United Church of Christ. Buck is the coordinator and works with eight translators. They have completed the New Testament and Psalms. Now she is beginning to put the finishing touches on the Old Testament with Jelke, who came here (Honolulu) from Ebeye to help her complete the work.

Journal 4/1/1994

P3 16 medals after Monday’s events After Monday’s events, the Marshalls had garnered 16 medals, tying it for second place with Saipan behind Guam’s 22. Four of those are gold. The wrestling team cleaned up, winning three golds, one silver, and four bronze. The tennis team won a team silver and the swimmers brought home the rest. Waylon Muller, Chris Bing and Kenneth Kramer each won golds in wrestling. Muller, who won his matches with pins in under 15 seconds, was named wrestling MVP. Edward Adiniwin won silver, and Jonji Ledbetter, Atra Matsumura, Francis Kintaro and Ambili Binejal won bronze.

P16 Bwiji bags biggest billfish (again) The last time the Marshalls Billfish Club held a Biggest Billfish Tournament, Bwiji Aliven took home the $450 first place check for his 426 pound Pacific blue marlin. As a 15-year-old at the time, Bwiji liked having a little extra pocket money. And now that he has turned 16, he was quite happy when his father Rudy named him captain of the But-Wiser team for Saturday’s Biggest Billfish Tournament. This time, Bwiji’s marlin was “only” 292 pounds, but was was more than enough to take first place again.

P19 Micro Games roundup The Marshall Islands men’s fast pitch softball team opened its first game Sunday with a bang, trouncing Palau 12-2. The Marshalls basketball team jumped out to a 2-0 record after wins Saturday over Pohnpei (70-61) and Sunday over Nauru (78-50). Swimmer Andrea Lindborg set a new women’s freestyle 200-meter record, coming in at 2.20.91.

Journal 4/1/2005

P1 Note briefed on test score ‘bomb’ The majority of teachers in the RMI did not pass a high school English test, and the Ministry of Education says that it demonstrates the crisis facing the country. Minister of Education Wilfred Kendall announced the results of the recent nationwide teacher testing earlier this week. The results: 63 percent of 900 Marshallese teachers failed both the reading and writing sections of the test; only 18 percent passed both parts of the test, with the remaining 19 percent passing only one of the two sections. “The teachers are not to blame,” said Education Secretary Biram Stege. “They are a product of the RMI education system over the last 20 years.”

P25 Big day out for MBC’s Bwiji It was a record-breaking day for the Marshalls Billfish Club Saturday, led by Bwiji Aliven bringing home a monster haul of 1,554 qualifying pounds of fishy flesh on his new boat CelinDa. His catch included three marlin all over 300 pounds.

P20 Brenson goes to bat for our bank Minister of Finance Brenson Wase has asked the US Senate to help resolve “unintended” problems for US-Marshall Islands banking caused by enforcement of anti-terrorism provisions of the Patriot Act. In mid-March, Wase wrote Senator Pete Domenici, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, asking him to assist with problems that have been caused by US banking regulators’ “zero tolerance approach to enforcing the USA Patriot Act and Bank Security Acts with American banks” in their relations with the Bank of Marshall Islands.