Ieremia Tabai

Who is Ieremia Tabai?

Sir Ieremia Tienang Tabai GCMG AO was the first President of Kiribati. He had been described as being the most able leader of the Pacific island states.

He was born in Nonouti in 1950, and went to New Zealand to receive his education. He then returned to Kiribati and worked as an accountant. He was elected to the House of Assembly of the Gilbert Islands in 1974. In 1976, the area received limited authority for self-government, and Tabai served as leader of the Opposition in a system dominated less by formal political parties than by loose coalitions of like-minded members. In this position, he regularly expressed criticism of the perceived centralist tendencies of Chief Minister Naboua Ratieta's government, expressing particular distate for Ratieta's plans for an expensive defense department and the westernization he was bringing to Kiribati. He fought in favor of traditional Gilbertese culture, helped to publicize the complaints of village copra growers, and criticized what he saw as a disproportionate amount of government expenditure on Tarawa over the other islands.