A Cook Island community is set to take legal action against a shipping company it claims has failed to deliver vital supplies.
Cooks Penrhyn Island Photo: Ewan Smith
Penrhyn Island residents say food, building materials, and household goods are amongst the supplies they've been waiting for since last September.
Lawyer and former Penrhyn MP Wilkie Rasmussen said Pacific Schooners had also failed to pay people for fish it was supposed to export to Rarotonga.
He said the company owes 25 households almost US$60,000 and he was preparing to file a statement of claim.
"It's a very very sad matter because the failure of Pacific Schooners to deliver the cargo that was already paid for and still in the cargo shed since September, in fact some of them were there before that. It's just disappointing because some of the food stuff, I know they've gone off."
Mr Rasmussen said he believed Pacific Schooners is in serious financial difficulty.
Penrhyn's mayor Tini Ford said calls to the company had gone unanswered, frustrating his constituents and leading them to question the long-term viability of the shipping service.