Aerial view of Amatuku island in Tuvalu. Photo: ©UNDP Tuvalu/Aurélia Rusek
Tuvalu's capital Funafuti is preparing to welcome the last four elected Members of Parliament from the northern islands of Nanumea and Nanumaga to form the new government.
The island nation held its national election on 26 January, and since then - a month this Friday - no government has been formed because most of the MPs have been stuck on their home islands due to bad weather across the islands for the past few weeks.
The final MPs, two each from Nanumea - Ampelosa Tehulu, Timi Melei and Hamoa Holona and Monise La'afai from Nanumaga - are due to arrive tonight or early tomorrow morning, according to sources in Funafuti.
There are speculations the newly elected MPs led by Feleti Teo, the former executive director of the Tuna Commission, has secured 12 of the 16 votes in the Tuvalu Parliament - with some members of the previous government and opposition joining the new group.
PACNEWS understands that some prominent members from both the former government and the opposition have crossed to join Teo and his group of new elected MPs.
A new newsletter in Tuvalu, Island of Hope, published by former MP, Kitiona Tausi predicts that it will likely be a coalition government.
"Normally after each general elections, new members when they have the majority seats, they form the government. But after this recent general elections, we can see that they have only six seats and the old members 10 seats. But of the returning members, six members are from the former government caucus and four were opposition members."
There are now three groups - six newly elected members, six members of the last government and four from the previous opposition group.
The newsletter said once all the MPs are in the capital Funafuti, they will have the time to campaign before the Governor General appoints a date for the first meeting of Parliament to elect the new Prime Minister.
-PACNEWS