Sirilo takes charge
Solomoni Biumaiono
Saturday, June 09, 2012
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Sirilo Dulunaqio piloting the waterways at Wainunu in Bua. Picture: SOLOMONI BIUMAIONO
To Sirilo Dulunaqio, the sea is not only the place where he earns a livelihood but a place he reveres so much.
In his own unique ways, he is one of the great men and women trying to protect his stretch of the Pacific Ocean.
Sirilo or Didi as he is fondly called, hails from Natokalau Village in Kubulau, Bua. He works for the Wildlife Conservation Society, a US non-government organisation which is one of the leading marine and land conservation experts in Fiji.
He is one of the WCS team that is working towards protecting vast tracts of coastal areas along the southwestern parts of Vanua Levu. This includes protecting the coastlines of his tikina (district) in Kubulau as well as his neighbouring kins in Wailevu to the East and Wainunu in the West.
For the WCS team, Sirilo is their diver, boat skipper and vanua liaison officer and he takes all these three responsibilities with a seriousness which is reflective of his love for the sea and his very own people.
My work as the vanua liaison officer is something I do really enjoy because I feel that going through the vanua is the best way of approaching environment conservation. It gives the communities the sense of ownership of these projects.
And I just like to serve my own people and I feel proud whenever we take charge of our own environment instead of relying on others to do it for us, Sirilo says.
Before he took up his role as the vanua liaison officer for CWS, Sirilo was already active in trying to conserve the marine environments for his Kubulau district.
So when they approached me to help them, I had already been working towards the aim of helping protect our environment but ever since they came in, it was a whole new level where I get to meet with communities outside my district but all Fijians know their lineage and the links that we have that allow us to approach others, Sirilo says.
While interacting with the communities is usually the main part of his job, Sirilos skills as a qualified dive instructor and boat skipper provides a good support base for WCSs scientists and field officers.
He is responsible for looking after the two boats owned by the WCS, the Adi Lasebula and Tivitivi, which are both based at Savusavu Town.
Using these two boats and under Sirilos guidance as captain, WCS field officers have carried out numerous research work in the Bligh Waters and the coastal waters of Vanua Levu in the past seven years.
But initially, he was a diver and he used to work for marine tourism resort Cousteau Resort in Savusavu and the Namena Island Resort, which is based on an island off the Kubulau coast.
He spent 13 years as dive master for both resorts where he earned his badge as dive instructor and as a boat skipper because he had to instruct tourists on how to dive and also transporting them to the dive spots.
While he was still a dive instructor Sirilo struck it lucky to travel the world. This was made possible by a physically challenged man, whom he taught to dive. His new friend gave him the world tour as a reward.
He was paralysed from the waist down and I managed to teach him how to dive and he even went out to the reef and enjoyed the dives. His thank you was taking me on a world tour where we travelled to Europe and other countries and diving some spots there, Sirilo says.
As a diver and boat skipper, Sirilo believes that his work for the environment is not in vain but he sincerely believes that all community members should take up this work.
As itaukeis, I believe its about time we let the whole world know about what were doing to protect our envrionment because usually we would rather that we keep things hush hush.
But for this kind of work, we should never be shy and tell the whole world about the effort were making to protect our environment, Sirilo says.
The seas are many things to many people. To some its a source of livelihood while others see the need to protect it and all creatures in it. He may not be a marine scientist but for Sirilo, it is his cultural and spiritual connection with the environment that is usually the driving force behind his work.