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Ever got into trouble for forgetting your absence note? I betcha it’s not as big as this: Edward Natapei, the Prime Minister of the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu lost his job because he didn’t have an absence note for missing Parliament sessions three times in a row:
Natapei was fired for attending the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) currently taking place at the Hyatt regency hotel in Port of Spain.
According to the standing orders, Natapei forfeited his seat in Parliament after missing three consecutive sittings without notifying the Speaker.
Natapei missed the extraordinary sessions of parliament being held in Vanuata to debate the budget, because of his trip to this country to attend CHOGM. On Friday, CHOGM was officially opened in this country by Queen Elizabeth II.
On that very day, Vanuata’s Speaker, Maxime Carlot Korman, told Vanuata’s Parliament that MPs will need to elect a new Prime Minister by next week.
Link (Photo: LIFE/Getty)
Johanna Sigurdardottir, an Icelandic MP, was elected Prime Minister of Iceland this week. She is the first openly gay prime minister in world history.
The 66-year-old politician lives with her partner, Jonina Leosdottir, a journalist and playwright. The couple were joined in a civil ceremony in 2002. Don’t expect them to show up togetherfor photocalls, however – that’s not the Icelandic way. Though she is famous across the island, having been a top politician for years, her lesbian union was no big deal in this calmly progressive nation of only 300,000 people.
“Johanna is a very private person,” said an Icelandic government source. “A lot of people didn’t even know she was gay. When they learn about it people tend to shrug and say, ‘Oh’. That’s not to say they are not interested; they are interested in who she’s living with – but no more so than if she was a man living with a woman.”
