Last week the Chairman of NCC, Reverend Kasiano Le'aupepe, a deacon in the Catholic church, said he feared the perils of gambling will shake Samoa's Christian foundation.

Tuilaepa said that Le'aupepe must have been "joking."

The Prime Minister, who is also the chairman of the Samoa Rugby Union, has also been in the news for suggesting that the IRB is racist and its referees are idiots.

In the course of an interview after the match in which Samoa narrowly lost to Scotland the Prime Minister said, among other things that "If the siren sounds and the referee continues the match unnecessarily, then a rock hitting his head would be justified!"

The editor of Savali, the Samoan Government's official newspaper, Tupuola Terry Tavita, says that Tuilaepa's remarks have been misunderstood. "At the heart of the matter is, there are subtle nuances in the Samoan language and particular to Samoan dialogue and its intended Samoan audience that gets lost when translated to English," said Tupuola.

"What is good-humoured ribbing when said in Samoan could mean something else when quoted in a formal newspaper article in English and read by people who are not accustomed to Samoan humour and the Samoan colloquy," he said.

Source

• Samoa Observer
• Radio New Zealand International
• Savali
• Savali
• Image: Flickr

While refusing to comment further on the matter, a member of Australian team management confirmed that the directive, with specific reference to biblical passages, was included in the IRB's most recent weekly update circulated to all teams.

Wallaby winger Digby Ioane, a devout Christian, said: "I don't write Bible passages on my strapping but I know a lot of guys from other teams who do.

"They are saying that you can draw a cross but any words you have to write down and take it to the manager who has to show it to the IRB. I'm just glad they haven't told me to take my tattoos off."