LAZARUS
EITARO SALII '56
Lazarus Eitaro Salii was born in Angaur, Palau,
on November 17, 1936. The oldest of the ten children of Edward
and Concepcion Salii, he had, by all accounts, that certain “something”
in his personality that made people around him give their best.
He was undoubtedly the favorite child and favorite sibling in
his family. All the best was given to Lazarus by his family, including
the best education, which is why he attended Xavier High School.
Lazarus showed his brilliance as a scholar and
a politician early on in his career. He was one of the first four
graduates of Xavier High School, along with fellow Palauans Anthony
Polloi, Raymond Ulochong and Andres Uherbelau. After graduating
from Xavier in 1956, he earned his degree in Political Science
from University of Hawaii-Manoa in 1961. He then became a member
of the Palau District Legislature and was elected to First Congress
of Micronesia in 1965. Lazarus became the first Chairman of Joint
Committee on Future Political Status in 1967, a position he retained
until 1976. In 1971, Lazarus and his young family moved to California,
where he was Graduate Fellow at the Institute of International
Studies at University of California-Berkeley.
Lazarus was the primary architect of the political
relationship, which was designed to end United Nations Trusteeship
Agreement over Micronesia, known as Free Association with the
United States of America. To this end, Lazarus was the Chief Micronesian
status negotiator and played a major role during Palau Constitutional
Convention in 1978. When Palau adopted its constitution, Lazarus
served as Palau’s Ambassador on Political Status and Foreign
Trade from 1981 to 1984. He was elected to the Olbiil Era Kelulau
(Palau National Congress) in 1984 where he served as one of the
Senators from Koror. When Palau’s first president, Haruo
I. Remeliik was assassinated in 1985, Lazarus was elected in a
special election to replace the late President Remeliik. President
Salii served his country until his death on August 20, 1988.
As a family man, Lazarus loved deeply and intensely,
indulging his wife, Christina, and children not only with the
best of everything he could give, but also with his brilliance,
instilling his love of knowledge and intellectual challenges on
his three daughters, Blanche, Kate, and Yvette, and his son, Scott.
But Lazarus was also a man with a mercurial temper, who expected
nothing but the best from those closest to him, and it is perhaps
this one quality that left its indelible mark on his family –
to strive for the best you can possibly be at whatever you choose
to do in life.
A sensitive and temperamental father and
husband, Lazarus Eitaro Salii leaves behind a legacy full not
only of controversy, but also full of love, loyalty, dignity,
integrity, and grace – just some of the characteristics
of a Xavier man.
