Raymond
Uluchong '56
Raymond Ulochong was born in the village of
Ngiwal on the island of Babeldaob in the Republic of Palau during
the Japanese period in Micronesia. He was too young to attend
Japanese primary school, but was able to enroll in the Ngiwal
Elementary School, which was one of the primary schools established
in Palau by the US Military Government after the Second World
War.
In 1949, Raymond Ulochong enrolled at Mindszenty
School in Koror and was one of the first students to graduate
in 1950. Mindszenty School was a middle school opened by the Maryknoll
Sisters from America who taught during the decade of the fifties
and the early sixties. In 1953, Raymond, along with Anthony Polloi,
Andres Uherbelau, and Lazarus Salii went to Chuuk, then called
Truk District, to enroll at the newly established Xavier High
School. These four received their diplomas from Xavier in 1956;
they were Xavier’s first graduates.
After Xavier, Raymond enrolled at what was then
the College of Guam for a year. In 1958 he enrolled at the University
of Hawaii at Manoa where he received his Bachelor’s Degree
in Political Science in 1962. Returning from Hawaii that year,
he was immediately recruited by the Trust Territory Government,
which had just moved its headquarters from Guam to Saipan. Raymond
was assigned to the Department of Public Affairs and was made
the Chief of that department’s Political Section. Later
the office became known as the TT Legislative Liaison Division
of which its primary function was to coordinate and expedite communication
between the High Commissioner and the Congress of Micronesia.
Raymond Olochong worked in the Trust Territory Headquarters in
Saipan for fifteen years (1962-1977) and was later transferred
to the Palau District Public Affairs Department in the summer
of 1977.
Raymond Ulochong was one of the two representatives
from Ngiwal to attend the first Palau Constitutional Convention
in 1979. The Convention wrote the Palau Constitution. When the
Constitutional Government of Palau was established in 1981, Raymond
Ulochong became a Special Assistant to President Haruo Remeliik,
a position he also held during the presidency of Lazarus Salii.
Raymond Ulochong retired from government service in December 1988.
He passed away in 2000 and was laid to rest in his home village
of Ngiwal. He is survived by his three children who now have families
of their own. Raymond Ulochong was a member of the Udes Clan,
one of the two paramount clans of Palau.
