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Funafuti Palace is the home of Marquess Pyash of Tuvalu and was built by local islanders in the year 2000 to mark the millennium. The palace was purchased by the Marquess of Tuvalu for the nominal sum of 100 Tuvaluan Dollars after the Tuvalu Millennium Commission went into liquidation in January 2001. The Marquess of Tuvalu has invested heavily in the communications industry and owns a majority share in the state communications company Tuvalu Communications. Investors have criticised the Marquess’ plans to blanket the entire pacific basin with wireless broadband internet, claiming that the huge cost of implementing the plan would take 3,000 years to recoup through revenues. Tuvalu has only 400 telephone lines, 50 of which are used at Funafuti Palace. Despite this criticism, the Marquess has pumped the majority of his family fortune into the project which is expected to be completed by 2010. Tuvalu Communications is in talks with Columbian Reality TV Corporation which Marquess Pyash co-owns, to produce a range of programmes on Tuvalu. These are thought to include a Tuvaluan version of Big Brother and a completely new concept provisionally entitled Wheelchairs in Paradise where a group of disabled orphans are brainwashed into believing that the contestant is their God and is there to cure them. The contestant has to keep the disabled orphans believing in them as their God even though he or she is unable to cure them. It is believed that Keith Chegwin, a friend of the Marquess, has been provisionally booked for the first series. Columbian Reality TV Corporation has been strongly criticised over some it’s more extreme programme formats. A new series called Celebrity Drug Courier was scrapped after 47 countries banned the programme within days of the pilot show being broadcast. Marquess Pyash has announced his intention to stand for election as Prime Minister of Tuvalu when he finishes his current term of office as Associate Deputy Vice Under Secretary at the Commonwealth Metrication in Antigua and Barbuda Special Advisory Group in 2006. The Marquess of Tuvalu is the honourary head of the Tuvaluan Navy which currently consists of three part-time fishing boats and a glow-in-the-dark pink jet-ski donated by the International Menopausal Women’s Foundation.
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