Jesse John Salalu is a Micronesian politician who is serving as the eighth and current

Governor of Yap The office of the Governor of Yap is the highest elected position in the state of Yap, Federated States of Micronesia The Federated States of Micronesia (; abbreviated FSM) is an island country in Oceania. It consists of four states from we ...

since December 29, 2021. Salalu was sworn into office following

Henry Falan Henry S. Falan is a Micronesians, Micronesian politician and the former Governor of Yap from January 19, 2019, to December 17, 2022. Falan was removed from his position as governor by the Yap State, Yap state legislature. Jesse Salalu, his former ...

being ousted by the Yap legislature. He previously served as lieutenant Governor of Yap under Falan from January 2019 to December 2021. He is the first Governor of Yap to be born on the outer islands, which means his lieutenant governor must be someone born on the main island of Yap. Prior to running for public office, Salalu served as a teacher, high school principal, and regional administrator for the Neighboring Islands at the

Yap State Department of Education Yap ( yap, Waqaab) traditionally refers to an island group located in the Caroline Islands of the western Pacific Ocean, a part of Yap State. The name "Yap" in recent years has come to also refer to Yap State, the state within the Federated Stat ...

. Salalu serves on the College of Micronesia Board of Regents, where he is the vice-chairman.

2018 gubernatorial election

In 2018, Jesse J. Salalu ran for Lieutenant Governor alongside Henry Falan running for governor. They won against the incumbent Governor

Tony Ganngiyan Tony Ganngiyan is a Micronesians, Micronesian politician and was the sixth Governor of Yap from 12 January 2015 to January 14, 2019. He ran for a second term in the 2018 Yap elections, 2018 Yap election, but he lost to Henry Falan. Ganngiyan is o ...

and Lieutenant Governor Francis I. Itimai with 51.7% of the vote.

Controversies

On 21 March 2022, 40 doctors and nurses resigned from the state hospital after Salalu's administration refused to listen to requests to raise wages. Prior to the resignation, members of the Yap medical community sent a request to the Office of the Governor for an opportunity to voice their grievances regarding their working conditions at the Yap Memorial Hospital in Colonia. Their grievances include: understaffing, low salaries, which led to an inability to keep qualified doctors, temporary contracts setup by the Falan government expiring, and the Yap legislature not approving the JEMCO (US-FSM Joint Economic Management Committee) grant that was meant for wage increases for those working at the hospital. After Salalu declined to meet with the doctors and nurses, they turned in their letters of resignation to the Office on 29 March. On 31 March, Salalu subsequently declared a state of emergency.

References

Micronesian people Politics of the Federated States of Micronesia Living people Governors of Yap Year of birth missing (living people) {{Micronesia-stub