American journalist, author, and photographer Jon Katz once said “animals have come to mean so much in our lives.”
“We live in a fragmented and disconnected culture. Politics are ugly, religion is struggling, technology is stressful, and the economy is unfortunate. What’s one thing that we have in our lives that we can depend on? A dog or a cat loving us unconditionally, every day, very faithfully.”
The same is true for Corporal Neumi Waqanokonoko, a member of the Fiji Police K9 Unit, and his furry four-legged work companion, K9 Kaleb. Cpl Waqanokonoko first joined the Fiji Police Force in 2017, and two years later, in 2019, he graduated from the New Zealand Police Dog Training Centre in Trentham, Wellington.
“I passed out in 2017 and I came through the normal process and procedures, and I was so lucky to be selected as part of the Fiji Detector Dog Unit (FDDU),” Mr Waqanokonoko said.
“I got my interview in 2019 and went on to graduate from Trentham, New Zealand.
“That’s where I met K9 Kaleb.” The dynamic duo went through a six-week training at Trentham, graduated and came back to Fiji together. One year later they had their first big bust.
“As a handler, a big thing for us is when we conduct a successful detection operation at the border or post-border. Post-border is the assistance we render to police stations nationwide.
“After we graduated from Trentham, the first biggest detection operation we undertook was the 1.5 kilograms of methamphetamine which we caught at the Post Fiji office in Nadi back in 2020.
“That was the most memorable one for me too because it was our first. For me, considering my background, I don’t know anything about dogs and also, this was the first dog for me to handle and conduct operations with in Nadi.”
The bond between dog and handler bloomed from then onwards.
“We create this bond through taking a walk together every day, playing, and when he successfully completes detection in a day, that is a bond in itself for us.
“Not only that but the bond is also strengthened when we groom them and bath them.”
“If you leave them idle, and you don’t work on that bond between the two of you, your dog will not cooperate. He won’t want to work, he won’t be productive, he’ll be lazy to deploy. That’s all that could happen because dogs can tell what kind of person you are.”
However, their time together was short-lived as K9 Kaleb got transferred to Suva. But the two met again in Suva on September 29, 2023, as K9 Kaleb retired from the force. “When he came to Suva, I was assigned another dog who retired awhile after. Then I was assigned another one which I’m currently working with.
“But since Kaleb is retiring, I was given the honour of attending his farewell because we had graduated together.
“They say that the more time you spend with your family, your children, you will create that bond with them and that’s exactly how it was with the dogs that I was put to work with.
“I spent less time at home and more time with my dog and that’s because of the bond we had.
“Today is a really emotional day for me because we passed out together, got deployed together. We’ve completed a lot of operations together which included saving the lives of children.
” However, Cpl Waqanokonoko said he was thankful that Kaleb retired while he was still fit and able, and hoped he would be a good companion to his next owner.
