Deputy Commissioner Papali’i Monalisa Tiai-Keti joined the Ministry of Police, Prisons & Corrections in 2004 as a Constable. She was the first female to be promoted to the rank of Assistant Commissioner and is the first female Deputy Commissioner of Police in Samoa appointed in 2019 50 years since women joined the Samoa Police.
DC Papalii progressed through the ranks during her 18-year career and had worked in various sections of the Police including the General Policing, Criminal Investigations Division, Human Resource, Policy and Planning, Samoa Transnational Crimes Unit and Training Unit.
DC Papalii is a strong advocate of female empowerment and gender equality. She implemented advanced policing frameworks through the various sections she was attached to as well as the various platforms she has led like the Samoa Police Women’s Advisory Network. She also implemented change in promotion processes, training frameworks, intelligence led policing practices and has been a regional leader in transnational crime collaboration is a committee member of the Australasian Council of Women and Policing 2021-2022.
DC Papalii was the Police Operational Commander for major local and international operations held in Samoa such as the United Nations International Conference on Small Island Developing States (UNSIDS), the South Pacific Games 2019, Commonwealth Youth Games and Regional Ministerial Conferences.
As acting Commissioner DC Papalii led the implementation of response through the most crucial components of the Samoa General Election 2021 which featured a constitutional crisis and politically sensitive times for Samoa. She also led Samoa’s COVID-19 lockdown police operation and 60th year of Samoan Independence celebrations police operation.
DC Papalii piloted the full implementation of the Police Pro case management system establishment all throughout the Samoa Police Service and assist in tracking case files but also with statistics to support Executive decision making. DC Papalii also supported a number of initiatives funded by the Samoa Australia Police Partnership (SAPP) to support the development of SPPCS. Such includes capacity and capability development by re-invigorate the SAPP Scholarship Project providing an opportunity for individuals to take responsibility for their own development. She designed a self-sustaining framework, curriculum and processes which promoted internal training opportunities, strengthening of the trainer’s ability and implementation of promotion courses to combat selective promotion.
She is the current National Coordinator for Pacific Centre for Law Enforcement Cooperation and has been instrumental in sharing presentations on capability developed in Samoa which may benefit the region. She recently negotiated a bi-lateral agreement to access the Fiji Police Forensic Pathologist to visit Samoa to work on post-mortems which were impacting criminal cases. Samoa does not have a Forensic Pathologist and other critical components which may be taken for granted in Australia and New Zealand.
She was also the Samoa Police WAN President between 2014 and 2016 she implemented an interagency mentoring program. This was driven by a feeling that women were being promoted but still felt that they were performing secretarial duties. The mentoring program saw Commissioned Officers being mentored by Senior Executive from other government Ministries while the Commissioned Officers mentored junior members who wanted to take part. DC Papalii continues to mentor emerging leaders encouraging those who are encouraged to pay it forward with the mantra of “have the hindsight to know where you’ve been, the foresight to know where you are going and the insight to know when you are going too far”.
DC Papalii is the only Pacific Representative on the ACWAP Committee and has driven greater involvement from the Samoa Police. In the last 2 years she has led the Committee who planned and delivered the largest Pacific ACWAP Awards night 2021 and was a panel member.
DC Papalii is an inspiring female leader and a role model for emerging leaders. She continues to strive for improvement of the Ministry of Police, Prisons and Corrections through the various areas of policing. Her passion is reflected in providing leadership development to men and women who desire to bridge the gap from simply managing daily operations to becoming exceptional leaders who architect change, innovation and sustainable excellence.