Just three months after opening its doors in February, Naweni Secondary School has announced one of the most unlikely entries to this year’s Coca‑Cola Games: seven athletes from a roll of just 33 students have qualified to compete in Suva after a standout performance at the Cakaudrove Zone Athletics meet.
Head coach Mafi Leiloma said the rapid progress has left him astonished. “It’s only been three months and most of them had never even travelled to Suva before, let alone compete at this level. I am amazed with the commitment showed by the athletes,” Leiloma said, speaking of a squad that has only just begun to train together under the school’s fledgling programme. Their qualifying places in the zone meet have earned the green‑and‑red strip a spot on Fiji’s biggest secondary school athletics stage.
The team’s identity has been as striking as its results. Naweni’s monogram carries a red prawn, a deliberate symbol the coach said speaks to their approach: small but bold. “We might be small like a prawn, but we will pack a punch,” Leiloma said, underlining both the humour and the fighting spirit that have become part of the new school’s narrative.
Community backing has been a defining feature of the team’s short journey. Leiloma highlighted the extraordinary support from the vanua o Naweni — parents, siblings, sponsors and relatives rallied behind the athletes at local events in numbers that in some cases outmatched their children on the field. “At one point, we would see that there are more parents than athletes,” he said with a smile, describing fundraisers and travel organisation that helped the students reach qualification meets.
Many of the seven had never been to Suva before this week, but the coach stressed that arrival on the mainland was met with resolve rather than intimidation. Now among Fiji’s best school athletes for the Coca‑Cola Games, the Naweni group has come to the capital ready to compete and make their mark despite their inexperience on bigger stages.
The appearance of a brand‑new school at the Coca‑Cola Games highlights how quickly grassroots programmes can alter the secondary‑schools athletics landscape when community will and committed coaching come together. For Naweni Secondary, the immediate challenge is converting zone success into finals opportunities against more established schools with deeper squads and longer traditions in the Games.
Whether the red prawn proves a lucky mascot beyond the initial shock of qualification, Naweni’s presence in Suva this year will be watched closely back home in Cakaudrove as a statement of ambition from one of Fiji’s newest schools. Coach Leiloma and his athletes have already transformed expectations; the coming days at the Coca‑Cola Games will determine how far that momentum can carry them.