When his own son was invited to join the police force, he couldn’t bear it. “If you go and be a policeman you are not my son,” he said at the time. But he wants that anger to stop. That’s why he came forward to the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State Care, which is this month tackling the Pacific experience of abuse. For 66-year-old Fuavao, the best way to overcome the past was to confront it. And to avoid backing out on the day, he agreed to film an interview with the commission. He sat in the witness seat at Fale o Samoa (Samoa House) in Māngere, South Auckland, while the video was played.