Chief of State and Head of Government—President Ieremia TABAI (since 12 July 1979); Vice President Teatao TEANNAKI (since 20 July 1979)
_#_Political parties and leaders: Gilbertese National Party; Christian Democratic Party, Teburoro TITO, secretary; essentially not organized on the basis of political parties
_#_Suffrage: universal at age 18
_#_Elections:
President—last held on 12 May 1987 (next to be held May 1991); results—Ieremia TABAI 50.1%, Tebruroro TITO 42.7%, Tetao TEANNAKI 7.2%;
House of Assembly—last held on 19 March l987 (next to be held May 1991); results—percent of vote by party NA; seats—(40 total; 39 elected) percent of seats by party NA
_#_Member of: ACP, AsDB, C, ESCAP (associate), IBRD, ICAO, ICFTU, IDA, IFC, IMF, INTERPOL, ITU, SPC, SPF, UNESCO, UPU, WHO
_#_Diplomatic representation: Ambassador (vacant) lives in Tarawa (Kiribati);
US—none
_#_Flag: the upper half is red with a yellow frigate bird flying over a yellow rising sun and the lower half is blue with three horizontal wavy white stripes to represent the ocean