The original inhabitants still maintain their links to the island, and still use the Rabi name in national competitions.

Rabi has four main settlements, all named after and populated by the descendants of four villages on Banaba (then known as Ocean Island) that were destroyed by the invading Japanese forces in the Second World War.

When the first Indians were brought to Fiji in 1879, aboard the Leonidas, most European planters refused to employ them because of the extra cost involved.

One planter, Captain J. Hill, who was sympathetic to Government policies, agreed to take 106 indentured labourers as field workers.

[3] The Banabans came to Fiji in three major waves, with the first group of 703, including 318 children, arriving on the BPC vessel, Triona, on 15 December 1945.

Although they were told that there were houses waiting for them on Rabi, they were only given tents to live in, along with food rations which lasted for only two months.

On 15 December 2005, sixty years to the day since the arrival of the first Banabans, more than 500 Rabi Islanders were granted citizenship at a ceremony led by Minister for Home Affairs Josefa Vosanibola and fellow-Cabinet Minister Ratu Naiqama Lalabalavu, who was also the Tui Cakau, or Paramount Chief of Cakaudrove and Tovata, to which Rabi belongs.

The Banabans, who had not previously been naturalized, came from the second and third waves of migration, which were technically illegal but tolerated by the Fijian government on humanitarian grounds.

As of 2006, approximately 4,000 Banabans on Rabi and 1,000 live in Savusavu, Nadi and Suva, where there are jobs and educational opportunities.

[6] David Christopher, who served in the House of Representatives from 2001 to 2006, was the first Rabi Islander to hold national office in Fiji.

He served as Permanent Secretary in the Fiji Ministries of Agriculture; and Housing, Urban Development and Environment from 1989 to 1996.

He was Chairman of the Rabi Council of Leaders from 1996 to 2001[7] and after the 2000 coup was temporarily appointed a Minister in the Qarasea government.