“NOT SURE OF HIS FACTS”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 174, 13 October 1927, Page 1

“NOT SURE OF HIS FACTS”

HON. 0. F. NESON CRITICISED COMMENT BY SIR CHARLES SKERRETT

Special to Press Association. —By Wireless Received 9.5. a.m. APIA, Tuesday. “MR. NELSON seems to be singularly lacking in the quality ITI of being sure of his facts, which men in the position of public leaders should always strive for,” said Sir Charles Skerrett, Chairman of the Samoa Commission, in commenting on the evidence given by the Hon. O. I*. Nelson.

At the sitting of the Samoan Commission to-day Mr. O. F. Nelson said the prices paid by the Administration for copra were impossible if all expenses were charged.

Samoa was run by a dictator, under whom the heads of departments carried out his policies against the wishes of the people. Alleged scapegoats were made, and unnamed people who had committed serious offences were allowed to leave Samoa. The medical department did not supply a service equivalent to its cost.

The Administrator, Sir George Richardson, had exceeded his duty, said witness, when he accepted from the faipules emblems of Samoan sovereignty. Properties in the town

of Apia, which shoild belong to the Samoan Government, were actually being acquired by New Zealand estates, -which was unfair to Samoa. Tie cry ‘‘Samoa for the Samoans” was mischievous. It could only result in dissension between the Europeans and the Samoans. The remainder of the day was spent In the cross-examination of Mr. Nelson, seeking to show that he knew the effect of the action of his committee would be to cause serious native unrest. He maintained hi 3 allegations against the Medical Department, esspecially the chief medical officer, in spite of the favourable reports of the latter by Dr. Buxton anci Dr. Hopkins, of the London School of Tropical Medicine, and Dr. Lambert, of the Rockefeller Institute, and still thought the department did not inspire respect, and excited ridicule, though one or two of its doctors did good work. He admitted that his committee’s financial report, published to the natives and Europeans, contained serious inaccuracies, which he might easily have detected if he had had time to check them. He had been too busy. It was true that the report went out to the natives and others, with the undeniable influence of bis name on the natives. His allegation about the foreclosure of the £IOO,OOO loan was based on a statement by the late Mr. W. F. Massey to Parliament about the Crown estates security loan. He admitted that his statements in his examination-ta-chiel about Apia town properties taken over as reparation estates had now been shown to be erroneous. He had based his evidence on what hacl been reported to him.