“Big Stick” Methods

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 261, 25 January 1928, Page 9

“Big Stick” Methods

REPLY TO SAMOAN STATEMENT Labour Leader Attacks Government A strong criticism and a reply to the Prime Minister’s ■Ti statement on Samoa has been issued by the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. H. E. Holland, who declares that the big stick method of the Government has utterly failed.

Press Association.

Press Association. WESTPORT, To-day. A reply was issued last evening by the Leader of the Opposition, Mr. H. E. Holland, to the statement of the Prime Minister relating to the deportations from Samoa. “While Mr. Coates’s statement is extremely unconvincing as an attempt to justify his Government’s line of action in Samoa, it is supremely interesting inasmuch as it constitutes a sweeping refutation of some of the most important reports which have come from the administration in recent months. Hitherto in his reports to the New Zealand Government, General Richardson has asked the people of the Dominion to believe that there was no real dissatisfaction in Western Samoa with his administration. We are told that the disaffection was on the part only of a few-Europeans and a small number of natives. Now, if the Prime Minister’s official statement is correct, the situation in Samoa is much as it was in Ireland between the Easter week insurrection in 1916 and the Constitution of the Free State — ‘The King's writ is not running.’ “Mr. Coates says the Samoans are refusing to recognise the rule of the administration, and that they won’t pay the fines inflicted upon them by the court, as in Robert Louis Stevenson’s day, when the tripartite Government operated. They are refusing to pay their taxes, and in other ways they are demonstrating their resentment against the treatment which the administration is meting out to them. Mr. Coates concludes his statement with the threat that a stronger course is to be taken in Samoa, and says that the interests of a large number of natives are to be preferred to the interests of a handful of Europeans, but he fails to explain why if this is so practically all of the Samoans are in revolt against his policy, nor does he explain why a multitude of punishments are imposed in the case of Samoans for offences for which he claims Europeans are responsible. Mr. Coates contradicts himself for having put the blame on Europeans. He also says ‘there can be no possible doubt that the present unfortunate state of affairs is due to the activities of the Mau.’ He cannot have it both ways. The Mau is a great organisation of Samoan people, and it exists despite every attempt to break it. The natives have been forbidden to contribute to its funds or join its membership. The Chief Justice has torn its membership badges from the coats of the chiefs. Recently certain Europeans have been ordered under an apparent threat of deportation to bring about its dispersion, an utterly impossible task for any European, but my information is that despite these things the Mau is stronger than ever.

“The Government’s deportation orders and its disregard for every fundamental principle of the Magna Charta have stiffened up the Samoan organisation and strengthened the natives in their opposition to the New Zealand administration, adding yet another contradiction to the contradictory* mass which his statement presents. “Mr. Coates makes the frankest of frank confessions. He now 'says that the three citizens who have been deported have been guilty of neither crime nor offence, and that their deportation must be regarded not as a penalty, not even as a judicial act, but as a preventive measure to facilitate the good government of the territory. LIQUOR AND CROPS “The Prime Minister declares that the two chief causes of white discontent in Samoa are the prohibition of liquor and the Administrator’s experiment in the handling of the sale of native copra. Of course the Prime Minister knows that the Opposition has frequently made it clear that it would stand against the introduction of liquor into the islands, but he covers up the fact that intoxicating liquor is being freely manufactured in Western Samoa, both by natives and Europeans, and I have no doubt he knows it was given in evidence before thfl joint Samoa Committee that officials of his Administration are among the chief offenders. “As to the experimental policy of the Administration in selling native copra, it would be informative if the Prime Minister would furnish to the public the figures showing the quantities of native copra sold and the prices obtained. I know that good prices have been obtained, but I understand that the quantity of native copra handled is comparatively small. OVERDUE REPORT “Up to the present the Prime Minis-

ter has withheld from myself and all other members of Parliament the commission’s report and evidence, notwithstanding his promise that it would be made available to us. His explan ation of why he has taken this extraordinary course is heavily overdue. It is my opinion, and in forming it I am fortified by the disclosures made by the Prime Minister of the magnitude of the Samoan revolt, that the ‘big stick’ policy of the New Zealand Government in Samoa has utterly faile-.d, that the recall of General Richardson is an immediate necessity, and that if the situation is to be retrieved and the historic rights of the Samoans conserved, the League of Nations must awaken to a sense of its responsibility and take prompt action.”

USE OF BOYCOTT TRADERS FACE LOSSES MAU NOT WEAKENING (From Our Resident Reporter .) WELLINGTON, To-day. The Apia correspondent of the Fiji Times,” writing on January 12, states that the latest rumour in Samoa is that the natives are going to start a boycott of all the stores. The boycott is not a new thing in Samoa. In 1922 they ran what was called a sa, which is the same thing, and the traders suffered a good deal while it was in progress. It is considered that if the boycott eventuates merchants. and traders will appreciate some of the difficulties the Government has been up against for the past 15 months. Just why the move is being made against the merchant is hard to say, save that there is an idea prevalent that it will eventually hit the Government in the loss of Customs dues. There is no sign just at the moment of the Mau weakening in any way. Copra is to be cut and it is rumourc-.d that the money will be forwarded to the League of Nations.