SAMOANS DEFENDED

Sun (Auckland), Volume IV, Issue 990, 5 June 1930, Page 10

SAMOANS DEFENDED

Sir, — Please permit me to review one asP®ot Ml% Holland's remarks in his address in the Newmarket Municipal Hall—tjide The Sun’s report of May 3. this is not an attempt to justify the last three years of Administration in Samoa. It i s a protest against the activities of politicians who, improperly informed of the cause of Samoan unrest, drag the territory and its misfortunes around the hustings as a pawn on their political chess-board. To trade, for a few votes in the political marts of the Dominion, the misfortunes of a people who have no voice in Dominion councils, and little in their own, is socially inequitable and indefensible. Mr. Holland is not the only offender in this respect; but his offence is the more prominent in that his party stands for democracy and humanitariamsm. If Mr. Holland knew that he is advocating the restoration to power of a. Samoan ruling caste, steeped in the lore of the race—accepting as Godgiven their right to chiefly privileges that it means the political enslavement of 36,000 kindly, law-abiding native people—he surely would modify bis attitude to the situation. The ethnic kinship of Maori and bamoan is no guarantee of the latter s ability to rule his country, despite Mr. Holland s illogical assertion to the contrary. But his belief that the .Samoan is intelligent enough to assume a considerable measure of self-gov- »* i' n , i , out i tedly well founded. ! Mr. Holland, in common with other political leaders, does not seem to understand is that intelligence plavs no. part in Samoan native statecraft Nl "*s y per . ce nt. of the natives are’ politically inarticulate. They have no Vote —no voice-—no political status - and are allowed to have no political opinions upon the larper issues of native policy. In short, thev live under an aristocracy more absolute tnan anything the world has seen since

the days of the feudal barons. The males of the ruling caste represent something under ten per cent, of the entire native population, and from these hereditary candidates the holders of titles are selected. But Mr. Holland must not think that they are “elected” under any democratic system. Each title is the specific property of a particular family, who, in nearly all cases, have the sole right of naming a successor. The faipule of a large district is thus named by his family alone, without reference to the people who have perforce *to accord him obediThe disappointed candidates, like th® kings in Ireland, are a constant source of dissension, and are responsible for the stigma of turbulence and lawlessness that attaches to the race. It is unnecessary to tell Mr. Holland that this caste possesses predatory instincts. He knows that no ruling caste can exist without theci. He also will believe, if he admits the existence oi a ruling caste in Samoa, that any Administration, by handing the control of the natives over to the chiefs, can purchase comparative immunity from political trouble. He will also find it possible to believe that any Administration that attempts to help the Samoan bottom dog, and thereby attacks the authority of these Polynesian barons, will, whatever Its policy otherwise, encounter just the same opposition that Xew Zealand faced in 192 7. . The Labour Party of Xew Zealand will remain faithless to its principles and traditions so long as it support® the imposition of undemocratic rule in Samoa. The excuse that the natives desire to live in subjugation to the ruling caste will not exonerate it. * These simple folk know no other state of existence: and are just as willing to fight for their oppressors as once were the serfs to do so for the barons. To allow the Samoan to hug his political illusion is about as fair and as to permit some poor, demented Xero in a Dominion State insane asylum to pinch a fiddle and set fire to th® institution As an instance of the lack of accurate information among politicians, I would like to say that the catch-word “Samoa for Samoans” was really into the mouths of the natives by Sir George Richardson; and, further, that he was roundly criticised by beach critics for so doing. At one of hi® earlier Fonos of the Faipule they raised the question of the settlement of Chinese coolies in Samoa. The Administrator replied that the Gove*** ment’s policy would not permit sue settlement of aliens, but was on *L “Samoa for the Samoans.” H absent-minded critics have sine® adopted it as a "sort of battle-cry. Finally, I challenge the statemeu that “Sir George Richardson began apply the principles of local banish* ment, and to tell Samoans to ta*® lower names of chiefly nam®*This form of punishment is, and for long, been a distinctly Samoan cU ®* tom. It was practised by the Mau lead* ers right up to the time of the dispersal. I shall be glad if Mr. Holla® will tell me of one instance where George Richardson, before the Mau became active in early 19*7, degraded cr to the Faipule and district councils tor a decision. __ Apia UPU MOJO*