FIJIAN RUGBY TEAM

Wairarapa Times-Age, 31 August 1939, Page 5

FIJIAN RUGBY TEAM

CAPTAIN EX-PUPIL OF WANGANUI TECHNICAL COLLEGE. A former pupil of the Wanganui I Technical College. George Thakambau. iis captaining the Fijian Rugby learn | which won the first match of its New I Zealand tour in Rotorua. Thakambau is the cousin of Edward Thakambau, also a pupil of the Wanganui Technical College, but he has a higher position in native affairs than Edward Thakambau. and will shortly j be the paramount chief in Fiji. George ; Thakambau’s claim to the chieftainship j is through the male line, and defeats I Edward Thakambau’s claim because the i latter’s is through the female line. It is not long ago since George Thakambau was a pupil of the Wanganui Technical College, and in 1934 he was a Wanganui Rugby representative. George Thakambau was first educated at Newington, Sydney, and them came to New Zealand to finish his education at the Wanganui Technical College. He is now an official in the Secretariat of Native Affairs in Fiji. Last year he played in the Fijian second fifteen against the New Zealand Maoris when the team toured Fiji, but he was slightly below form then. This season he is reported to be playing excellently. The correct name of Thakambau is Ratu George Kadavulevu Cakobau, but because it was so very difficult to pronounce in the European tongue it be-. came Thakambau, which is a rough version of how it really sounds. George Thakambau is aged 27, stands five feet seven inches, and weighs 12 stone six pounds.