MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 November 1940, Page 2

MAORI MEMORIES

TEACH US HOW TO WORK. (Recorded by J.H.S., of Palmerston North, for the “Times-Age.”) When Potatau was the Maori King, our influences over his people was merely nominal. Maori lads infested the streets of Auckland in a drunken condition, committing all kinds of offences with impunity. Owing to the superior numbers of the Maori people we dared not appeal to the British law against them lest they retaliated upon our country settlers. The missionaries gave valuable help by negotiating with Potatau, whose pride in effecting a peaceful end where our Governor failed, carried weight with the Maoris. Up to the outbreak of war our police were instructed not to take action against Maori offenders.

Long after an event it is easy to judge what should have been done; but why not take the lesson to heart in this year 1940. and invite or even conscript every Maori man and woman to perform useful work of all kinds under control, for the three main purposes of learning to do useful things, redeeming the race, and increasing production. Their response would be as phenomenal as their answer to the call to arms, which, in proportion to their population. is a glorious example to our own boys.

Industrial training should be the first and only objective, leaving academic schooling to the initiative of each willing worker. The first principle of* education for the Maori is to teach him to earn a living for himself and his family. Our Minister for Education should visit Tuskegee University, where Booker Washington taught 2000 of his Negro brothers how to make that model school entirely self-supporting “by learning to do useful work.”