LABOUR AND SAMOA.

Waikato Times, Volume 107, Issue 17971, 17 March 1930, Page 9

LABOUR AND SAMOA.

ADDRESS AT ARAPUNI. DOMINION'S BROKEN PROMISE. There was a large attendance at the “ Social Hail at Arapuni to .'isten to addresses from two visiting politicians, Messrs Lee Martin and P-. J. Howard. e M’s.P. v Mr Howard gave an outline of the s trouble in Samoa, tracing tbe history - of the island back to t'u3 eighties when s the Great Powers were looking for ;. coaling stations in the Pacific eonsey quent on the building of the Panama c Canal. There were hundreds of islands :1 in the Pacific, said Mr Howard, but t strange to say all shipping seemed to 3 make for Apia, and that part had been e written into song and story. The only 0 reason was Hie fact that the people were the kindest m the South Pacific 3 and ships’ crews had not to fight to get the necessary food ami water. The 1 harbour of Apia was not go id. and I even treacherous during the hurricane j season. After the great wrecks of 89 j j the three nations concerned, England, Germany and tihe United States, agreed ; that there was a better way of settling • their grievance than chasing one an- . other around the Pacific, so after a ; trial of the three-party control an 1 agreement was arrived at whereby ■ America took Tutuila, Germany took • Upolu, and Great Britain took Savaii. . The last-named island was the most ; useless of the group, owing to a live volcano and no harbours, so cventu--1 ally Savaii was given to the Germans ‘ in exchange for other territory. The foundation then of the present ; trouble, stated Mr Howard, was laid in 1901, when there was issued an ordinance taking away many of the native ’. I rights and abolishing many native cus- ■’ toms. The Germans found that this ordinance would not work, so it became a dead letter. At the end of 1914 , Great Britain asked New Zealand to . send an expeditionary force to Samoa - to seize the wireless station. We were 1 warned that the settlement of the - territory would rest with Britain when - peace came and we were not to con--3 sider it captured territory. During the • military occupation tilings went fairly 1 well with the natives, and until the 1 influenza epidemic came and took so ' many by death (roughly 8000 out of a g total of 38,000) our administration was . fairly successful. When the Peace Treaty was signed at Versailles there arose a controversy over the settlement of these Islands. Mr W. F. Mas1, sey, the Prime Minister of New Zea--5 land, demanded that they be passed over to New Zealand, but eventually the mandatory system was adopted as a compromise. Under that system the natives did not become nationals of • Hie country administering the mandate, and after reciting other things we could not do wo were instructed that an annual report was' to be presented lo a permanent commission established under the League of Nations. s s Civil Administration. :i 0 When New Zealand sent the civil r administration to relieve the military c the trouble actually slarled. The old - German ordinance was again enacted 1 and enlarged, and the old struggle that had taken place when the Germans e tried to enforce it once more broke out. e in 1921 a Samoan Act was passed by e _ New Zealand Parliament that could be termed a model piece of legislation except that it made no provision for Hie , Samoans to have any part in the govq ernment of the territory. In 1927 the c Reform Party put on the Statute Book 0 an amendment giving the Administrator s power to gaol, to deport and to de- !. prive chiefs of their titles without any , trial whatever. There then, without >i any frills or side-tracking side issues, - is the history of the !rouble, said Mr Howard. Those who believe that Lh<w 'j Hon. J. G. Cobbe had settled Hie Jij trouble were ultra optimists. So long c as the 1927 Amendment Act remained . on the Statute Book, so long d ies the trouble ."(•main. It was simply an exv tension of Hie German ordinance. The , Samoans would not accept it, would ». not live under it, and the struggle c would go on until New Zealand rea- - lised it was 100 costly a job In try to '■ force them so to do. The Ward Ads m nistratiuu had' simply carried on ir with the Coates method and had gone “ one better in P’ying to bully Hie natives. Labour’s Attitude. Labour if it came iuLo force would simply reverse the method adopted by the two older parties, concluded Mr v Howard. New Zealand had broken her ‘ word to the League of Nations. She 3 had promised that no military force l should be used against Hie nr.lives, in actual fact she had sent all the same war parly and used the some methods J as in the war with the Germans. Mr Lee Martin briefly addressed the ” meeting and gave an outline of labour - in politics. He said lie had invited Mill o ward, a Southern member, to come and see Hie country, and in particular Arapuni. Both speakers were ,r,carded votes is of thanks for their addresses. Mr D. d Lindsay occupied the chair, d s