Pacific Islands Monthly - 1 April 1979

Pacific Islands Monthly

Voi. 50 No. 4

April 1979

(Usps 952480)

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Published monthly by Pacific Publications (Aust.) Pty Ltd and printed in Australia by Paramac, Alexandria, NSW Australian cover price is recommended retail only. Regis tered at the GPO Sydney for transmission by post as a publication category B. Second class postage paid at Honolulu, Hawaii. Copyright © 1978 Pacific Publications

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Subscriptions

PIM is airfreighted to most subscribers and agents in the Pacific Islands and the United States.

Aust.

Other American Samoa $13 $US16 Australia $12 Canada $14 $US18 Cook Islands $13 Fiji $12 $F12 French Polynesia $14

Cfp 1700

Guam $13 $US16 Gilbert Islands $13 Hawaii $13 $US16 Japan $16 Y4500 Micronesia $13 $US16 Nauru $13 New Caledonia $14

Cfp 1700

New Hebrides $13 New Zealand $12 $NZ13.50 Niue $13 Norfolk Island $12 Northern Marianas $13 $US16 Papua New Guinea $13 K12 Solomon Islands $13 Tonga $13 Tuvalu $13 United Kingdom $15 £10 US Mainland $14 $US18 Western Samoa $13

• Political trial in Tahiti Six men gaoled, but de fence lawyers from Paris turn the case into something the like of which Papeete has never seen before . 9 • Art Artist Bobby Holcomb tells what he tries to do in his paintings, and why he chooses to live in French Polynesia rather than his native Hawaii .. 12 • Cook Islands More excerpts from a new book tell ing the colourful tale of the reign of the now fallen House of Henry 14 • US and the Pacific A US Senate committee hear ing shows that Uncle Sam hasn’t yet got his act together on future relations with Pacific Island coun tries 17 • Banaba —Banabans ‘invade’ their homeland, Ocean Island, and argue their case for ownership with petrol bombs 22 • New Hebrides Despite deep misgivings on the ‘moderate’ side of politics, the new government of national unity holds together and the painful progress to independence goes on 27 • New Caledonia A thesis by an Australian history student on an episode in New Caledonian history sparks controversy in Noumea 35 • Fiji Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara is characteristically outspoken on the high salaries paid to United Nations experts in his country, and puts a possible solution to visiting UN tall poppy Bradford Morse 39 • Aviation A close look at the dilemma facing Pacific regional airlines in the wake of the low fare revolution 49 • PNG investment Foreign investors are welcome in Papua New Guinea, but not if they’re only after ‘a fast buck or kina’ 55

Afterthoughts 29

American Samoa 42, 57 Art 12 Australia 24, 25 Aviation 49 Books 45 Banaba 22 Colonialism 9 Cook Islands 14, 25 Deaths 67 Fill 39 Hawaii 48 Indonesia 25 Islands Press 21 Letters 4 New Caledonia 35

New Hebrides 27 New Zealand 24, 25, 39 Pacific Report 7 Papua New Guinea 25, 29, 41, 45, 46, 55 People 32 Philately 63 Shipping 69 Solomon Islands 22 Tahiti 9, 12, 39 The Region 17, 24, 49 Tourism 49 Tradewlnds 49 United States 17, 24, 25 Western Samoa 25, 41, 42 Yachts 65 Yesterday 35

Bobby Holcomb... Neo- Polynesian art in Tahiti

John Kaputin... guide lines for investors in PNG.

Simple questions

for US

My questions may be very simplistic and naive but never theless have bothered me for some time. As a member of the Micronesian community for four years and also a US citi zen, I feel the right to ask them of the US and particularly the Department of Interior.

Was the ‘trust’ of Micronesia in the hands of the US under the United Nations to guide and assist them from the end of World War II to economic and

political self-determination?

If so, why is it that the US

has been continually increasing

economic aid, social welfare programmes particularly, with no apparent concern for the lack of tangible economic

development until the begin

ning of the issue of transition and termination of that ‘trust’?

Why has the US built up a bureaucratic monster that em ploys 61% of the employed in Micronesia and then under taken a fiscal restraint and budget cut programme two years prior to the opening rounds of status talks with

these peoples?

Why does the ‘free feeding’ programme, so generously volunteered by the US, sud denly have a price tag of SUSI 7 million?

Why was it initiated in the

first place without explanation

that it was a welfare pro gramme only as long as the

people stayed politically

dependent upon the US, or they would have to pay for it out of their own funds?

Does the US feel any re sponsibility for the divisive re percussions of the withdrawal of the programme, or the ‘strings’ now attached, among the Micronesian people toward their leaders who have opposed it?

How well have we handled our ‘trust’ if the peoples of

Micronesia are economically crippled and must seek foreign investment after termination of the trusteeship to begin econ

omic self-sufficiency?

How politically developed

are these people if the leaders’ credibility and wisdom are

being challenged by their own

who have no idea of the state of their economy and blame their leaders for the withdrawal of the US ‘generosity’?

I feel the people of America do believe in human rights and are moral and people of con science. The actions of our Department of Interior and the US Congress are another mat ter. A person responds from the heart. A politician or bureau crat is sensitive to votes and

public opinion.

Ask the average American where Micronesia is and he’ll say: ‘Mike who?’ I pray for Micronesia and her people. I pray for America.

Saipan Northern Marianas

Jon D. Kawika

A man before

his time

Re the article on Ratu Sir Lala Sukuna which I submitted last year and which was published in PIM January.

Recently I have been work ing in the Fiji National Ar chives in Suva. While working through the Methodist collec tion I came across a file con

taining the same speech given

by Ratu Sukuna to the Defence Club but the date was 1934.

Mention is made to 60 years of British rule. As Fiji ceded to Britain in 1874, this would mean the paper was delivered in 1934 which makes it an even more interesting state ment.

Camberwell Victoria Australia

Ken James

A good point, Percy

Percy Chatterton is to be con gratulated for his criticism of

the condom-pushing campaign

in Papua New Guinea (PIM February). He has said what many other people are think

ing.

There is one other aspect which has not been discussed

publicly. The condoms being

sold by Family Planning As

sociation pedlars in PNG are, I assure you, uncomfortable and very difficult to use. There must by now have been many

pregnancies directly attribu

table to this FPA campaign. I wonder whether members of the FPA executive have tried

using the wretched things

themselves?

This misguided FPA cam paign has surely set back the cause of birth control by many years in PNG. The public has now come to associate birth control with the selling of third rate condoms by self-interested

pedlars.

Upng

Papua New Guinea

T.E.S.

No ‘lapse of taste’

My attention has been drawn to your comments on the report in Nabanga of my farewell interview with Jean Massias and Mr Laffont (PIM

January).

In fairness to them and

Nabanga they should be

acquitted of any ‘lapse of taste’ on their part. The quotation in their report of what, to a Frenchman reading my French, might have been taken as a rather colourful and amus

ing Anglicism, was certainly

with affectionate rather than any malicious intent.

Equally certainly, I took no offence, where none was intended very much the re verse in fact. Nor should you.

Callow

J. S. Champion

Hereford ( latel y British England Resident Commissioner in the New Hebrides) PIM is relieved that Mr Cham pion was not offended and that he took the matter in the spirit in which Mr Massias says it was intended.

PNG the lucky

country?

I read your Tropicalities item about the three Mekeo men back from the United States (PIM January). I met all the nationals who were in the PNG dance group while they were here in New York City. It was good to talk with them, some in Pidgin, others in Motu. I was a missionary in New Guinea in the 1950 s and early 19605. I love New Guinea, both the people and the land.

Andy Supeke says; ‘As usual these people ... discovered, as do so many Papua New Guineans, that foreigners know so little about their country not even where it is.’

I am a school teacher here in

John Champion... no offence taken

I New York City and would like * to say that many of the children I have taught from year to year [ have parents who fought in [ World War II and were in New r Guinea. These parents have [ told their children of their ex periences in New Guinea so the younger generation do know where it is.

During the 14 years I have been teaching since my return from Papua New Guinea I have taught class sizes on the average of 35 children. So, 35

multiplied by 14 equals 490.

Those 490 children have seen my slides and heard all my ex periences.

There are so few Papua New Guineans who have visited the States (I can think of only seven to date outside of the Raun Raun dance team) that they have not confronted enough people to come to the conclusion that foreigners know so little.

Most Christian church con gregations know where New Guinea is if they are at all missionary-minded. Most well established Christian schools and colleges inform their students as to where New Guinea is so that they may con sider it as a place to go to preach the gospel where Christ has never been named. That’s where I heard about the second largest island in the world .. .

The Mekeo people said ‘America is not good .. . our place good ...’ I think this shows a lack of education on their part as to interdepen dence of nations on one another. New Guinea is ‘good’

and free today because

Americans helped defend it

from a dominion which would not have been good for them.

Perhaps New Guineans today

would be working in their gar dens to produce food for the government instead of their

awn individual families. They

night not be free today to ravel to the USA to see the \mericans ‘hustling to make a iving’. But they should be educated to the fact that if it veren’t for the earnings (de

lations of hustling American

Christians), there would be no

nissionaries there in Papua

'Jew Guinea offering the bread )f life, eternal life, for easy

taking. Because of our Good American Way of Life, the gos pel has been free to be preached, sinners converted, and lives changed to serve the Lord . . .

America is good. We are free here to worship God as we see fit. The word of God is not bound as it is in some coun tries. I am glad I was born here for it was here that I heard and received the good news of sal vation in Christ and through him shall ‘never hunger nor thirst’.

Because of the entrance of foreign missionaries into New Guinea, the nationals there need ‘never hunger or never thirst’. The word of life is there for the taking. They don’t even have to dirty their hands. Just reach out .. .

Every evening that there was a showing of the PNG dancing at the Museum of Natural His tory there were hundreds of people who could not get inside due to lack of seats. If New Guinea was not well known I’m sure the Americans wouldn’t have been interested enough to show up ... I have

pictures of Aisaga Opu in a

new blue suit I bought him in Macy’s. He had a good time shopping for himself and his

son.

Queens Village

New York

Usa

Lois F. James

Perhaps a Papua New Guinean would like to agree or disagree with Ms James. Editor.

Misplaced ‘no

confidence 7

In your January issue I read with interest your Port Moresby correspondent Angus Smales’ articles on the topic ‘Somare, the Great Survivor’.

On page 17 Mr Smales reported that I introduced a motion of no confidence in the Somare administration in the

November-December sitting

of the Papua New Guinea Par liament.

I wish to correct that. It was the Honorable Member for New Ireland Province Mr Noel Levi who moved a motion of no confidence in the Somare Government under the spon sorship of the ‘Loyal Oppo sition’.

May I be allowed to suggest,

Sir, that in future your cor respondents spare no effort to ensure that what is reported is as accurate as possible.

J. C. Noel

Member for Kiriwina- Goodenough and Minister Boroko for Housing and Urban Papua New Guinea Management PIM apologises for its error, to both Mr John Noel and Mr Noel Levi.

Style even depth

Congratulations on PIM for December and January. For a while I thought it was going to be all tits and bums but now PIM has suddenly become a paper of style and even depth which makes it worth buying

again.

Upng

Papua New Guinea

Ross Stevens

Is all forgiven?

Apparently the governments of New Zealand and France are working toward closer ties. A New Zealand Herald news item on February 2 stated that a ‘high-powered French naval visit in two weeks’ time may herald a new era of entente cor diale between New Zealand and France . .. Since dif ferences over nuclear testing at Mururoa have been resolved there has been greater contact 9 So, apparently, all is for

given, and underground nu

clear tests are a worry of the past. However, according to the NZ Department of Scientific and Industrial Research geo physics division, in a letter dated December 15, 1978, two underground tests were con ducted in November 1978 at Mururoa, a small one on

November 3 and the other, quite large, ‘possibly 100 kilo tons or more’, on November 30.

And, according to many scientists, underground nuclear tests are equally as dangerous as atmospheric ones, so the

silencing by such dubious

means, of anyone who opposes them, must be viewed with alarm.

Elaine Shaw

Auckland New Zealand

They know who

they are

Thank you and congratulations for your coverage of Norfolk Island in February. It was fair on the whole and in some parts it was generous.

Your headline stating we have an ‘identity crisis’ is very misleading. We do not have an identity crisis. We know exactly who we are and what we be lieve.

There is a crisis, but it is in Australia, not on Norfolk. Aus tralia wants to lay hands on Norfolk as its own property but it suddenly has doubts and wonders whether Norfolk might be entitled to its own ideas.

So the crisis is whether Aus tralia should live up to its com mitments to let Norfolk people decide their own future or whether it should go on making all the important decisions and, incidentally, grab off 350 000 square kilometres of ocean for itself while the Norfolk Islanders aren’t looking.

No matter which way the crisis is settled, Norfolk Islanders will go on knowing we are very different people from Australians, and that we are entitled to this island and the sea around. Australia can take its usual attitude of ‘the islands don’t count’ and take our sea, and suffer the con sequences. Or it can decide to go along at last with England and the US and NZ and let a small island have its own fair g°- That is the crisis. Will Aus tralia honour its commitments or will it take what it thinks it might get away with?

John Pearson

Society of Descendants Secretary of the Pitcairn Settlers Norfolk Island

John Noel... no ‘no con fidence’ motion

Chinese Vice-Premier Gives Png A Miss

‘Pressure of business’ arising from the invasion of Vietnam was probably behind the cancellation of the planned March Pacific tour by Chinese Vice-premier Geng Biao. Vice premier Geng has a reputation as an international trouble shooter. But Zhen Muhua, a more junior vice-premier, stood in for him so the various hosts would not be too disappointed.

She was to visit Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Western Samoa. A curious feature of the itinerary was the absence - from it of Papua New Guinea, largest of the Pacific nations.

The official PNG Newsletter had announced on January 19 that Vice-premier Geng would be spending seven days in PNG in the course of his March tour. The idea of exchange visits between PNG and Chinese leaders went into operation in late 1976 with a visit to China by PNG Prime Minister Michael Somare himself. Mrs Zhen has not the seniority of a prime minister, or of Vice-premier Geng, and in view of the fact that PNG is currently reviewing its whole foreign policy with particular reference to China and Russia (neither of which is at present represented diplomatically in PNG), Mrs Zhen’s omission of PNG from her swing through the Pacific is seen by PNG foreign affairs officials as having all the hall marks of that inscrutable oriental tact which might be expected of her.

New Caledonia’S ‘Contract’ With France

After a bumpy passage, New Caledonia’s council of govern ment in February approved the French Government’s plan for a 10-year contract between France and the territory. It provides for an economic reorganisation of the territory, with emphasis on the economic, social and cultural promotion of its Melanesian and Polynesian inhabitants.

Banabans Say No Again - Loudly

More than 1000 Banabans at a March meeting on Fiji’s Rabi Island angrily rejected new British proposals to meet their demand for separation from the Gilbert Islands (to be known as Kiribati after independence in July). British Under secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Evan Luard was shouted down as he put the proposals, which fell short of Banaban claims for complete separation Meanwhile, the Banaban cause has won expressions of sup port from the World Federation of Trade Unions, headquar tered in Prague, Czechoslovakia.

TOP BRASS BEAT PATH TO NEW HEBRIDES After many decades of ‘benign neglect’ by the condominial powers, the New Hebrides is now a Mecca for a succession of s ©n' or British and French officials. February saw visits by Sir Michael Palliser, permanent Under-secretary of State in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and head of the diplo matic service of that office, and of French Secretary of State m ° verseas De P ar tments and Territories Paul Dijoud It was Mr Dijoud’s second visit in six months. He is expected back yet again in May. With Lord Goronwy-Roberts, British minis ♦ r i )f A ? tate for forei 9 n and commonwealth affairs, he will study the proposed New Hebrides constitution which, if ap proved at a referendum, will form the basis for election’s. The elected government will then decide on a date for indepen dence in 1980. H

Tuvalu Signs With Uncle Sam

Under a recent treaty of friendship between the United States and Tuvalu, the US has dropped its claims to four of the country s nine islands - Funafuti, Nukufetau, Nukulaelae and Niualakita. The treaty provides for consultations between the two parties on security and marine resource matters, waters near Tuvalu are an important fishing ground for US and other foreign fishermen.

Polynesia’S Problem As Seen By Paris

France’s High Commissioner in French Polynesia, Paul

Cousseran, said in an interview with the newspaper Depeche de Tahiti: ‘One can be intellectually for the CEP (Centre d'Ex perimentations du Pacifique, the French nuclear test agency), or one can be intellectually against it. But the fact is that this country lives off it. Three thousand two hundred families do so quite directly, not counting Polynesian military personnel. Above all, thousands of families live off it indirectly,’ Mr Cousseran added: ‘I have said before and I repeat: independence is not the problem faced by this country. On the contrary, its problem is its depend ence . . . Polynesia’s problem is that it does not produce what it consumes, it does not produce the money necessary to pay for what it consumes, so someone must always be found to pay in its stead.’

MICK LEAHY DIES IN PAPUA NEW GUINEA Explorer, farmer, grazier, Michael James Leahy died at his Zenag, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea, home in March, aged 78. Mick Leahy won world fame for his explorations in the PNG Highlands in the early thirties. His search was for gold but he will be remembered for his trail-blazing.

Tupuola Efi Under Threat

Early March saw strong suggestions that Prime Minister Tupuola Efi of Western Samoa could be toppled when the new parliament met late in the month or early in April. A majority of new mem bers, with three former Tupuola supporters, had pledged to vote for Vaai Kolone, a veteran member from Savaii. Should they all stand firm, Vaai Kolone could win as many as 30 of the 47 votes (See election report, Political Currents.)

Irian Java Rebels Fly To Sweden

Jacob Prai, self-proclaimed president of the provisional government of West Papua (Irian Jaya), and his three most senior aides flew out of Port Moresby in February for Sweden.

With Mr Prai were his former deputy, Otto Ondawame, Darius Maury and Amos Indey. The group also included Nicholas Meset, a Papua New Guinea citizen, who was arrested with Messrs Prai and Ondawame last September in the township of Vanimo near the Irian Jaya border. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees spent more than three months seeking a sanctuary for the men after PNG refused them political asylum. Announcing Sweden’s decision, a UN regional representative said he was continuing talks with the PNG Government on the future of another 103 Irianese refugees seeking asylum.

Pacific’S Big Slice Of Undp Funds

This year’s United Nations Development Programme budget lifts aid for South Pacific countries from $2 million to $12.3 million, giving a regional per capita aid figure of about $3, the highest amount provided by the UNDP to any part of the world. UNDP administrator, Brad Morse, said the money would be used for fisheries development, off-shore prospect ing, research into root crops, telecommunications and the bulk purchase of drugs.

Fiji Casts Out The Noose

Fiji has abolished capital punishment for murder. The crime in future will be punishable only by life imprisonment Fiji’s fast hanging was in 1964. When the question was debated in parliament in March, seven members said they opposed abolition, but only one opposing voice was heard when the vote was taken.

Joint Exercises For France. Nz?

The French navy has invited two New Zealand warships and two Royal New Zealand Air Force Orion aircraft to take part in training exercises off Tahiti in May. The invitation was issued by Rear-Admiral Y.L.L. Leenhardt, commander-in chief of French military forces in the Pacific, during a February visit to New Zealand.

Coalition Talk Again In Fiji

The prospect of a coalition government between the mainly Fijian Alliance Party and the mainly Indian National Feder ation Party is a hardy annual of Fiji politics. It was flowering again in March with Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara once again expressing support for the idea. In a long inter

view with Fiji Times editor Vijendra Kumar, Ratu Mara said his main reason was to ensure a balanced multi-racial rep resentation in cabinet, adding that he was not naive enough to believe that all potential cabinet material was in his own Alliance Party.

Lini Huddles With Jimmy Carter

Father Walter Lini, deputy chief minister of the New Hebrides, was among representatives of churches from 130 countries at the 1979 annual prayer breakfast hosted by US President Jimmy Carter in Washington. After a talk with President Carter Fr Lini predicted closer relations between the New Hebrides and the US after independence.

Outcry On Australian Academic

The Papua New Guinea government’s decision to retain an Australian academic to conduct a review of PNG foreign pol icy (PIM March) has aroused a storm of protest. Opposition leader lambakey Okuk described it as ‘a kick in the teeth’ for officers of the Foreign Affairs Department, and said it made a joke of the government’s claim that it was free from Australian influence in its decision-making.

Un Man With The Two Limousines

The controversy over highly paid United Nations Develop ment Programme experts touched off by Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, Fiji’s Prime Minister (Tropicalities), has spilled over into Western Samoa. Apia newspaper Savali, published by the Prime Minister’s department, noted in February: ‘Prime Minister Tupuola Efi’s salary is SWS7B3O per annum.

The lowest paid UN expert, known as L 1 can expect to earn around $25 000. At L 3 he is at $34 000 and can afford, if he so desires, to own two Mercedes-Benz limousines. The duty free privileges which go with the post have made such a prop osition attractive to at least one expert in Samoa.’ $2 MILLION TO KEEP FORUM FLAG AFLOAT Australia, New Zealand and Island nations with shares in the Pacific Forum Line will make more than $2 million available in bank overdrafts to keep the line going. President Hammer deßoburt of Nauru, chairman of the regional transport minis ters’ meeting in Auckland in February, said the line could now meet existing debts of $1 million and operating costs until 1981.

Somare Stirs Up The Unions

A statement by Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Michael Somare that he would be ‘only too glad’ to go along with any parliamentary decision to outlaw trade unions in the country has stirred up a united opposition front of trade unions and associations with about 200 000 members. The front plans a concerted campaign against any move to ban or restrict trade unions in PNG. Mr Somare spoke after strikes had hit a number of industries, including the economically vital Bougainville copper mine.

Evergreen Gets Pago Plum

A new air service between American Samoa and the US Trust Territory of the Pacific (Micronesia) has been approved by the US Civil Aeronautics Board. The Arizona-based airline Evergreen International will operate the service. Evergreen was granted a temporary licence to operate charters between American Samoa and the USA last year, but no decision on a permanent licence will be made until completion of hear ings on an objection by Zantop International Airlines.

Mara Welcomes Tora And Friends

Apisai Tora and other former members of the Taukei (Fijian) committee of the predominantly Indian National Federation Party were ceremonially welcomed into the Alliance Party in March. The ruling Alliance Party is mainly Fijian in mem bership. Present at the ceremony were Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara and a number of government ministers.

Sandalwood Oil Plant For New Caledonia

Plans have been announced for a sandalwood oil distillery in New Caledonia which on completion will produce 12

tonnes of sandalwood oil, or 10% of world production, a year.

The factory, to cost $2 million, will use raw materials from New Caledonia’s Lifou and Mare Islands, and the Isle of Pines. The oil will be used in the French perfume indus try.

Who’S Idea On Diarrhoeal Diseases

Diarrhoeal diseases, still among the top killers in Pacific Island communities, expecially of children, could face a for midable foe in the newly developed oral rehydration method being promoted by the World Health Organisation in this International Year of the Child. The oral therapy has many advantages over the usual intravenous method. The prescribed liquid is simple to prepare and, above all, it can be administered at home.

Nadi College Thinks Of Needy

Nadi College, Fiji, is introducing a seventh form for students who cannot afford the SF3OOO annual fee charged at the University of the South Pacific. Seventh-form students, who will sit for the New Zealand bursaries examination, will pay S3OO for the year.

More Local Equity For Post-Courier

South Pacific Post Pty Ltd, publishers of the Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, plan a capital restructuring designed to widen local ownership and bring the company’s holding down to about 60%. South Pacific Post is a subsidiary of the Melbourne-based Herald & Weekly Times Ltd.

Apia Warning On American Firm

The Western Samoa Government has issued a warning that people should not become involved with the San Diego based finance firm of Stanley M. Sabihon and Associates.

The government warning said: The firm claims to offer large amounts of money at cheap interest rates. However, they "disappear” after applicants have paid a fee for their appli cations to be processed.’ The statement added that the government was ‘co-operating with the FBI in an investi gation of the firm.’

Huge Bid For Guam Franchise

A resounding vote of confidence in the future of Guam’s tour ist industry was a bid of SUSI4O million by Duty Free Shop pers Ltd for the 15-year shopping and restaurant franchise at the proposed new Guam international air terminal. The bid was believed to be based on the ever-increasing affluence and increasing numbers of Japanese visitors, the opening of new air services to Guam, and anticipated interest in Guam as a tropical resort for South Koreans.

Cooks’ Davis Looking Elsewhere

The Cook Islands Government has told New Zealand that it will look elsewhere for supplies if it is not allowed to send its own vessels to New Zealand to collect cargo. The NZ Seamen’s Union threatened to impose a ban on all NZ-registered vessels serving Rarotonga if the Cooks persisted in trying to send its locally-manned vessels to New Zealand. The union was refusing to allow vessels not manned by New Zealanders to be in the service. Cooks Premier Tom Davis was quoted in the New Zealand Herald as saying: ‘What am I going to do? Sit and put up with it? No sir.’ The only solution, he said, was to buy else where.

Munk And Gilmour

In the January issue of PIM an item was published in Pacific Report which reported a statement made by Senator Kuar Battan Singh last November in the Fiji Senate. In the state ment Senator Singh made certain allegations against Mr Adnan Khashoggi, Mr Peter Munk and Mr David Gilmour. PIM in reporting that the allegations had been made was not intending to convey the impression that the allegations were true. On the contrary, PIM is satisfied that the allegations were not true. PIM apologises unconditionally to Messrs Khashoggi, Munk and Gilmour for any embarrassment which this article, including its headline, may have caused them.

Trial With

New Politics

When the long delayed, twice postponed, trial of young Tahi tians accused of having bombed the Papeete telephone exchange and murdered a French businessman (PIM November 1977, August 1978) ended on February 2, the roles of accusers and accused had been completely reversed, write Marie-Therese and Bengt Danielsson from Papeete.

One after the other, the de fendants had risen and sol emnly accused France of an even more serious crime that of slowly murdering the popu lation of French Polynesia with its nuclear explosions. Even be fore the final declarations of these main protagonists in the drama, the eight spirited law -1 yers for the defence had con demned the whole rotten i colonial system within which the trial was taking place a I system maintained, as they pointed out, with the help of I thousands of gendarmes, foreign legionnaires and para troops.

Such a sudden transform -1 ation of the court, officially f convened to judge a few com mon criminals, into a political forum made a strong im pression on the jury they took three and a half hours to reach their verdict. When, at 7pm, it was finally read to a hushed audience made up mainly of government officials, French gendarmes and plainclothes police flown in from Paris for the occasion, it

jwas considerably more lenient

than the death penalties and life sentences for which the

government-inspired mass

media had long been clamour

ing.

Self-confessed killer Marcel Tahutini, and his brother Jonas, who was captain of the so-called Toto tupuna (Blood of our Ancestors) guerrilla group, were sentenced to 20 years apiece, while the three other members got off with 18, 10 and five years.

It can however be argued that the sentence of 10 years meted out to Charlie Ching, president of the legally consti

tuted Tahitian People’s

Independence Party, was less

warranted. He had been found innocent of the main charges of

having personally organised

and directed the bomb attack and the murder.

In view of the fact that the trial had repeatedly shown glaring denials of basic human and legal rights, the defence

immediately lodged an appeal.

For those of us who had wit nessed in 1959 how Charlie Ching’s uncle, the old freedom fighter Pouvanaa a Oopa had been shamelessly framed with the help of police snoopers and false evidence, and then sent off to linger for eight long years in French gaols, the 1979 trial was nevertheless a milestone.

All credit for this must how ever go to the relatives and friends of the accused who took

the unprecedented step of hir ing first-rate French metropoli tan lawyers, willing and able to speak up and denounce all the denials of justice and irregularities which in the past have been simply overlooked or condoned. The presence of these lawyers had the salutary effect of obliging the French Government to despatch to Tahiti, at the last moment, a new presiding judge who was presented as being extremely liberal’. What this meant, in the event, was that he did his best, as all judges should, to give everybody a fair hearing.

To most people in French Polynesia it came as a new and rather shocking experience to hear, or to read, throughout the five-day trial, the constant self descriptions of the accused as ‘soldiers in a liberation army, whose duty it was to kill the enemy’.

Actually none of the boys, all in their early twenties, looked exactly like a bloodthirsty killer. People who know them well describe them as kind and mild-mannered.

But apart from such personal qualities they had another thing in common: they were school drop-outs who had been rejected by the harsh new

European-type society which has come into being in Tahiti since the nuclear era began.

They had ended up believing that their failure was not of their own doing but inherent in the system imposed by their French colonial masters. A few

meetings with Charlie Ching

had confirmed them in this be lief and helped them to articu late their feelings better, the feeling of hatred in particular.

The Toto tupuna commando members, ever since their arrest more than a year ago, had not only admitted but almost boasted of their deeds.

The only really suspenseful as pect of the trial, therefore, was provided by the public pros ecutor’s attempts to implicate Charlie Ching in the bomb attack and murder.

Mr Ching admitted freely

Part of the overflow crowd outside the court. Photo B. Danielsson

that he had, indeed, organised the Toto tupuna commando group. But he had done so only in order to attack military tar gets, such as the aircraft and

warships maintaining the

shuttle run between Tahiti and Mururoa, site of France’s nu

clear testing.

The only human .target he had selected was the principal upholder and defender of the colonial system, the then minister for overseas territories Olivier Stirn. However, when Mr Ching found out, at the time of the planned attack, that the military airfield and navy harbour to be visited by Stirn

were closely guarded by armed

soldiers accompanied by dogs

he put off all action for the time

being.

Jonas Tahutini, captain of the Toto tupuna commando, bitterly frustrated by this hesi tation on the part of Charlie Ching, then took over. He de cided to mount his own attacks

against less protected civilian

targets in order to sow terror and panic in the enemy ranks.

His men swore to follow him wherever he led them.

One evening in August 1977, during a visit by Olivier Stirn

to Tahiti, they placed charges

of stolen dynamite against the walls of the Papeete telephone exchange. Only one went off and damage was quite limited.

But the message left on the spot aroused strong psychological shockwaves: ‘Take your flag, your people and your statute, Stirn, and go home!’

Two weeks later Jonas Tahu tini drove his men to an exclusive residential section on the west coast, where most homes belong to Europeans.

After failing to trap two Frenchwomen, they came upon an isolated villa where they found a French business man sound asleep. Marcel Tahutini shot him in cold blood. The message left behind said; ‘We do not want any more Frenchmen in our

country.’

Throughout the trial Charlie Ching stuck to his guns, so to speak. He swore that he had no advance notice of this shift in tactics to civilian and non official targets, of which he

strongly disapproved. From

the beginning the public pros ecutor pooh-poohed this state ment as a patent lie. He was evidently bent of securing a life sentence for the ‘obnoxious’

Mr Ching. He was however un able to muster a single witness to support the charge that Mr

Ching organised the bomb

attack and murder. All the Toto tupuna boys emphatically exonerated him. Marcel Tahu tini went a step further and accused the French police of trying to persuade him to bear

false witness against Ching.

The betrayal was to be rewarded by an extremely lenient sentence. In his final speech the public prosecutor

dropped this charge altogether

and maintained only the very vague one of ‘consorting with proven criminals’.

When their turn came, the defence lawyers devoted their final addresses wholly to the wider issue of who was ulti

mately responsible for the

mounting tide of violence and crime in Tahiti. To a man they pointed the finger at the French Government which has consistently refused to let French Polynesia follow the road of all other Pacific peoples, except the Kanaks of the other French colony of New Caledonia, towards self rule and independence. Even worse, they claimed, there was a deliberate policy of flooding the Islands with French settlers from the ‘mother country’ and from former African colonies.

There are now 20 000 of them, and they are still coming in at the rate of 1000 a year. The purpose of this belated colonis-

Marcel Tahutini is led from the courtroom. Photo B. Danielsson

ation, in the worst nineteenth century tradition, is to make the Islands ‘safe’ for the con tinued nuclear tests which by now have poisoned the whole population.

Another more insidious French policy denounced by the defence lawyers is the systematic destruction of the Polynesian culture and

personality, with the help

of French-language schools, powerful. government controlled mass media, and

compulsory military training

programmes. For every Polynesian on a decent income, 10 live in slums. It is not surprising, therefore, argued the lawyers, if many young Polynesians do not see any alternative to armed revolt.

One of the black-robed accusers, who happened to be born in Algeria, drew a telling parallel between the Tahitian situation and the total blind ness shown in Algeria by the French authorities and settlers who, almost to the bitter end, >aw the Arab freedom fighters is nothing but criminals and bandits.

Quite revealing of the gen eral turn taken by the debate it this stage was the appear mce in the witness box of the dumber One local politician.

Vice-President Francis San ford a man who at each elec tion musters at least a two-thirds majority. Sanford had no inhibitions whatsoever about repeating what he had so often said in the past - that although he is opposed to viol ent methods, he does not blame those who wish to obtain independence for the

Polynesian people, adding that

their activities do not constitute criminal conspiracy but rep

resent an undisputed right,

guaranteed by the French con sititution and the United Nations charter. As to the bomb, Sanford declared that he was as opposed as ever to continued nuclear testing in the Islands.

The defence lawyers also pointed to unjust aspects of the colonial system as demon

strated by court proceedings.

For example, the jury was com posed of four persons only, instead of nine as in France.

The four would obviously have much less chance of imposing their views on the three presid ing judges than would the larger number. The defence counsel also pointed to the

injustice of French-language

skills being required of jurors, a requirement which unavoid ably made it very difficult for

accused persons, who are mostly Polynesians, to get a fair

hearing.

In their final salvoes, the de fence lawyers enumerated a

long series of irregularities

committed during the prep arations for the trial. They es

pecially singled out for

criticism the disappearance of

potentially embarrassing docu

ments, and brutal interrog ations carried out not, as the

law prescribes, by examining

magistrates, but by various police officers. One of the lat ter, who had made the mistake of being present in the court room at the time, was promptly pointed out by his victim. On other occasions, the interrog ators had made the accused sign depositions in French that did not correspond to their statements in Tahitian. In a surprise move, the lawyers also brought to the witness box a convicted criminal, Manuel Tauhiro, who started the prison riots in January 1978 (PIM April 1978). Mr Tauhiro had an even more gruesome tale to tell. Two officers from the

French ‘thought police’, Ren

seignements Generaux, had promised him parole if he killed Charlie Ching, who con veniently happened to be in the cell next to his own. Mr

Tauhiro cheerfully gave the names of the officers con cerned Lecam and Noel.

Last but not least there had been a serious denial of justice in that during the first six months of their detention the accused were not assisted by defence counsel at all. It appeared that the local justice

department had actually

appointed several local lawyers to perform this task, as the law prescribes in the case of ‘paupers’. But the lawyers con cerned had never found time to visit their ‘clients’. This was the main reason why the relatives and friends of Charlie Ching and the Toto tupuna boys eventually set about raising the necessary funds to call in metropolitan lawyers.

In view of all this, there seemed to be abundant grounds for quashing the ver dicts and ordering a retrial. At least, everybody expected the sentenced men to remain in custody in Tahiti until the de cision of the appeals court had been made. However, four days later, in a surprise move, the prisoners were taken out of their cells, bundled into a mili tary plane at Faaa airport, flown to the atoll of Hao, the army base in the Tuamotu group where nuclear bombs are assembled, and transferred to another plane which im mediately took off for France, via the French West Indies.

Their final destination may well be Baumettes prison in Marseilles where Charlie Ching has already served two years.

The only possible expla

nation for such a hasty removal of the prisoners is the fear felt in Paris that their continued presence in Tahiti will remind the population too forcefully of the issues raised by their trial.

The defence lawyers discuss the case during a break... they made It hot. Photo B, Danielsson

through Bobby Holcomb’s eyes

Born in Hawaii where ‘Polynesian culture has all but died ’

Bobby Holcomb is developing what he calls his ‘ neo - Polynesian ’ art form on the French Polynesian Island of Huahine. Robert F. Kay, a contributor to the San Francisco Chronicle, who spent six months recently in French Polynesia, reports.

Bobby Holcomb stared defiantly at the young Tahitian man and repeated: T will not

paint racing stripes on your

pirogue (canoe).’ the Tahitian tried to convince him otherwise but with no success.

The man finally left and Bobby shook his head in despair.

Bobby is usually glad to do

a favour for a villager but as far as he was concerned, the Tahitian was asking him to desecrate a genuine Hawaiianstyle outrigger canoe. ‘lf he had asked me to ornament the boat in a Polynesian fashion I would have been happy to do it but to decorate it like a sports car is out of the question.’

Bobby Holcomb is a young

artist determined to keep tra ditional Polynesian art forms alive as well as creating new ones. Bom in Hawaii in 1947, the son of a black American serviceman and a Hawaiian- Portuguese mother, he was raised in the ramshackle hous ing projects of Honolulu.

Through a scholarship he attended the University of Redlands in Southern Califor nia and later travelled through the United States, Europe and Asia.

In his travels he was again fortunate. Sympathetic patrons of the arts and famous artists such as Salvador Dali saw promise in him. Bored with life in Europe, Bobby decided it

was time to return to his roots in Hawaii. He boarded an ocean liner but never made it to Honolulu. On the ship he met a French artist living in Tahiti who urged him to see the island of Huahine in French

Polynesia. Bobby boarded a

flight for Huahine the same day. He has been there ever since.

On that island he and his

Swiss-American companion,

Kim Dios, live in a square brown clapboard house. Their home is at the foot of a holy mountain, Moua Tapu, near the ruins of several marde (temples). Huahine has over 500 temples and according to tradition it is one of the centres of mana (power) in

Polynesia.

Huahine is also legendary for its proud and obstinate inhabitants. They are a combi nation of proud obstinacy and the spirituality of the ancient past. The environment for Hol comb is perfect. It is within these holy ruins that he finds

inspiration for his paintings.

Bobby does not consider his artistic style unique but sees it rather as a new motif for

Polynesian art. He explains:

Traditionally Tahitian and other Polynesian artists used geometric patterns in their tapa and tattooing to create a har monious design much like the Moorish style. My work com bines the traditional geometric patterns with human and ani mal figures. It’s a new school of art. I call it ‘neo-

Polynesian’.

He emphasises that Polynesian art is a sophistica ted art form and by his defi nition cannot be pigeon-holed as ‘primitive’. He adds: ‘When Tahitians decorated their tapas and tattooed their bodies they did so for the pure aesthetic: pleasure of it rather than for utilitarian (religious or sym bolic) purposes. It is the utili tarian aspect which for me: characterises primitive art.’

His works are richly coloured, finely detailed* sometimes erotic, and often have a mythical or ‘phantas

magorical’ touch. His paintings

evoke an emotional response and express the all-pervading sensuousness that is part of the essence of Polynesia.

In Tahiti Bobby has startec a trend in women’s gowm. modified from Tahitian styles:

Artist Bobby Holcomb in his tiputa (poncho)... competing with Paris?

'Tattooed Man’ ... Holcomb plans to bring back the art from Samoa

which he calls chic maohi (chic Polynesian) and, according to their designer, they are as fashionable as anything in Paris. Manufactured out of materials such as tapa, cloth, and feathers, the neo traditional clothing uses the same natural colours that were employed before artificial dyes were available. Chic maohi de signs include the tiputa{poncho) and the pareu (sarong).

He hopes the clothing will be as readily accepted by Tahi tians as Western fashions such as nylon windbreakers and platform shoes which they seem to gobble up.

Although his creations sell, Bobby is equally concerned with the influence of his art on the Tahitian people. He was es pecially pleased by an exhi bition in Papeete in June last year where many Tahitians who normally would not go to an art exhibit were drawn to the event. Besides paintings on

display were costumes, outrig

gers, tapa, and photographs of children being taught by him in the schools.

For the children of Huahine, Bobby is nothing short of a pied piper. His rapport with youngsters enables him to work effectively as an art instructor, which he has now done for two years in Huahine. He feels his task is to educate the children and re-instil in them a pride in their artistic legacy. He feels the chief danger is that the Tahitian culture will be inun dated by the West and lost for ever. As an Hawaiian he is acutely aware of the past de struction of the Hawaiian cul ture and it seems to have left an indelible scar on his psyche.

Bobby feels strongly that

Tahitian children must be first taught about their own culture and leam to appreciate that be

fore they can integrate Western

culture properly. ‘For

Jxample,’ he says, ‘l’ll try to cultivate a child’s interest in Irawing Tahitian themes such

is outriggers and dancers

ather than airplanes and peedboats. The children know nstinctively that this is better

)ecause it is something really

fahitian.’ Although the sym

bols of the white culture some

times seem more attractive to a young Polynesian, the chil dren must be taught that their own legacy is just as important (Oceanic art, PIM, May 1978).

One question which arises is why he, an American with only part-Hawaiian ancestry, is

teaching and painting in

French Polynesia instead of Hawaii. He answers by saying: ‘l’m not in Hawaii because the Polynesian culture has all but died there. Nobody speaks Hawaiian save a few old people and some college pro fessors. There is still a basic Polynesian essence in French Polynesia that has not been de-. stroyed. Gertrude Stein once said; “It’s not what the French give you, it’s what they don’t take away.” In other words here I can still walk down the street, speak a living

Polynesian language and live

in a Polynesian society.’

Bobby Holcomb late last year was in Samoa studying the ancient art of tattooing which he feels is an art form as im portant to the Polynesians as frescos were to the Italians or architecture to the Greeks.

According to Bobby; ‘Some of the most beautiful creations ever made were tattooed on

people’s bodies and disap peared when they went to their graves.’ He hopes to bring the

traditional form of tattooing back to Tahiti where it has be come a lost art.

'Tamure’... sometimes erotic, always traditional

Reclining Vahme'... combining traditional geometrical patterns with human figures

Cook Islands

Davis Returns

To ‘Fear’ And

‘Subjection’

Fear he had seen among the people of Haiti and the Dominican Republic was to be seen in the people of the Cook Islands on his return in 1971, writes Dr Tom Davis, now the Cooks premier, in Cook Islands Politics: The Inside Story published by Polynesian Press, Auckland, in association with the South Pacific Social Sci ences Association of Suva, from a study co-ordinated by Professor Ron Crocombe of the Institute of Pacific Studies, University of the South Pacific. PI M’s editorial adviser, John Carter, presents a sec ond selection of extracts. The first appeared in PIM last month.

Dr Tom Davis, born in the Cooks in 1917, graduate of the University of Otago (NZ), ex

fellow of Sydney University, ex

surgeon specialist to the Cook Islands Medical Service, ex medical monitor of the US Pro ject Mercury moon shots and renowned in America as a phys ician and now Premier of the Cook Islands, devotes five pages to the ‘Rise of the Democratic Party'. Considering his battles with the CIP after answering an appeal from Cook Islanders ‘to come home\ Dr Davis' story is told with great restraint. But it

pulls few punches when he tells

of what he found during a short stay on Rarotonga in July 1971: i came back in 1971 to have a look and see for myself. I spent two weeks in Rarotonga, but it took only a few days to see that the complaints about the Henry Government were justified. The sense of an all pervasive fear in the people

was overpowering and highly

disturbing. The people as I remembered them of yore were self-assured, stood up for their rights, laughed a great deal and were always full of joy in meet ing an old friend. This was no longer the case. I was avoided by people with whom I had grown up. Former patients and people whose health if not their lives I had given back to them, were cold toward me. People whose homes were as homes to me were no longer friends. I no longer could distinguish friend from foe. There were few who

openly showed their pleasure

at seeing me again.

‘lt was obviously no secret that I had returned with the possibility that I might oppose

the existing government.

Indeed I had been away for 19 years, but I had been pre viously away for 16 years and had been welcomed home as a

conquering hero. My achieve

ments in the USA were not un known to them and these were more notable than my achieve ments during the 16 years absence at school and medical school. The fear was real and existed in all but a few. It was what 1 had seen in Haiti and the Dominican Republic and elsewhere where people’s sur

vival depended on subjection

to those in political power. It was sad to see this in my once happy homeland. If there was one single factor which made me resolve to return, it was this. ‘There were other factors, of course. The two weeks’ stay

showed clearly the nepotism,

the deliberate distortion of

democracy to gain politically

‘True to expect ations Albert Henry... offered me head of state or deputy premier.

self-serving ends, the political subjection of the public service, the deliberate use of people’s ignorance to gain credence with half truths as well as blatant misrepresentations, the purposeful destruction of both traditional and national leader ship, the “happy the body and to hell with the mind” ap proach to the young, the under mining of the natural industriousness of our people with “no work” jobs, the re moval of people from pro-

ductive efforts to unproductive and unnecessary government jobs, the attack and deliberate

downgrading of qualified and

trained individuals, the victimisation of those foolish enough to voice criticisms of government, the rewarding of those whose only qualification was that they supported the Henry regime. The list goes on. All these helped me to make up my mind ...’

After returning to the United States to wind up his affairs. Dr Davis ‘arrived back in Rarotonga on October 1, 1971 to start what proved to be a long relentless road of political battles and personal abuse against a backdrop of corruption, dishonesty, deceit, discrimination, intimidation, economic ignorance and administrative ineptness. All of this I had expected, having known Albert of the silvery tongue long ago. True to expectations Albert Henry, both on my first visit and soon after my return, approached me and offered me head of state or deputy premier. Both were

firmly refused.

‘The opposition party in the

Cook Islands at that time was the United Cook Islanders Party (UCI) which was not really a party but a loosely organised group of sincere and honest citizenry dedicated to the downfall of Albert Henry, Their politics were emotionally charged, well-intentioned, but

unsophisticated. They had

little chance against the ruling Cook Islands Party under the leadership of Albert Henry who had received the pur posive training of the New Zealand Communist Party, This basic training was obvious in the political prac tices that he put into effect which, as has happened else where, eventually resulted

in a grossly over-controlling

government with party oriented benefits of political office, and economic

chaos . . .’

Dr Joe Williams, once regarded as Sir Albert’s most likely successor and a firm sup porter for years, ‘ defected ’ in January, 1978, when he was minister of health and edu cation. Dr Williams spills the beans in the eight pages he writes:

Arise Sir Henry... Queen Elizabeth went to the Cooks in January 1974 to dub Albert Henry knight. Johnsons Photographic

‘ln January 1978 two Cabi net ministers resigned. William

Estall (agriculture) and myself

(health and education). It was said that we were “power hungry academics” who re signed from our posts as minis ters of the crown and from the Cook Islands Party because we were “greedy for position and money”. Does a minister resign from a prestigious position be cause of greed for power? Does a minister resign from the sec

ond highest paid position in the

Cook Islands Government be cause of greed for money? I re

signed to uphold the principles

that I believe in; to uphold jus tice, to fight injustice and an ineffective system of govern ment. I have come through the very heart of the Cook Islands Party government. I am

intelligent enough to know

what is wrong and what is right.

To continue to be part of a government that is riddled with discrimination, nepotism, ex

ploitation, favouritism,

authoritarianism and inef ficiency at the expense of the

well-being of the community

would be the greatest injustice that I would commit in my pol itical career . . .

T joined the Cook Islands Cabinet in January 1975. My first reaction was one of disillusionment. I thought I was joining the highest execu tive authority, “the mana” of the country to take part in high level discussions for the benefit of our people. But instead, we wasted time in Cabinet meet

‘... even relatives of relatives have been included on the bandwagon

ings on trivial matters such as overseas travel of public ser vants, appointments to the

public service, scholarships,

etc. One of the fundamental criteria for approval was politi cal loyalty; “Yes” to CIPs and generally “No” to Demos. This procedure of Cabinet con

tinued with systematic appli

cation of discriminatory

principles until my resignation.

Important matters such as the economy, dependency, em

ployment, cost of living,

business opportunities for Cook Islanders etc, received very little attention. Hence the retarded state of development in almost every facet of the

Cook Islands society ...

T have always found nepot ism a little hard to swallow. But being part of CPI political ma chinery and having had a very high regard and admiration for

the premier, I partly ignored

nepotism in the Cook Islands government hierarchy. But the expansion of the Henry dyn asty over recent years with

appointments made on family

ties became too overbearing for me to accept. ‘What was once a joke be came blatant full-blown nepot ism. It would be foolish for anyone to deny the expansion

of nepotistic practices or to jus

tify it in terms of the Henrys

being a “clever” family as they

feel. It has reached the stage where almost every close rela tive or associate of the premier is in a high ranking or comfort able position. Even the media is dominated by the fruits of

nepotism.

‘ln 1968 when I joined the Cook Islands Party, there were few Henrys in Government.

Since then, the number has in creased so much that even rela tives of relatives have been included on the band wagon. ‘ln this 1978 general election, four new CIP candidates within the family circle were nominated, Hugh Henry (premier’s son), Tepou Boaza (speaker’s son-in-law), Eric Ponia (Geoffrey Henry’s brother-in-law) and Charlie Carlson (husband of Lady

Henry’s niece).

‘The first thunderbolt jolt for me to have a hard look at nep otism was in the 1974 general election when all standing CIP candidates were surnamed Henry by the Henrys to “jus

tify” the family government

image, and thus neutralise Op position criticism of it. I resented being called Joe

Henry . . .

‘lt was decided after we lost the Atiu seats by a narrow mar gin in 1974 that Atiu would be developed to “buy Atiu”. Man gaia was neglected because it would not accept the premier and the CIP and the gap was too big to close. Again after

CIP lost the 1977 by-election in Mangaia, it was decided to “punish Mangaia” by minimis ing government expenditure there. Mauke received top pri ority because of the “special privileges and favour” of its CIP member, Hon Tupui Ariki Henry ... ‘The large-scale persecution was of civil servants. Pro motions of government officers were much influenced by ministers. Loyalty and service to the Cook Islands Party was a major criterion in promotion, appointment and the provision of training and travel oppor

as soon as was realised that Cyclone Charles had political potential, the meteorologists were asked to dismount...’

tunities. For example Mr Tutu Ina was chief health inspector, but a strong supporter of the Democratic Party. We ensured that he was denied normal and

justified salary increases and

opportunities so that he would resign once he realised that he would suffer if he remained.

The strategy succeeded and he resigned and migrated to New Zealand. We replaced him by a strong supporter of the Cook Islands Party ...’

All political parties were sup posed to have access to radio which was controlled by the Henry family and friends. Mrs Marjorie Crocombe describes how the CIP sabotaged Demo cratic Party time on the air: ‘The Democratic Party al leged a number of other minor media harassments. These in

elude “technical problems” leading to the radio stopping

broadcasting during key

Democratic Party speeches, but not during Cook Islands Party

speeches, the postponing of

materials booked and paid for at peak listening time until the peak was over, giving poor quality transmission to the

Democratic Party’s English

speaking meeting but not to any Cook Islands Party meet ing, and turning up the volume for the clapping at meetings of the Cook Islands Party which were broadcast. Ironically, ex-CIP Cabinet minister Dr Williams also complained about unfair actions by the CIBNC to his Unity Move ment, but no complaints were heard from the CTP..

Sir Albert even managed to

make political capital out of a

cyclone. Mrs Crocombe illus trates: ‘ln the last week of February, Cyclone Charles de veloped north of Palmerston atoll. It was election time, and as soon as it was realised that

Cyclone Charles had political

potential, the meteorologists

were asked to dismount. The premier swung into the saddle, with his closest henchmen clinging firmly behind, and they rode the storm across the radio waves like cowboys in a rodeo. But it was handled like a TV rodeo rather than a live one, so the media men could use the zoom lens and the sound effects to make the bronco appear more dangerous and the riders more courageous than was true in real life. Sir Albert used to the full his su perb talent for making his sup porting audience feel that they were riding with him, vicari

ously sharing every prance.’

Pro-Davis demonstrators after last March’s election... a momentary victory for Sir Albert.

Into The ‘Sea

Of The Future’

The inquiry into Australia and the South Pacific conducted by the Australian Senate Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and De fence (PIM March) is not the only such effort made recently by an off dal body of a ‘metropolitan' power. In July 1978 the Sub committee on East Asian and Pacific Affairs of the United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations devoted a morning to the subject of the ‘Emerging Pacific Island Community'. Staff writer Malcolm Salmon examines the report.

Opening the hearing the

chairman, former astronaut Senator John Glenn, recalled that Queen Victoria had once described the Pacific as the ‘Sea of the Future’. He sug gested her idea was proving correct. He noted also that Pa cific Island countries were ‘often overshadowed by their more powerful neighbours’ in the deliberations of his com mittee, but that the region ‘has too much economic and politi cal significance to be overlooked any longer’.

It is fair to say that past rela tive neglect of Pacific Island countries by the committee showed through in Senator Glenn’s own remarks. His claim that they ‘form a com munity of equal and sovereign nations’, for example, com pletely ignored the very real problem of the continuing pol itical dependence of a good number of them, notably on France and on his own country, the United States. Similarly, his reference to the ‘lO - South Pacific Forum’ would have been more im pressive if he had got the num ber of Forum members right. It was 11 at the time of the hear

ing.

First witness was Richard Holbrooke, assistant secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs at the US State Depart ment, and the man generally credited with the initiatives of establishing the new ‘Office of Pacific Affairs’ within the department, and the appoint ment of a new deputy assistant secretary with special responsi bilities for the South Pacific not, as Mr Holbrooke himself Jiad the modesty to tell the committee, that ‘within the

context of the vast Washington bureaucracy’, these are ‘earth

shaking moves’.

Sketching in the background

to the new US concerns, Mr Holbrooke noted: ‘There are, to be sure, signs of growing Soviet and Chinese interest in the area. However, at this time the Soviet side seems to be con

cerned largely with advancing

their fishing interests in the re

gion and promoting their

diplomatic standing vis-a-vis

our own and that of the People’s Republic of China.

Peking is also interested in

expanding its diplomatic pres

ence in competition not only with Moscow but also with

Taipei.’

As for the line of future US action, he said: ‘We do not need to develop massive pro grammes for the South Pacific; this would be contrary to the interests of the islands and our own. Nor should we seek a dominant role as initiator, helper, and guide. We do not wish in any way to impinge

upon the sovereignty of these free peoples or to usurp the leadership role that belongs to them and to their near neigh bours, Australia and New Zealand.’

The theme of smallness, of the modesty of scale of any future US aid projects in the Pacific, recurred again and again during the hearing. The main reason for this can be summed up in one word: Micronesia.

Senator Glenn introduced the Micronesian theme, saying: ‘We saw an article in The Washington Post last week, a

rather devasting critique,

which was critical of how we have handled our programmes in Micronesia .. . The article spelled out how because of our influence there and our moving in with large amounts of money and programmes from the outside, we have pretty much devastated their econ omy. We have made people largely dependent on what will be, at least in part, government

Us In The Pacific

dole. It seemed to me that per haps for certain islands which were used for nuclear testing it was inevitable that all the re quirements for support would mean that local people would

become partially dependent on

us. I can understand a few situ ations like that. But if that article is even halfway correct - and I presume it is - we have pretty much devastated the normal, the better, patterns of

development that might have

been followed in those areas’.

The late Dr Frank Mahony, formerly of the South Pacific Commission, took up the theme, saying; ‘Micronesia got

along during the 1950 s and

until mid-1969 on a budget of about SUSS million a year.

Then there was a massive in flux of aid, and the budget went up tenfold and twenty fold. It was far more than Micronesia could digest very

easily.

To cite one example, funds were budgeted to build schools, but there was so much money available that outside contrac tors from places like Korea and

Hong Kong were brought in

and they built the schools. It would have been much better to train local people and get local contractors established and have them build the schools so that the schools would be built by the people themselves ... What you find today is that the schools that were built by these outside con tractors are being defaced now.

People scratch them up, write on the walls, throw rocks at them, and so on. But there have been a few projects, done when the programme ran out of money and outside funds were brought in to help people con struct their own schools where they really wanted them, which are being much better cared for. These were much more successful kinds of projects.’

Consensus at the committee hearing was that the best hope for the future lay in what were described as ‘accelerated

impact programmes’ jointly

mounted by the Peace Corps and the US Agency for Inter

national Development. They

were described to the com mittee by AID representative John Sullivan as ‘small-scale,

self-help projects, primarily

John Glenn In Solomon Islands... a blind eye to colonialism?

Children on Moen Island in the Truk group in the late Sixties... victims of a 'de vastated economy?

aimed at community and rural development’. Each individual project would have a $lO 000 limit and would be carried out in close co-operation with the Peace Corps.

Mr Sullivan’s attempt to give a ‘concrete example’ of an ‘accelerated impact pro gramme’ in a Pacific country led to a polite wrangle with Senator Glenn one of the many indications provided by the committee hearing that the US is still a long way from having got its thinking straight on just where it is going with its new policies.

Mr Sullivan’s example: ‘Let us say that the Peace Corps identifies a need for water, fresh water. In the past, they would have the idividuals available who could give the technical assistance to provide that water. But the Peace Corps does not bring material re sources. So, if they needed a well digger, it would have to be provided by the host country or not provided at all. Under accelerated impact, AID would provide that well digger to the Peace Corps and then volun teers would carry out the pro gramme. In effect, we are bringing material resources to bear on Peace Corps pro grammes.’

Senator Glenn’s response: ‘lt will be interesting to see how that develops ... The strength of the Peace Corps was that people went out, they gave of themselves, of their own exper tise, of their own knowledge and their own ingenuity, in using what was there, on hand, to help people better their own 10t5... This is a different ap proach ... Now we are coming in and instead of the people getting out their local equip ment, whatever that is, and dig ging the hole for their well, we are now bringing in a well dig ger. That is your example of this. We now bring in a mechanised tool. Then, one of these days, when it breaks, and we don’t have a new well dig ger, no wells will get dug.

Under the earlier system they might have dug wells by local

indigenous methods.’

The senator concluded by

stressing the importance of

follow-up’ in such schemes, something he had found sadly

lacking in AID practice in the past. Said he: i think unless we can show what is working and what isn’t, we don’t want to pour money down a rathole.’

The retreat from ‘giantism’ in US concepts of aid is cer tainly timely and necessary.

But the confusion as to what is to be put in its place was pain

fully clear and clearly disap

pointing - to Australian journalist Denis Warner who covered the Solomon Islands independence celebrations in July 1978. Warner wrote in Pacific Defence Reporter (August 1978); ‘The Americans sent Senator Glenn, the first astronaut, and Mr Richard Holbrooke, Assist ant Secretary of State for Asian and Pacific Affairs, to the

independence celebrations,

along with a couple of de stroyers, and a stack of Guadal canal veterans, who re-fought the old battles over the plen tifully available Scotch (30c a nip) with some of the Japanese veterans who had miraculously survived the carnage and had come to feel their old wounds ache ... ‘Of nostalgia there was plenty. But the Solomons flag had scarcely gone to the mast head when Senator Glenn and Richard Holbrooke called a press conference at which they made it clear that there was to

be no American aid for the new country other than that which

it receives indirectly through

the World Bank and other multi-national organisations.

The US will not even establish an embassy in Honiara.’

A feature of the Senate com mittee hearing was what appears to be a curious American failure to appreciate the regional role of Papua New Guinea, and even a tendency to denigrate that role.

This exchange between Senator Glenn and Mr Holbrooke is a good example of the tone. ‘Senator Glenn; Papua New Guinea straddles both Southeast Asia and the South Pacific. Do you see any par ticular role for them, or do you see their own internal prob lems as being sufficient to keep them busy without worrying much about the rest of the re gion? ‘Mr Holbrooke; I think that Papua New Guinea has long wondered whether it was a Southeast Asian country or a Pacific Island state. Having visited it now twice, my im pression is that it is a little of both, and mostly neither.’

In another remark. Senator Glenn, forgetting the age-old saw that ‘comparisons are odi ous’, said: ‘. . . there is a tend ency in much of the rest of the

South Pacific for the other smaller states to regard Fiji with some suspicion and con cern, based on the fact that small as it is in absolute terms, in relative terms Fiji is the strongest, most viable, and largest of the South Pacific nations, with the exception of Papua New Guinea, whose population is so dispersed as not to really make much of an

impact.’

Such remarks show scant understanding of the firm and

frequent statements by PNG

Prime Minister Michael Somare that his country is a Pa cific nation, or of the active, even leading, role played in re

cent Pacific regional meetings

by figures such as PNG Foreign Minister Ebia Olewale.

The record of the Senate committee discussion abounds in references to the tuna re sources of the Pacific Island countries, especially since the establishment of their own fishing zones. The potential of the mining of their seabed min erals in the future is also given due attention.

The refusal of a majority at the South Pacific Forum meet ing on Niue in September 1978 to accept the US as a member of the proposed South Pacific fisheries agency showed that all is not going to be smooth sail ing as the US sets its new Pa cific course.

As The Wall Street Journal put it in a December article; ‘Some of the sardines sensed a shark in their midst.. .’

The paper adds: ‘The Americans still are hoping to produce a compromise, but the blow-up makes it plain that the Western orientation of the islands is diminished, and that they aren’t about to tolerate any dilution of their newly asserted rights in the Pacific.’

It quotes an Island diplomat as saying: ‘These countries see that for once they do have something that’s valuable to others. . . Never in this stage of

their history are they going to

give away anything that has to do with fish.’

Perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad idea if Senator Glenn’s com mittee got together again soon to chew over that one.

US marines at Solomons independence... but no embassy.

From the

Press

Savali, Western Samoa At the offices of Pacific Islands Monthly in Sydney the colonial days live on ... flying boats, never ending stories of what a great time all had during the war and problems with the native servants These residents of the glorious British Empire are only now awakening to the reality of a new independent Pacific. It may well be sometime yet before PIM stops running lengthy raves on the good old days, but at least the old school appears to be dying out in another section of their office. This is the section which has produced the latest issue ... of the Pacific Islands Yearbook ...

Arawa Bulletin, PNG The Prime Minister. Mr Michael Somare, has stated he will not allow Papua New Guineans to become Australian citizens regardless of the fact that they have lived in the Torres Strait for more than 15 years. Mr Somare was commenting on an order from the Queensland Government to deport about 100 Papua New Guineans living in that area. The Prime Minister added that Papua New Guineans who are in the area for traditional purposes cannot be ordered out of the area.

Fiji Times

At last. . . palusami. kai and rourou, lovo pork for lunch. Suva may as well be Peking when it comes to finding ready-made Fijian food in restaurants. Tourists who try to have a Fijian meal as part of their island experience are doomed to settle for chow mein or beef in black-bean sauce, unless they’ve got enough time to go inland. But now a tidy little take-away with fantastic Fijian fare in the heart of Suva. The dalo does come out of the lovo each day, the ota is green and fresh, the rourou thick and creamy, and all at reasonable prices. We won’t say where it is because we don’t like standing in line. But it’s worth looking for . . .

Cook Islands News The Minister of Police Hon. V. Ingram is not amused with the latest prison breakout... He is being criticised for being too lenient with the prisoners of Arorangi. During Christmas all but two prisoners were given a week off to visit their homes and relations. Yesterday 13 warders took all 21 prisoners fora picnic to Wigmore’s at Titikaveka ... The taste of all this free life must have been too much for the prisoners. An hour later they broke out.. .

From the Fiji Times Capital punishment will be one of the first issues considered by a five-man law review committee named yesterday by the Fiji Law Society. At its next sitting Parliament will consider a Bill to amend the Penal Code to impose the death sentence on every person convicted of murder.

Savali, Western Samoa • • J? r Tom Davis (Cook Islands Premier) was recently in Samoa He flew up on the Auckland-Apia service. In Tonga nobody recognised him. although Tonga’s Prime Minister was sitting in the VIP lounge at the airport. Dr Davis had to join the rest of the transit passengers in the tiny airport building. Eventually

Tonga’s PM got on the flight to Apia and both he and Dr Davis were accorded the facilities usually given to Prime Ministers. Has Tonga got something against the Cooks, or did Polynesian (Airlines) forget to tell Tonga of its passenger?

Cook Islands News (By I. Fogelberg - Tourist Authority General Manager) The book Cook Islands Politics, The Inside Story’... is a fascinating tale . . . Having lived through all the tumult and the shouting that was the 1978 election and its aftermath, I enjoyed reading the book immensely. It is largely a political document of course, not an unbiased inside story, and having detected such serious errors in just a few paragraphs, one is left with a fascinating question how much is fact and how much fiction?

Island, newsletter of the Institute for Island Research

and Assistance, Seattle, USA

In some islands a protein-based bread spread called Vegemite is imported from Australia. Because their systems are malnourished, some Island children developed a craving for this product and ate it directly from the jar. In the eyes of expatriates, this ‘indiscriminate’ use indicated that the children lacked discipline and control and that their ‘savage’ heritage was coming to the fore ...

Fiji Times

A bill was gazetted yesterday exempting Fiji’s soldiers serving in Lebanon from income tax on the extra pay they get for serving with the United Nations peacekeeping force.

Advertisement in Lae Nius, Papua New Guinea Lost, believed stolen: One only white Mercedes left-hand (passenger side) door. The suspected thieves were seen driving in convoy round the comer of Aircorps and Milfordhaven Roads,

in the following vehicles .. .

From a letter in Tohi Tala Niue To those ex-visitors to Niue and your article describing Niue as a ‘Paradise of Flies’ may I direct you to pay a visit to Australia’s capital city and even Adelaide where I once was. There you would be able to qualify your article on flies. In Canberra ... I could not stop fanning away the flies from my face, but not here in Niue. In Adelaide too, where we had our picnic lunch, the flies were everywhere. These flies even chased my hand to my dish held high over my head. I had to gulp my food down before the flies devoured it. . .

From a letter in PNG Post-Courier Unemployment in many PNG towns is causing men to ‘sell’ their wives. This is shameful to our traditional way of thinking. If we considered wisely how to run smallscale businesses in our own province or in the village, I am sure that we would make more money than by working for wages ...

Pitcairn Miscellany

(Re the replica HMS Bounty built to make a third film of the mutiny story.) ‘.. . The only small complaint we have here on Pitcairn ... is that the company is not so concerned about authenticity of the film in its final scenes, as it is using an island in the Tahiti group rather than Pitcairn itself.’

The Norfolk Islander Investigations carried out on Philip Island by the Conservation Officer Mr Peter Coyne have revealed that at least 80% of the whalebird chicks had died of exposure during the recent hot spell.

Indiscriminate shooting on Philip causes the parent bird to fly off in alarm leaving the little ones quite unprotected. As you can well imagine, the sun and hot wind cause the death of the young ones.

Political

Petrol Bombs

On Banaba

Eight Banabans were gaoled in February following a wave of petrol bomb attacks on the

phosphate mining operations

on Ocean Island, their isolated Pacific homeland, writes a cor respondent who travelled from Fiji to Ocean Island with the Banaban ‘invasion’ party (PIM March). They were acting in protest at the British Govern ment’s decision to incorporate Banaba in the Gilbert Islands on their independence in July (PIM March), and against con

tinued mining operations by

the British Phosphate Com mission on the island.

Among those detained were the deputy chairman of the Banaban council of leaders, the Rev Kaitangare Kaburoro, a council member, Tekaie Tabuariki, and the council’s as sistant secretary. Teem Takoto.

Working to a detailed plan, groups of Banabans moved under cover of darkness to six target areas. Within half an hour flames lit the sky as petrol bombs were hurled at mining machinery and installations.

Surveying a still smoulder ing excavator, maintenance

superintendent Don Begbie

said: ‘l’ve never seen anything like this in the 18 years I’ve been on Ocean Island. The Banabans seem to have gone mad. There even seemed to be kids in the raiding parties. I was shaking like a leaf when I saw what had happened.’

Two Banabans were hurt.

The leader of one group injured a leg when he fell into a ravine while following the escape route from an attack site. Another member of his party also sustained leg injuries. Five Banabans were reportedly arrested after their car ran over a precipice. They scrambled from the vehicle as it went out of control and were apprehended soon after.

A council member told how the car he was driving was

ambushed by police, who

threw tear gas at it. The Banabans slipped away into

the night.

Anticipating trouble when Banaban council members arrived, local authorities called in 30 special constables to re inforce the island’s 10-man police force. As many as 300 additional men were hurriedly recruited after the Banaban attacks.

There were fears that the Gilbertese population, who work for the BPC, would launch a reprisal raid against the Banabans, but by morning tempers had calmed.

Earlier, councillors and about 200 Banabans living on the island marched to the Bri tish Phosphate Commission

offices carrying placards saying

‘British justice stinks’, ‘Hands off Banaba’ and ‘Return stolen property’. Marchers wore black arm bands to represent the ‘death’ of British justice.

Mr Kaburoro delivered a statement to BPC’s local man ager, Ron Elliott, outlining Banaban demands and setting

a T2-hour grace period’ after which, if mining was not

stopped, plans for obstruction

of mining operations would be

implemented.

The BPC reply said the

mining organisation, in which

the British Australian and New Zealand Governments are partners, had a responsibility to continue mining. The attacks came soon after.

The Banabans also staged an emotional demonstration at a memorial stone commemorat ing A. F. Ellis, who discovered the island’s phosphate.

Fiji parliamentarian Fred

Caine, who had travelled to the island as political adviser to the Banabans, said that Mr Ellis was ‘the biggest thief who ever lived in the South Pacific’. Ex ploitation of the Banabans had started on the day he found the phosphate, Mr Caine said.

Most of the 3000 Banabans today live on Rabi Island in Fiji. They were moved there after the Japanese occupation of Ocean Island in the last war.

Fiji’s Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara has urged the British Government to hold

further talks with and between the Gilbertese and the Banabans in order to find a

peaceful and mutually accept

able solution to the consti tutional future of Ocean Island. ‘Fiji firmly believes that the best solution to this difficult and sensitive issue is one reached in direct dialogue be tween the Gilbertese and the Banabans, and which is accept able to both groups,’ Ratu Sir Kamisese said. ‘Neither the resort to viol ence nor an imposed solution which was not acceptable to all

the parties directly concerned

could contribute to a per manent settlement of the Ocean Island issue,’ he said.

Toward the end of February it was reported that 100 more

Banabans were being picked

up by the Nauruan ship Cenpac Rounder to be taken to Ocean Island to strengthen the Banaban presence there.

Honiara: Even

Keel For Now?

When the Solomon Islands parliament last December threw out the government’s

1979 ‘rural growth budget’

(PIM February), some people

wondered whether Prime Minister Peter Kenilorea might not have to follow it into obliv ion, writes a Honiara corre spondent. But on February 7 an only slightly revised version of it sailed through the house in less than a week and was ap proved without a division.

While Opposition Leader Bart Ulufa’alu stood firm in his rejection of the $8145.3 million budget, the leader of

Above: Protest march on Banaba; left: Messrs Kaburoro and Takoto with ‘white paper’ before ritual burning

the larger Independent Group,

Willie Betu, urged parliament

to pass the budget to prevent further damage to the country.

All Solomon Islands secondary schools had been closed since the defeat of the budget.

To the surprise of many, the

changes suggested by the pub

lic expenditure committee, set up to probe into departmental estimates, were rather minor.

They do not go much beyond an estimated saving of about $2OO 000 by keeping 130-odd government posts vacant. In any case, this sum will be passed on in higher service grants to the provincial govern ments to enable them to spend more in the rural areas.

A major reason for the first budget’s defeat had been a strong feeling among members that, despite its title, the budget did not do enough for rural areas, where nine out of 10 Solomon Islanders live. There was also a feeling that the budget had been foisted on ministers by civil servants with out adequate consultation.

More than anything else, however, the December de feat reflected a growing disenchantment among mem bers with the government and the Prime Minister Kenilorea’s style and handling of various issues, in particular the West ern Province ‘breakaway’ ques tion.

But for all their misgivings about Mr Kenilorea, most members cannot see Oppo sition Leader Ulufa’alu hand

ling the job successfully.

Among other members outside the present government, the former minister of home affairs, Francis Hilly, who re signed last year over the PM’s handling of the Western Prov ince issue, looks a likely con tender but not quite yet.

With renewed backing from most of the house, the govern ment can face this year’s tasks with greater confidence than seemed possible a few weeks ago.

The economy is still going strong with exports and imports more or less in balance at just over $3O million each, and foreign reserves amount ing to almost $25 million at the end of last year.

The government recently

negotiated a major coconut/

cocoa development project

with the local Unilever sub sidiary. Now it must try to allay the fears of the rural areas by pushing ahead much more

effectively with rural develop

ment in its 1980-84 develop ment plan.

Three Faces

Of Migration

Two recent developments in New Zealand and on the west coast of the United States were designed to ease the lot of Pa cific Island immigrants in those countries. At the same time, the Australian Government an nounced new immigration

regulations which appeared to

be designed in part at least to keep the number of Pacific Islanders resident in Australia as low as possible.

Auckland in December saw the official opening of the SNZI.2 million Samoa House, which is designed to serve as a focal point for the business and cultural life of the city’s 20 000strong Samoan community, and also to serve as a bridge be

tween Pacific Island peoples in

general and the European

population.

The building houses the con sulates of Western Samoa and the Republic of Nauru, Polynesian Airlines and the Western Samoa Trust Estates

Corporation. Two shops at

street level of the five-level

building specialise in Samoan

produce, processed foods and

handicrafts.

About 300 guests, including Prime Minister Robert Mul doon, were welcomed at the

opening by Western Samoa’s

Deputy Head of State Tupua Tamasese Lealofi IV. He said the generous financial help of the New Zealand Government toward the cost of the building was an acknowledgment of the role the Samoan community would play in the life of the city and New Zealand as a whole.

The same month saw the

publication by the University

of California, Santa Cruz, of New Neighbors Islanders in

Adaptation. The 295-page book

focuses on the special problems of the ‘invisible minority’ of

Pacific Islander migrants living

on the US west coast. It covers the proceedings and papers of two UCSC conferences on Pa cific Islander migration the first in May 1977, the second in the (northern) spring of 1978.

Commenting on the meet ings, Bryan H. Farrell, director of UCSC’s Center for South Pacific Studies, said that ever since the explorations of Cap tain Cook in the eighteenth century, the South Sea islands have been synonymous with ‘paradise’ in the West. They have been a magnet for tour ists, as well as expatriates from America and Europe in search of a simpler way of life. ‘But the end of World War II brought a turnabout in that pattern of migration,’ Farrell said.

Pacific Islanders, seeking to share the advantages of demo cratic, technological societies access to material goods, jobs in the industrial sector, better education for their young, and social mobility in cultures free of the traditional barriers of rank and family status began to move outward.

The first groups migrated to New Zealand, then others in the 1950 s to Hawaii and to metropolitan areas on the west coast of the American main land. Now many thousands of them primarily Hawaiians, Samoans, Tongans and Micronesians live scattered in pocket communities, until

recently largely independent of

one another, from Seattle to

San Diego.

As a result of the UCSC sponsored conferences the Islanders formed the Pacific Islander Coalition, an organis ation run by themselves for themselves. The UCSC offered staff support, when needed, for the coalition, but remained without membership in the group.

Across the Pacific in Aus tralia, a new system for the selection of migrants came into effect on January 1. Known as the Numerical Multi-factor Assessment System (NUMAS) the scheme was described

by Immigration Minister

MacKellar as ‘in line with the Australian Government’s established policy of non discrimination which is applied to all applicants regardless of

Deputy Head of State Tupua Tamasese Lealofl IV of Western Samoa (right) with New Zealand Prime Minister Robert Muldoon at the open ing of Auckland’s new Samoa House... recognition of the Samoan community’s role.

their race, colour, nationality, descent, national or ethnic ori gin or sex’.

But such claims cannot dis guise the fact that NUMAS represents a net of restrictions on entry into Australia so dense that only tiny numbers of Pa cific Islanders could ever hope to penetrate it.

Some of the factors con sidered under NUMAS are: the standard of work skills pos sessed by an applicant and the demand for those skills in Aus tralia; whether an applicant has a job waiting in Australia or has adequate resources to establish a business; and the

degree of fluency in English

and ability to communicate in the type of employment fol lowed.

‘Secret Plan’

A Hoax?

Nation Review, an Australian

weekly, in February published

the full text of what it claimed was a ‘Very Secret’ Indonesian intelligence document outlin ing plans for an Indonesian take-over of Papua New Guinea by 1984. The document was first referred to in the Aus tralian press in a December 1978 report in the Melbourne

daily, The Age. Photocopies

had been posted anonymously from Singapore to Australian

political figures who had

spoken against the policies of

Suharto government.

The document outlines ‘Op eration Bird of Paradise’ which began in 1975. In the first phase, from 1975 to 1979, Indonesian intelligence agents were to be placed in eight groups throughout PNG, co

ordinated from Jayapura, capi

tal of West Irian. They were to make monthly reports to Jakarta on progress. Aim of this stage was to win support,

through political propaganda,

for integration with Indonesia and, most importantly, to ‘cre ate cadres among the people so that leaders... will emerge who ... will form groups and a political power oriented towards Indonesia’.

One Australian political commentator, appearing to accept the authenticity of the document, has claimed that Indonesian agents are active in

the West Irianese exile com munity in PNG. He linked them with the arson at the PNG ministry of finance (PIM March). Responsibility for the fire has already been claimed by ‘sympathisers’ of Irian Jaya

freedom fighters.

A spokesman for the Indonesian embassy in Port Moresby has described the document as ‘a very cheap joke’. He denied that Jakarta had any such plans as those de scribed in the document, and

appealed to Papua New

Guineans to ignore it.

The spokesman accused the Australian Communist Party of supporting moves to create ‘another Indochina’ in the Asia-Pacific region. He called for support for present efforts by the Indonesian and PNG Governments to establish ‘cor dial and harmonious’ re lations.

One Australian source sug gested that the document could have been prepared by pro- Fretilin forces in Australia in an effort to widen the campaign of opposition to the Indonesian Government for its take-over of East Timor.

26 New Faces

In Apia’S Fono

There will be 26 new faces in the 47-member Legislative As

sembly which emerged from

the February 24 elections in Western Samoa. Among de feated candidates was Lilomaiava Niko, minister of education in the last govern ment.

Prime Minister Tupuola Efi held his seat of Aana Alofi No 2 against Tanuvasa Livigisitone by 94 votes to 26.

The minister of economic development, Asi Eikeni, retained his Faasaleleaga No 2 seat with 125 votes. His closest

challenger, Papalii Laupepa,

son of Western Samoa’s head of state, received 122 votes.

Closely watched was the contest for the Lotofaga seat where the widow of the late prime minister Mataafa, Laulu Fetauimalemau, was standing.

In 1976 she missed out on elec tion by only 10 votes. This time she won the seat with 85 votes over her closest opponent on

72. Laulu was being widely tipped as a contender for the

prime ministership.

A row broke out in the week leading up to the election when

the prime minister’s depart

ment issued a statement saying that three unnamed MPs had met with representatives of an American company which the government believed to be dis honest. The three - Sala Suivai, Tofialu Eti and Faasoo tauloa Semu Pualagi then identified themselves in a pam phlet, which also claimed that the prime minister was using the issue to have them defeated in the election. The three were all returned, and have formed themselves into a loose oppo sition group. The row could be a factor in the election of a government, expected in March.

About 7500 votes were cast in the elections. There are about 10 000 registered matai, the only people who are en titled to vote under the con stitution.

The first session of the new Fono (parliament) was expected to be held about a month after the poll.

In a commentary on the elec tions, the editor of the news paper Savali, Mike Field, wrote; ‘With no party structure, election campaigns in Western Samoa’s villages tend to avoid “issues”, and concentrate on •the personality of those run ning. So great attempts were

apparently made by candidates

to paint themselves as the warm, generous, free-spending individuals they believe them selves to be anyway, ‘The result was stories which tell of candidates selling up their houses so that they could pay for the feasting necessary in any campaign. Another dis trict’s pigs lost their freedom because one candidate was al

leged to have purchased pig

wire for each district family.

And some candidates spent way beyond their means.’

Somare: ‘I’D

Ban Unions’

Papua New Guinea’s prime

minister, Michael Somare, has said that if parliament decided there would be no trade unions in the country, ‘I will be only too glad to support that move’.

Mr Somare was speaking after a series of strikes by PNG unionists including air traffic controllers, bus drivers, water side workers and copper miners.

Mr Somare said: ‘We are a developing country and we will get our people to work. We will not allow unions to run the country. Unionism must have responsibility... So many countries have been paralysed by their activities.’

Commenting on the series of strikes, Kipling Uiari, secretary for labour and industry, said that although the men involved are all paid above the mini mum wage, the fact that this rate was set two years ago has had an inevitable ‘ripple effect’, as inflation, even at the low PNG rate of 5%, made itself felt.

Leaders of unions represent ing about 200 000 members have formed an alliance against any government moves to curb union power. They have the backing of the

parliamentary opposition.

From Anzus

To Canzus?

The latest candidate for mem bership in the ANZUS defence pact, which links Australia, New Zealand and the United States, is the Cook Islands, writes William Gasson from Wellington. ‘Will ANZUS be

Laulu Fetauimalemau... prime ministerial contender?

come CANZUS?’ asked the New Zealand Herald in Auckland in an editorial wel coming the attempt by the newly elected Premier Dr Tom Davis to make the islands stand on their own feet.

What Dr Davis suggested during a recent visit to New Zealand was that the 18 000 Cook Islanders commit them selves to the ANZUS treaty and relieve New Zealand of the task of defending the islands.

Officially, the Cook Islands is a self-governing nation in free association with New Zealand which looks after its defence and foreign affairs.

Dr Davis, whose affinity for the US developed while he worked there on space medi cine, apparently raised the issue with Prime Minister Robert Muldoon. He did not suggest the Cook Islands run to the economically debilitating extent of raising a standing military force, but said it could produce an army if required. ‘ln times of an emergency in the Pacific, we would supply forces as we did in the First World War,’ he said. (In the Second World War Cook Islanders travelled to New Zealand to enlist in the armed forces there.) While at first glance the idea of the tiny Cook Islands throw ing its weight into the ANZUS pact might seem to have little going for it, Dr Davis has pointed out to the strategically minded that the northern island of Penrhyn in the Cooks has a deepwater harbour ‘big enough for a whole fleet’.

Heavy aircraft could use the Cooks airfields on Rarotonga, Aitutaki and Penrhyn. ‘By doing this we feel we would be no less effective in defending ourselves than New Zealand would be without Australia,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to be bystanders in an emergency situation.’ The par allel is to the point, since New Zealand’s defence policy is bound up with Australia’s fate.

The attitude is that any attack on Australia would automati cally involve New Zealand.

A probable factor in Dr

Davis’ scientifically calculating

mind is the situation that would face the US if it were

pushed out of its base at Subic Bay in the Philippines. Should the US lose this toehold in the Southeast Asian region then

logically, according to some

American political scientists, it must fall back to defensive pos itions in the Pacific. Any size able piece of Pacific real estate with deepwater harbours and airfields thus becomes stra

tegically important.

Reaction from New Zealand’s foreign affairs officials was one of welcome, tempered by uncertainty as to how other ANZUS members might greet the idea.

New Moves In

N.H. Drama

Formation of yet another pol itical movement, a conciliatory gesture by the Vanuaaku Party in handing over to the govern ment a cheque for $A6852 representing the taxes levied by its now disbanded People’s Provisional Government, and continued doubt and hesitation among the moderate parties about the new government of national unity these were the main features of the lively New Hebrides political scene in

February.

The new movement is known as ‘Nakamal’, or ‘Meet ing house’. Its leading figures are Vincent Boulekone of Pen tecost who recently resigned as secretary-general of the UCNH (Union des Com munautes des Nouvelles Hebrides) (PIM December 1978), and who was minister of internal affairs in the Kalsakau government; and Maxime Carlot (Natatok Efate Alliance Party) of Efate, minister of internal affairs in the present government, and former speaker of the Representative

Assembly.

The two leaders have ex plicitly denied that Nakamal is

a new ‘political party’. They

said on Radio New Hebrides that their aim is to bring people together, whether they speak English or French, and regard less of religious persuasion.

They said the movement fully supports the work of the present government of national unity, and believes that its ministers should be given time to work at their jobs before

attempts are made to judge . . e aim to bring people

r ’r. not t 0 them

said Mr Boulekone, according to a report in the french/

islama fortnightly Nabanga.

e spoke of Nakamal as a p ace of reflection, a think tank open to people of all

pohtical tendencies.

He went on: ‘Away from partisan quarrels, we hope to reflect calmly on the questions that affect all Melanesians. The New Hebrides will soon be independent. But it’s only three years since we first discovered po itics. Now, we have to achieve awareness of our re sponsibilities. That s what we aim tp do within our move

mtl?t, 1 , .

i akama(rejects traditional

political labels, saying that in the view of the movement they should be re-examined. ‘We are neither moderates nor rad icals,’ said Mr Boulekone. ‘We want to be ourselves. We will be drawing up our programme out of contacts with the masses of Melanesians,’ Mr Boulekone said. This programme would not be designed to countereither the VP or the moderates. ‘lf we can reach agreement with them, we would ask for nothing more,’ said Mr Boulekone.

The repayment to the government by the VP of taxes raised by the People’s Pro visional Government removes one of the sorest spots in that party s relations with other pol itical groupings in the country,

The VP established the alterna

!| ve following its

bo y cott of the November 1977 elections. It was disbanded be fore talks began between the *wo sides in April 1978.

Following their demon strations and petitions at the end of January (PIM March), fo e moderate parties continued to show unrest at the course fol iowed by the new government.

An all-in meeting of the mod erate parties was held in mid- February in Santo to plan strategies for the coming meet jng Q f tbe Representative As

sembly

At t he same time two leaders of the moderate parties j ea n-Marie Leye of Tan Union , and Jack Kalotiti of Natatok Efate voiced their strong disa p prova i of the ‘breakaway’ Nakamal move ment. Mr Leye predicted new divisions among the moderate parties as a result of Nakamal’s appearance, and Mr Kalotiti could see no reason why another political movement should be formed on Efate> An attempt by moderate forces in mid-January to re move the sensitive broadcast fog, district and local administration portfolios from the VP was defeated. Localis ation of positions within the

bureaucracy by VP ministers

aroused criticism. But the pro cess went ahead , wit h Joe B omal Carlo being appointed director of the now unified Radio New Hebrides, and Alfok Noel and Godwin Ligo

respectively deputy director

and chief news reporter. For mer director of the unified ser vice, Jean Massias, is back in his previous job as director of the French residency infor mation service.

New Hebrides’ Deputy Chief Minister Father Walter Lini (right) shakes hands with French Minister for Overseas Departments and Territories Paul Dijoud during the minister’s February visit to Vila... a new confidence.

An Old Airy

Verandah Lover

AFTERTHOUGHTS with Percy Chatterton in Port Moresby.

The fire which recently gutted the top floor of the main Papua New Guinea Government office block at Waigani, a Port Moresby suburb, set a lot of people thinking and talking about , the inadequacy of fire fighting services in Port Moresby and other urban centres in Papua New Guinea, particularly in respect of

the increasing number of multi-storey buildings.

The problem is not so much one of manpower as of equipment, and the PNG Post-Courier cartoon depicting a couple of firemen commandeering a kid’s toy motor car pointed it up crisply. There are also, I understand, particularly in the case of high-rise build

ings, problems of inadequate water pressure.

Of the firemen themselves, my impression is that they do as good a job as their equipment allows, and sometimes show con siderable devotion to duty and willingness to take risks, as was evidenced when a government store building in Port Moresby was burnt down a few years ago.

Some of us who have been around for a long time found our minds going back to earlier fires in Port Moresby, especially to the one which destroyed old Hanuabada village in 1942, a catas trophe which, by the way, was not the result of enemy action.

In my case my memory took a trip back into the past to con template the changes in building styles which have taken place over a century. Expatriate homes in Port Moresby 50 years ago were still copied from a tropical Queensland design, with high ceilings and spacious verandahs surrounding a central block of rooms, frequently with a central open living space running through the middle of the house from front to back veran dahs.

As time went by and building costs went up, the verandahs shrank and eventually disappeared, and the lofty ceilings came down nearer and nearer to the heads of the occupants. The result was a house which, in spite of the increasing use of louvres for ventilation, called for electric fans or air-conditioning to keep it cool.

I had the good luck to live in one of those old style houses for many years. Its outer dimensions, including its three metre verandahs, were 32 metres by 11 metres. Its frame was of Queensland hardwood, and after 40 years (it had been built at the turn of the century at a cost of £ 600) the studs were so hard that one couldn’t drive a nail into them without boring a hole for it first.

Most government offices of my early years in Port Moresby were built in the same style, and the quiet and coolness of the inner rooms, protected by broad verandahs, could be conducive either to work or slumber.

Building costs rose, and designs became more and more ‘func tional . Fibrolite, concrete and brick began to replace timber; and the electrically induced coolness of fans, and later of air conditioning, together with fluorescent lighting, replaced natural ventilation and lighting, till a point was reached at which some buildings became unusable during a power cut.

Then came high rise. ANG House and the recently opened Travelodge hotel now dominate the scene in the old city centre and port. There, with limited space and a hilly terrain, high rise makes good sense.

It may be questioned whether high rise makes such good sense in the new city centre at Waigani. Here there is no shortage of space. Three impressive high-rise buildings - the main govern ment office complex, a privately owned office block and the Aus

tralian High Commission building together with a number of smaller though very impressive structures such as the National Library, National Museum and Law Courts, are scattered, appar ently at random, over a wide area of flat grass country. Multi laned, impressively-named streets, at night brilliantly flood-lit though practically deserted, intersect the area and connect it to the main road.

The whole set-up gives an impression of theatricality. It must have cost the heck of a lot of money, and one cannot but wonder whether, in a city in which such a large proportion of the popu lation is housed in shanties and mini-houses, it was money wisely spent.

True, as time goes by this area may fill up and high rise build ings may become essential. But that’s a long way off, and in the meantime something less ostentatious, less expensive and less vul nerable to fire and other risks might have served this young nation better. However, I suppose it’s the way of the young to be a bit

flamboyant.

At the other end of the scale, in providing housing for the less affluent, the much criticised housing commission has, in my opinion, done a good job in the face of many difficulties and plenty of obstruction from land-owners and others.

Sure, their low-cost houses are very small, but there are only two ways in which they could be made bigger. One is by charging rents which only a minority of the people clamouring for houses could afford. The other is large scale government subsidisation, and so far the government has set its face against this solution.

Recently I was very courteously invited by an officer of the commission to have a look at some new designs in low-cost houses which were being tried out in one of Port Moresby’s older sub urbs. I was impressed by what seemed to me to be a very successful attempt to break away from the rectangular box type struc ture.

I wish I could be equally complimentary about Air Niugini’s ‘Disneyland’ a rash of terrace type staff housing currently spreading across the hillside opposite to my perch on the Sabama ridge. The adjective, other than rude ones, which most readily comes to the mind to describe this architectural novelty is

‘quaint’.

For all I know, these houses may be very comfortable to live in, and some of them certainly have a wonderful view. But I find myself wondering what will happen when some late reveller tries to negotiate the narrow spiral iron staircase which leads from the ground to his front door, and what the reaction of his neigh bours will be when he starts to play punk rock with his hi-fi at full blast at two o’clock in the morning.

But to end on a pleassanter note: I have heard no criticism and nothing but well-deserved praise for the PNG Banking Cor poration’s new building in the old city centre. It’s really terrific.

I don’t know who designed it, but he, she or they deserve a nation’s

gratitude.

Let’s hope that that one doesn’t catch fire, whatever happens

to Waigani’s pretentious sky-scrapers.

In a surprise move in February,

Port Moresby City Council

voted Kipling Uiari, in his absence, out of the job of lord mayor and elected politician and former radio announcer Sevese Morea in his place. Cr Morea, member for South Central in the national parlia ment, got the job by a 14-11 vote after Cr Uiari, his deputy, Sogo Sebea, and the council’s finance and executive com mittee had succumbed to a vote of no confidence moved by John Torrisheba. At the time of his sacking, Cr Uiari was representing the council at an International Union of Local Authorities conference in Manila. On his return to Port Moresby Cr Uiari described the action of his opponents as ‘rather low’ in waiting until he was out of town to make their move, and indicated he would be questioning the validity of the no confidence motion.

National Opposition Leader lambakey Okuk and Papua Besena parliamentary leader Gavera Kwarara welcomed Cr Morea’s elevation. Cr Tor risheba, in justifying his motion, claimed it had taken the death of a council worker to bring to light the ineffec tiveness of the council and its

disregard for safety.

About 70 years ago Maria Rovoseko was kidnapped from her home during the Choiseul tribal wars in Solomon Islands.

Attackers killed her son and carried her off. The story of her escape when the war party stopped at Qalovoke is now

legend in Sirovanga. Recently

her descendants and other Sirovangans honoured Maria, now in her nineties, while visit

ing her at Vaseqo'where they

prayed for their clan mother and then settled to feastifig.

Dr Tom Davis, 61, premier of the Cook Islands since the overturning of Sir Albert Henry’s government last August by Justice Gaven Donne (now Sir Gaven). hasn’t

had much time to himself since getting to grips with the task of government. But early in February, with little or no fan fare, he snuck away to his home at Muri Ngatangiia to marry To Pa Teito Ariki of Takitumu village. For both it was a second marriage. First to officiate was a Ba’Hai minister, representing the faith of the bride; second was a minister of the Christian Church of Raro tonga. Dr Davis was divorced from his first wife, a New Zealander, last June.

Pitcairn Miscellany notes that the island’s roadman has been

going ‘beyond the call of duty

in his work’, having planted marigolds and begonias on the verge of the roadside to give the people something to smile at’. The roadman is Christy Warren, aged 79. A later issue of Pitcairn Miscellany looks at the island’s oldtimers in gen eral and puts their longevity and active ways down to ‘exer cise’ (‘one cannot go anywhere on Pitcairn without walking either up or down’) and ‘other important factors’ such as the

‘non-smoking, non-drinking

nature of the community’ and the ‘abundance of good fresh food and fruit plus the bounti ful supply of fresh air and sun

shine’. Among the ‘young’ people of Pitcairn mentioned was fisherman Andrew Young, 79, who still rows his own canoe and pushes a wheelbar row around the island ‘for fun’; Mimic Warren, the island’s oldest inhabitant at 89, who still does for herself around the house; John (83) and Bernice (79) Christian who are usually

found working their garden

‘near the top of the island’; Albert Young, 79, who still ‘grubs’ bush ‘up at the radio station’; Virginia Warren who ‘can often be seen busily sweeping the island tracks and roads clear of leaves’; and Roy Clark, ‘one of the most alert 85 year olds one could wish to meet’ who is ‘still turning out first class writings’.

The University of the South Pacific centre director in Honiara, Mostyn Hahu, has re signed to become headmaster of the Kamausi secondary school in Santa Ysabel Prov ince. Mr Habu, 35, who comes from Kia on Santa Ysabel, explained to the News Drum: T want to take a part in com

munity education and help

local people. This is more im portant than considerations of pay in any case I shall enjoy living in the rural area.’ The

post of USP centre director is one of the highest education appointments in the country.

Two senior officials of Papua New Guinea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade are doing an advanced course in international relations at Oxford University, England.

They are Ralf Karepa, first as sistant secretary (political), and Mary Tabogan, head of the Asia section in the political div ision. The course will list for nine months.

Fiji has appointed two former residents, now living in North America, honorary consuls to promote trade and commercial interests on the West Coast.

They are Joel Kamali who lives in Canada’s largest West Coast city, Vancouver, in British Columbia, and Elias Hannif of San Francisco.

John K. Lee has taken over from David Tuncap as elected chairman of the Guam Visitors Bureau. Mr Lee, vice president, branch manager and supervisor of branches of the First Hawaiian Bank on Guam, has been a director of the bureau since last June. A native of Hawaii, he moved to Guam in 1971. Among other positions, Mr Lee is president of the Chinese-American As sociation of Guam.

Lani Tupu, a Samoan com munity leader in New Zealand, has been given the matai title of Tuioto, Falelima, Savaii.

When he finishes his daily work as manager of the post office savings bank in Welling ton, he becomes secretary of the Pacific Islands Advisory Council and of the Samoan

Advisory Council in Welling

ton. His active interest in com munity work won him a trip to China in 1978 with a group of New Zealand community workers. He visited Western Samoa for bestowal of the title.

George Atkin, editor of Solomon Toktok, has been acquitted of a charge under the sedition act. It was alleged that Mr Atkin had published a let ter entitled ‘Local War’ in Toktok last September with the intention of promoting ill will

Sevese Morea at the lord mayor’s desk... Kipling Uiari questions events. PNG Post-Courier photo

between the people of Malaita living in Honiara and the people of Guadalcanal. Prin cipal Magistrate L. M. Holt said that while Mr Atkin had been negligent he was not guilty of a criminal offence.

Paul O’Regan, for Mr Atkin, submitted that the sedition act was a colonial law, not relevant to an independent country, and that Mr Atkin’s alleged offence was outside the act because of a lack of intent. Mr Holt, in acquitting Mr Atkin, observed that while there should be no interference in the freedom of the press, everyone involved in the production of publications should take care to avoid

including anything which

might bring harm to the country.

Irene Johnson, since last Sep tember Canada’s Wellington based envoy to New Zealand and four South Pacific nations, has made her first sortie to the Islands, presenting her creden tials to King Taufa’ahau Tupou IV of Tonga. She also gave the king a gift of Eskimo (Inuit) sculpture. Mrs Johnson, as high commissioner to New Zealand.

Tonga, Fiji, Western Samoa

and the Cook Islands, visits each of these Island nations twice a year.

William Farmer has taken over from Hugh Craft as Australia’s

deputy high commissioner to

Fiji. Mr Farmer has served with the Australian foreign service in Cairo, London and Lisbon. His most recent assign ment was as executive officer in the diplomatic staffing sec tion of the Department of Foreign Affairs, Canberra. Mr Farmer is also accredited to Tonga and Tuvalu, The US ambassador to New Zealand, Tonga and Western Samoa, Armistead I. Selden Jr will complete his term late this month after making a final visit to Nukualofa on April 23. Mr Selden on his return to the US in mid-May intends to work in

private employment,

This

year’s Fulbright-Pacific

island News Association (PINA) fellows are Ngauea Uatioa, editor of the Atoll Pioneer in the Gilbert Islands and Kuar Singh, chief reporter G f the Fiji Sun. They are en rolled in the University of Hawaii’s school of journalism for one semester and will then spend six weeks working on the Honolulu Advertiser Kumalau Tawali, one of Papua New Guinea’s best-known poets, has been appointed as-

sociate editor of Wantok, the national Melanesian pidgin weekly. Since graduating at the

University of Papua New

Guinea in 1971 he has worked as a freelance writer and guest lecturer at Gualim Teachers College in East New Britain Province and at UPNG where he was a teaching fellow in the

literature department.

Frank S. Rosario, 28, former Saipan bureau chief of Micronesian News Service, is now working as managing edi tor of a new Saipan weekly, The Weekly Star, Mr Rosario had been with MNS, a valued and copious source of infor mation on that part of the Pa cific, since June 1973. Derson Ramon, assistant editor of the High Commissioner’s newslet ter Highlights has now the ad ditional responsibility of writing for MNS.

Consecrated a bishop 20 years ago. Daniel Stuyvenberg, 70, now Roman Catholic bishop of Honiara, will become an arch bishop in March with the elev ation of the diocese of Honiara to an archdiocese, a natural se quel to the attainment of

independence by Solomon

Islands last July. The pope also seems to have given a clear hint of the identity of the arch

bishop’s successor by appoint

ing as his auxiliary bishop.

Father Peter Kurongku, 49,

vicar-general of the Bougain

ville diocese since 1971. Auxili

ary bishops normally succeed

when the see becomes vacant.

Taina Dai, one of the first to train under the Papua New Guinea Education Depart ment’s executive training pro gramme in the early sixties, has been appointed assistant sec retary for teacher education.

Mr Dai, of Tubusereia village just outside Port Moresby, has served around the country as a teacher, headmaster, inspector and superintendent of schools and last year completed three years as teaching service com missioner.

Dr Bill Razzell has been appointed director of the South Pacific Forum Fisheries

Agency. The appointment is

for two years. Dr Razzell was

previously engaged in fisheries

research with the Canadian Department of Environment, Vancouver.

Tovale Nimarota, the first woman in Western Samoa, to train as an air traffic controller, is now in New Zealand on a three-year course at the Civil Aviation Aeronautical College

in Christchurch. Sponsored by

the New Zealand Government, Miss Nimarota left Western Samoa in January with three male air traffic controller cadets.

Father Peter Kurongku, from Tonu village in the North Solomons Province of Papua New Guinea has been named next bishop of Honiara. He will succeed Bishop Daniel Stuyvernberg who becomes archbishop of Solomon Islands. Father Kurongku, who is to be consecrated this month, has spent the past five-and-a half years at Tubiana, North Solomons.

Dr Ram Narayan, medical superintendent of St Giles Hospital, Suva, since 1973, has retired after 14 years in the Fiji civil service. The only qualified psychiatrist in government ser vice, Dr Narayan is understood to be planning to settle in Aus tralia. Dr Issac Karim has taken over as acting medical superin tendent at St Giles.

Papua New Guinea’s consti tution is being combed through by a General Constitutional Review Commission an nounced at the turn of the year by Prime Minister Michael Somare. Chairman of the com mission is the national member for Wewak, Tony Bais, and the national member for Abau, Gerega Pepena, is deputy chairman. The other seven members are Ibne Kor, Barunke Kaman, Buri Kidu, Pedi Anis, Louise Aitsi, Anthony Deklin and the Rever end Dick Avi. The commission has two years to complete its report which is due to be tabled

in parliament by early 1981.

Harold Picton-Smith, Fiji’s solicitor-general, will be suc ceeded, on his retirement in June, by Qoriniasi Bale, at pre sent crown solicitor. Mr Bale, 38, acted as solicitor-general in 1976 and 1977.

Mrs Johnson, at the entrance to the Royal Palace, Nukualofa, listens to the Canadian national anthem by the Royal Band of Tonga. With her from left is Soisaia Maulopeko Tofa Tuit, assistant secretary in the prime minister’s office and a son-in-law of the king, Howard Campbell, Canadian commercial counsellor in Wellington, and Lieutenant Maafa, ADC to the king.

Yesterday

Echoes of the 1878 New Caledonia revolt

It is a rare event for an Australian history student’s thesis, written for a BA Honours degree and unpublished in her own country, to become a focus of public controversy in Noumea, New Caledonia.

But this has been the fate of the 1974 thesis, The 1878 Revolt on New Caledonia, written by Linda Latham, then a student at the Australian National University, Canberra. Noted French eth nologist Professor Jean Guiart of the Musee de I’Homme. Paris, who has made a study of New Caledonia, offers his appraisal of Ms Latham’s work, discusses the possible political implications of its publication in Noumea, and ponders the impact of Ms Latham s research on an emerging generation of educated Melanesians.

The paper by the Australian re searcher Linda Latham on the causes of the 1878 rebellion in New Caledonia should have been left in decent obscurity.

Its translation into French and its subsequent publication by the Societe d’Etudes His toriques de la Nouvelle Caledonie, a pseudo

historically-minded associ

ation in Noumea, raises an acute problem - that of the possible political impact of re search of this type.

My main argument with the Latham paper, however, is not with its pro-settler approach, but with its lack of scientific content. She writes as if she were wielding a critical tool vis d-vis the colonial archives she has studied. In fact, she follows closely the path traced in these archives - and what docu ments there are on the subject

in Sydney’s Mitchell Library

are also part of the colonial ar chives.

What I mean is that any writ ten document of the colonial period (New Caledonia, like New Zealand, is still in the col onial period) must be checked thoroughly, not in regard to its trustworthiness, since such documents are always untrust worthy in a way, but for what ever useful information may be elicited from it. Such an effort requires a whole battery of checks and counter-checks, and involves much time and effort.

The very first problem is to

know what exactly happened,

in the field, at that time. As to 1878, this has yet to be shown.

Events, as related by colonial

history, are doubtful. The ar chives were compiled to fit contemporary local prejudices and conceal the more disgrace ful aspects of European actions. Nevertheless, even as much as is established appears not to worry Miss Latham, who

conveniently disregards the

wholesale murder of the inhabitants of the so-called ‘thieves’ village’ high up on the Dumbea river, and the shoot ing, as spies, of Melanesians wanting to cross the lower reaches of the Dumbea in the first hours of the panic that gripped Noumea after it was known what had happened further north.

What is needed is not value judgments on the situation, nor on such and such an author, but inventories of weapons, of am munition spent, of soldiers' pay, of special combat allo cations. The need to augment the soldier’s basic pay appears to explain a number of other wise inexplicable and useless

military expeditions. A cut-to

the-bone budget was the reason for the care with which officers looked after ammu nition and tried in every way to wage a ‘silent war’.

The delays in securing re placements and reinforcements

explain why commanding offi

cers such as Major Riviere were so wary about losing their men, and so keen to organise auxili ary troops from among natives, convicts and even mounted Australian gentlemen, using them to bear the brunt of the fighting. An unbalanced diet too much meat of dubious freshness, and too much

inferior alcohol explains the relative lack of success of the

regular troops. The highly

racist general outlook of the settler community - ‘a good Kanaka is a dead Kanaka’ accounts for the clamour for revenge from the European population, which drew its economic and in part its cultural patterns from nearby Queensland.

One of the problems of colonial government in New Caledonia has always been

white-organised provocations,

designed to secure a reaction on the part of the natives which

would justify further military

action and confiscation of l an d.

Curiously for a person writing in our day. Miss Latham seems to think that European land-grabbing on the scale on which it was conducted before 1878 around La Foa had some justification, Pushing Melanesians away from their house sites, sacred groves, cemeteries, and good and rare agricultural lands, is condoned by her. (If somebody

did it to her own kin, we can imagine her shrill cries!) She has not taken a hard look at what this ‘treasure island’ of New Caledonia is really like. Good, cultivable land is in fact the rarest of its assets. This fact she would not have found mentioned in the colonial archives, but a study of soil science publications deal ing with New Caledonia would no doubt have enlightened her.

Good farmland in New Caledonia is most often made up of irregular strips, often no more than a meter wide, at the bottom of otherwise sterile

slopes.

Most of New Caledonia is of niaouli trees thriving on acid soils. Whites and blacks have fought over about 10% to 20% of the whole land mass, the rest being infertile or mineral-rich only. In most valleys it was per fectly silly to have believed that

a European agricultural com

munity could be settled close to a Melanesian group. There simply was not enough useful soil to go round. One group had to be reduced to slavery to

Statue of Governor d’Olry... the man credited with ‘quelling’ the 1878 revolt. From Pacific Treasure by Wilfred G. Burchett.

allow the bare economic sur vival of the other. The very low pre-war standard of living of white settlers on the west coast arose from these simple facts.

The day Melanesians regained their freedom, rural European settlement was bound to wither away as far as agriculture was concerned. The average age of settlers living off the land out side Noumea is now over 60.

Although I have done some of the work work of a kind that perhaps a green history student would not understand - putting the events on the map remains a task waiting to be done. The distances be tween points involved in the story must be checked in terms of hours and days of walking, not in terms of the metric sys tem. if specific examples of the behaviour of actors in the drama are to be understood.

In the military reports of the time, because of the desire to justify requests for reinforce ments. ammunition, and appli cations for special bonuses, grassy hills became mountains, a grove became a forest, and a clump of bamboo an impass able barrier. The real difficulty lay in walking the dense maze of low hills on the west coast.

Working from the crest of the mountain range Lieutenant Servan (whose correspondence I managed to save from being burnt) had a better view, and better results, with fewer European soldiers and auxili ary native troops who knew their way around. But even his careful reports need reassess ment in the field, by travelling the same routes on foot This remains an urgent task.

We do not have a precise map of what native establishments were dispersed in the area covered by the 1878 uprising.

The available information on the northern half (Poya-Kone- Poindimie- Ponerihouen- Hou ailou) is being put together and will be published as a map. The southern part remains to be

done thoroughly, especially the

Bouloupari-Thio-Canala tri

angle. Miss Latham could have done the job if she had under stood the need for it. Roselene Dousset too, who likewise went no further than repeating what we already knew, and adding a few romantic touches.

Colonial happenings can be inventions, pretexts for acts of

repression. The so-called siege

of the Wagap Marist mission, on the east coast, some 10 years earlier, has recently been shown by research to be a fab rication. There never was a

siege. Enough material was

available to establish this, but Miss Latham carefully leaves the matter aside because it would have gone against her contention that it was the unor ganised savage playing at a tribal war, whereas the white

man saw it as a general re bellion.

If she sheds tears over the European dead, the number of Melanesians who lost their lives seems to annoy Miss Latham, who tries to give the impression that there were fewer blacks killed than is gen erally accepted. This is curious.

The colonial authorities kept a tally of the so-called rebels killed: there was a price, at first for each pair of ears brought back, then later for each head, when it was found that ears could be those of women and children. There was every reason to accept the correctness of the official figure.

Miss Latham criticises me for doing this too readily. In fact I did nothing of the kind.

I thought at first that the figure was too low, having seen the

vast expanses of unpeopled lands in the southwest of New Caledonia as a result of the 1878 repression. To obtain an honest estimate I had neverthe less to take account of every surviving group. There were those who had been exiled to Belep Island and the Isle of Pines, and who had only been allowed to return on condition that they accepted a written contract imposing on them a semi-feudal link with a grazier.

But then there were all those who had gone hither and

thither, to the far north, to the east coast, and to the far south near Noumea, so they would not be sent into exile except where they chose to go. Having quite enough on its hands, the colonial government turned a blind eye to this as long as no vocal settler group chose to make an issue of it.

Administratively speaking

these people were ‘lost’, and were not accounted for in the archives. It was my task to rediscover them through their

descendants, village by village,

quietly, and this took me some years. Only then could I attempt the necessary calcu lations. using what I thought was a reasonable estimate of the population at the time. The result was a confirmation of the official figure. So I could not say that the loss of Melanesian

lives was greater than the fig ure given at the time.

All this being said, what is the impact of Miss Latham’s paper? Another brick in the dead-end wall built by all those colonial thinkers who still be lieve we brought civilisation wherever we went (at the cost of coloured people’s lives), and who still judge any non- Western culture (with the exception of those of India.

Japan, China, Vietnam and maybe Mexico) as being de void of intelligence, of analyti

cal capacities, of organisational capabilities. White settlers in New Caledonia can still sleep their lives through with a Melanesian common law wife and neither know nor care about what is happening in the village next door. They are ‘su perior’ beings and are uncon cerned with the exotic games of the ‘savage’ mind even if they themselves are barely lit erate, and the children of the

‘savages’ university-trained.

Miss Latham has done no better. Her paper is being hailed as a partial moral justifi cation of the colonial re pression of the time. This is neither science nor history. Nor is it good for the image of Aus tralian research among the new, young and knowledge able sections of local Melanesian society.

‘Colonists and native workers’ is the title of this 19th century engraving of a New Caledonian scene... One group had to be reduced to slavery to allow the bare economic survival of the other' From Nouvelle-Caledonie, by Patrick O’Reilly and Jean Poirier.

Tropicalities

costs’ for the films which are estimated to be budgeted at around SNZSO million. From London a few days later came the report that Lean had can celled plans to film parts of the films in New Zealand.

Trouble with New Zealand’s taxmen is not the only problem that has bedevilled prep arations for the films. The de Laurentiis production company initiated the scheme for the two films but then backed down. It was at this point that United Artists ex pressed interest.

Just where the Bounty goes from here is not clear. But on the whole New Zealanders are a little saddened to miss out on the publicity, fame and job opportunities that would have come with the filming of many of the sequences in their country.

Meanwhile the $1.3 million replica of the Bounty rides ser enely at anchor at a Whan garei, a small settlement in the north of the North Island where it was built to exact specifications by a local firm.

Mara upsets

‘iat cats’

Fji’s Prime Minister, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, upset Suva based staff of the United Nations Development Pro gramme when he said the in clusion in aid programmes of highly paid consultants upset local salary structures and raised the cost of living in Fiji.

He suggested it might be poss ible for UNDP to fund aid pro jects, leaving Fiji itself to find the experts. Ratu Mara was speaking at a luncheon for visiting UNDP administrator, Bradford Morse.

Mr Morse, 58, a US lawyer and former congressman, said UNDP was ready to go along with Ratu Mara’s idea. It was already in effect elsewhere in the world. But he was guarded about criticism of Ratu Mara by UNDP staff. ‘l’m not div ine,’ he said. ‘I can’t say what their subjective attitudes are.’

Taxmen scuttle

the ‘Bounty’

Plans to base in New Zealand production operations for two films on the Bounty mutiny (PIM March) are all at sea, writes William Gasson from

Wellington. Oscar-winning

director David Lean’s plans to film much of the two-film epic in New Zealand ran aground on tax matters. He failed to convince. New Zealand’s beady-eyed taxmen to allow tax concessions for incoming technicians and actors.

The plans came unstuck when Lean and United Artists senior executive Lee Katz met government financial rep resentatives. Said Mr Katz after the morning-long session; ‘Our visit here had gone very well until today. But I had hoped the government would make tax concessions available within our assessment of the added costs involved in basing the project here.’ He declined to give any figures on ‘added

French Polynesia, wrote an open letter to French President

Giscard d’Estaing.

The text of the letter, which has appeared in the Paris daily Le Monde and the Swedish press, reads; ‘Mr President, We the undersigned, the first of whom is a French citizen and the sec ond a citizen of Sweden, and who are by profession anthro pologists, historians and writers, have for the past 30 years been permanent resi dents of French Polynesia. Our researches and publications on local culture and history, both ancient and modern, have always attracted keen interest and have frequently been praised by both individuals and institutions. In addition to our literary and scientific pur suits, the first signatory has

actively participated in local

politics and is at present a councillor in the municipality where we have our home. The second signatory was appointed honorary consul for Sweden in 1961. ‘Seventeen years later, at the

Danielssons

tell Giscard

After the withdrawal of Bengt Danielsson’s exequatur official recognition as honor ary consul for Sweden (PIM February), Mr Danielsson and his wife Marie-Therese, PlM’s accredited correspondents in

beginning of 1978, the French minister for foreign affairs sud denly discovered his note is dated January 18, 1978 that a person exercising the above mentioned professions cannot at the same time act as honor ary consul. In consequence of this he took the decision on November 8, 1978, to withdraw

the consular exequatur granted the second signatory to this let ter by President de Gaulle on January 20, 1961. ‘With great frankness and small logic, the minister then goes on to reveal the true reason for his displeasure: we have written a book entitled Moruroa, mon amour, whose subject matter of course is the installation of nuclear test bases in these islands and the disastrous consequences these have had, especially for the

Polynesians, and the publi

cation of this book is branded “a hostile act towards France”.

‘Again, what surprises us

most is the length of time it has taken the minister to make these accusations, considering that the original French edition of the book, with a preface

by Jean-Jacques Servan-

Schreiber. was published back in 1974 without provoking anyrebukefromthehonourable minister for foreign affairs.

The reason for this surprising delay can be found in the abovementioned note of January 18, for it blames us above all for having authorised Penguin Books to publish an English translation of our book in September 1977, thus giving it a much wider audience than the original French edition. We are therefore forced to con clude that what counts most for the minister is the choice of publisher and the size of the printing. It is moreover highly regrettable that he has not deemed it useful to issue at an earlier stage any precise instructions for the guidance of

honorary consuls with literary

ambitions. ‘For the minister for foreign affairs, the most reprehensible aspect of our book is our constant concern with the un avoidable health hazards due to the radio-active fallout which has long-lasting effects, such as Strontium-90 and Caesium-137, resulting from 41 atmospheric nuclear tests made here during the periods in office of President de Gaulle and President Pompidou. That these radio-active substances are harmful is a well-known fact, and if any additional proof were needed it has re cently been furnished by its fatal effects among the

The Danielssons in earlier, less stressful Tahiti days

* islanders in Micronesia, re f cently discovered, as long as 25 years after the first nuclear tests although the most reputable experts had always sworn that there were no health hazards whatsoever. The quite precise questions asked by us in our I book about the radio-active I fallout and the contamination I of the islanders here in French I Polynesia call, in our opinion, I for a more adequate reply than the sanctions taken by the minister for foreign affairs. It will, furthermore, undoubtedly be taken by all the peoples of the Pacific as a confirmation of the fears that they have always held. ‘Let us only add here that our concern about the health hazards due to the tests in our islands is fully shared by such local political leaders as the late senator Pouvanaa a Oopa, ■ the present senator Daniel Millaud, the president of the territorial assembly John Teariki and the former deputy and present vice-president of the government council Fran cis Sanford. As a matter of fact we have simply echoed in our book statements and questions from these well-known leaders. ‘Their names also figure prominently in the chapters of our book dealing with the pol itical events in French Poly nesia, all closely linked with the nuclear test issue, whereas others deal with the long struggle for internal self government which has domin ated local politics since the last World War. Although most of the political leaders mentioned above have publicly testified to the truthfulness of our account, the French minister for foreign affairs now accuses us with out furnishing any proofs whatsoever of having “mis represented the significance of the recent administrative re forms in the territory”, and of

having “painted a black picture

of French policies in this part of the world”. ‘lf the only strictures decided by the minister had been the withdrawal of a consular exequatur, we could or would hardly have done more than express our surprise at such an unusual sanction. But it so hap pens that it was accompanied

by a thinly veiled threat to expel us from our adoptive country, where we have our home, where our son was born and where our daughter is buried - if we don’t shut up!

Coming from a country which honours free speech and which has traditionally given asylum to foreign writers persecuted in their home countries because of their dissident opinions, this threat seems particularly strange to us. ‘As a result of our writings, we have in the past often been shadowed by various agents of the French Thought Police ( Renseignements Generaux ), our office and home have been visited during our absence by specialists in electronic gadgetry, and several attempts have been made to blackmail friends into supplying infor mation tending to incriminate us. Such antics are of course unworthy of a democratic country such as France, but we have nevertheless occasionally found them quite amusing be cause of the clumsiness of these French agents, so easily spotted in the local, tropical environ ment. Charitably, we have also been inclined to ascribe these

spying activities, occurring

long after your welcome civil liberties programme was implemented in France, to the usual delays which occur in the French overseas territories after new reforms are promul gated in France. ‘The recent sanction and threat, however, emanated from one of your ministers.

This is the reason why we are attempting by the present letter to draw your attention to this distressing affair which, we are sure, you know nothing about,

considering its insignificance in

the French national context.

We consider moreover that there is an additional justifi cation for writing directly to the holder of the highest office in the country, and that is the simple fact that the consular exequatur which has just been withdrawn was originally granted and signed by a previous president of the republic. ‘We remain. Respectfully yours, Marie-Therese Daniels son, Benet Danielsson.’

The Tami tr2d&

canoe revived

Just over two years ago the then Australian high commissioner to Papua New Guinea, Tom Cntchley, now ambassador to Jakarta, travelled by government vessel to Tami Island, just off the south-eastern tip of the Huon Peninsular in PNG’s Morobe Province. He had heard that the Tami tradition

of building large ocean-going

trading canoes was in danger of dying out: a canoe had not been made for years and only a few of the old men of the village knew both the method of building and the ceremonial routine vital to the wellbeing of the vessel. Mr Critchley told villagers he would put up the money, on behalf of the Australian government, to cover the cost of materials and of their transport to the building site if the villagers would do the work. He would also purchase an outboard motor which

would make the new canoe independent of the ‘vagaries of the sea’. Slowly the project got

underway and by February this

yea r the canoe was ready. It set sai i from Wanem Island in the Tami group following a tra ditional trading route to Lae where Prime Minister Michael Somare was waiting to con gratulate the Tami people and the people of the Morobe Prov ince for their awareness of the nee d to preserve, and attempt t o revive, worthwhile cus toms

Apia-Hamburg

rpnfpnprv * January 24, 1979, was just another day for most people in Western Samoa. But a few were aware that the day marked the centenary of the signing of a treaty of friendship between Western Samoa and

Germany,

A research scholar in West

ern Germany recently dis

covered the text of the treaty.

Tami’s ocean trader... a tradition revived. PNG Post-Courier photo

in German and Samoan. It was

signed by four gentlemen; von

Werner and Weber for Ger many, and Tuia Lemana and Meisake for Samoa.

According to the Western

Samoa prime minister’s department, the treaty is not valid in today’s circumstances, but ‘represented a stage in Western Samoa’s develop ment’. The long-standing Ger

man influence in Western Samoa is still reflected in special agreements between the two countries on ‘economic co-operation’ the West Ger* man expression for aid to

under-developed countries.

Hayo Breckwoldt, who is Western Samoa’s honorary consul in Hamburg and whose family name has been well known m Pacific trading circles for many decades, sent a special message to Prime Minister Tupuola Efi on the

anniversary. The national flag

of Western Samoa was flown from the flagpole of Brewo House. Hamburg, for the first time since the consulate was established there.

W. Samoa goes

11l Dig OH games

The Western Samoa Sports Federation is planning a kingsize effort in the August South Pacific Games in Fiji, writes Judie Teall from Apia. By sending a team of more than 200 at a cost of SWS9O 000 the federation hopes to expose as many people as possible to the

organisation and regulation of

the games in preparation for the 1981 games, to be hosted by Western Samoa at Apia Park.

The 200 include hockey, rugby, soccer and cricket teams. New grandstands are already under construction at the park. Plans also include a swimming

pool.

Gov. Coleman’s

‘come home’ call

The Governor of American Samoa, Peter Tali Coleman, hopes to encourage some of the territory’s 32 000 Samoans now living in Hawaii to come back to Samoa to work. For this pur pose American Samoa is set ting up a liaison office in Hawaii to serve as a recruit ment and information centre.

The figures show that more than 20 per cent of the Samoans in Hawaii between 20-25 years of age are unem ployed. The Governor says a similar office in California may be established if the American Samoa legislature is satisfied with the accomplishments of the office in Honolulu.

Some of the 2500 children who attended the 1979 school-holiday project at the Australian Museum, Sydney, where, on the basis of models supplied by the Papua New Guinea National Cultural Coun cil in Port Moresby, they took part in making their own versions of traditional PNG masks, belts, grass skirts, nose-pieces and other artifacts. Australian Information Service photo.

Blarney and his fellow petty officers at war

In early August 1942 the Aus tralian militia battalions in the mountains north or Port Moresby, the area now known as the Kokoda Trail, were close to being overrun and 21 Brig ade, Australian Imperial Forces (AIF), commanded by

Brigadier A.W. Potts, arriving

in the middle of that month, was to change the situation.

Unlike the militia men, those of 21 Brigade had seen action in the Middle East and it was expected that they would turn back the Japanese. It was not to be. On September 2, Potts gave orders to fall back, and

eight days later Brigadier

S.H.W.C. Porter relieved him.

In addition to 21 Brigade there were now two companies each of 3 Battalion and 2/1 Pioneer Battalion and a troop of 2/6

Independent Company, and

Porter had been told that 25 Brigade AIF would soon arrive. By September 14, 25 Brigade was in the loribaiwa- Überi area and Porter was re

lieved by Brigadier K.A.

Father. The arrival of ad ditional troops enabled the Australians to turn back the Japanese and Father was able to report by the beginning of October that the enemy was

withdrawing.

Dudley McCarthy, in South

west Pacific Area - First Year, one of the volumes in the series Official History of Australia in the War 1939-43, observes that neither Father nor any other leader could have done better than Potts: the units which bore the brunt on the Kokoda Trail, 39 and 57 Militia Bat talions and 2/14 and 2/16 Bat talions AIF, had sustained horrendous losses many killed or wounded, some miss ing, and hardly a man who was not suffering from malaria or

dysentery.

General Douglas Mac- Arthur, allied supreme com mander in the Southwest Pacific Area, very worried about the situation, obtained the approval of Australian Prime Minister John Curtin to have General Sir Thomas Blarney, the Australian commander-in-chief of allied land forces, to move to Port Moresby and take over com mand of the New Guinea Area from Lieutenant General S.

Rowell.

Arriving on September 23, Blarney asked Rowell to be his deputy but Rowell demurred because he regarded being staff officer as bereft of all com

mand authority. Two days

later, Blarney having ordered

troops to Wanigela without consulting Rowell, there was a blazing row between the two and, with approval from Curtin and MacArthur, Blarney sent Rowell back to Australia.

Three generals Potts, Porter and Rowell had now been relieved, but more was to come. On October 1, Lieuten ant General E.F. Herring took over command of New Guinea Force from Major General A.S. Allen who was then put in charge of forward operations, and on October 27 Allen was relieved by Major General

G.A. Vasey.

These changes in top com mand are, of course, men tioned in Australia’s official war history and, in greater detail, in John Hetherington’s

Blarney: Controversial Soldier (1973), and Rowell’s autobi ography Full Circle (1974), but the Australian, Papua New Guinea and American sur vivors of the Kokoda and Buna-Gona campaigns can now read the whole story in Crisis of Command: Australian Generalship and the Japanese Threat, 1941-1943.

Using hundreds of official Australian and American documents, official war his tories, relevant books and pri vate correspondence, and having interviewed some of the ‘top brass’, D M. Horner, an of ficer in the Royal Australian Infantry, believes that a great deal of incompetence in the leadership was due to personal ambitions and animosities out

weighing the responsibility of

office, in particular the re sponsibility for the welfare of subordinates down to the most lowly private, among some of the generals.

The replacement of Allen by Vasey, says Horner, was

ordered by Blarney although

Blarney was in no situation to assess how well Allen had per formed. Horner writes: ‘Few division commanders in history have been replaced by their army commander without having been visited by either army or corps commander.’

There had not been progress

sufficiently rapid for Blarney’s

liking but, as Allen had reported, the slowness was due to the terrain, insufficient

Somewhere in Papua, October 1942... from left, Australian Minister tor the Army F. M. Forde, General MacArthur, Field Marshal Blarney and Major-General George Kenney

supplies, units being under

strength, poor condition of troops, and difficult evacuation of wounded.

By the end of October, writes the author, the Australians had learnt two major lessons: that

jungle warfare requires

endurance and courage of the highest order and that ad

equate supply is important.

‘Through Blarney’s reluctance

to believe Allen’s account .. .

Blarney and MacArthurfailedto take heed of another lesson they did not understand the determination of the Japanese in defence his fanatical resis tance and willingness to die for his emperor.’ This lack of under

standing explains why lightly

armed troops were sent against the Japanese defences. Neither Blarney nor MacArthur had

given thought in peacetime to

the problems of tropical war fare in a mountainous area.

Blarney, as commander-in chief Australian Military Forces and commander Allied Land Forces under MacArthur, had a dual role which became more difficult

because of the attitude and temperament of MacArthur ‘who placed his subordinates in

difficult positions through his

inaccurate strategic assess ments in July and August 1942, through his determination to edge Blarney out as com mander of the land forces, through his interference in the technical conduct of the cam

paign, through his influence

over the Australian Govern ment and through his fears that an apparent military reverse might lead to his dismissal.’

‘Blarney was unwilling to

risk his own position by an af firmation of loyalty and trust in his subordinates,’ but even the unsatisfactory command ar rangements in Australia may not have had such a bad effect if Prime Minister Curtin had been more experienced and Blarney more tactful.

To the Diggers on the Kokoda Trail, ‘Pottsy’ (Potts),

‘Tubby’ (Allen) and ‘Bloody

George’ (Vasey) were good

blokes, to be followed through thick and thin. Their nickname for Blarney was ‘Brothel Tom’.

This book proves if proof is still needed that the French

politician Briand wasrightwhen

he told Britain’s Prime Minister Lloyd George, in World War I, that war is much too serious a thing to be left to military men.

Harry Jackman

Crisis of Command: Australian General ship and the Japanese Threat, 1941-43.

D.M. Horner. Published by Australian National University Press, Canberra, 1978. 515.95.

Tripping

with

Wad Kui

Sogeri National High School in the mountains behind Port

Moresby has produced yet

another superb collection of modern Papua New Guinea art. This time the featured art ist is Powesiu Lawes who matriculated at Sogeri in 1975.

The book is entitled Wati Kui, an expression of the Loniu people of the Los Negros Islands in Manus Province, Lawes’ home. Art adviser to

the publication, Marjorie

Walker of the school’s express ive art department, in the preface, says: ‘This expression is used by young boys as they become more aware of their growing power as they pass through adolescence into adulthood.’

In the case of Powesiu Lawes, wati kui does not stop at the simple achievement of Papua New Guinean adult

hood. Leafing through his

work, one feels a sense of curi osity and searching which pen etrates not just into earthly worlds beyond New Guinea’s shores but into the extraterres trial and decidedly abstract.

Powesiu obviously does not have his feet on the ground.

And, if he keeps them that way, we can look forward to more

pleasing flights of fancy. The

overall impact of his work is refreshing and it is most cer tainly original but there can be no doubt that Powesiu ranks among those who have de lighted in the works of Kauage, front-runner among PNG

modern art pioneers.

R.H.

Xotes on a

wwk in

Hawaii

The Hawaiian Islands have been a tourist attraction since their discovery in 1778. As such, they have also been the subject of the observations of the transient visitor. Such is the rationale and the quality of the present re-publication of the articles of Theodore-Adolphe Barrot who saw the Islands in 1836.

A French diplomat on the consular level, he was travel ling in the French warship La Bonite to a post in the Philip

pines when the ship stopped in

Hawaii. He spent about a week on the island of Hawaii and about two weeks in Honolulu on the island of Oahu. From this experience he was able to write about the Islands for a periodical in Paris.

Of what value are the com ments of the tourist-observer?

The most important value of this document is the perception

of Hawaii and Hawaiians on the part of an intelligent Frenchman of the first half of the nineteenth century. Barrot presents a mixed view of per sons and places which reflect the confusion in his own mind toward native peoples and their culture.

He romanticises the

Hawaiian by expecting to study

him in his ‘simple and guileless nature’. At the same time he describes natives in their most native aspect in images which

are scathingly ugly.

He deprecates the influence of the American Protestant missionaries who were Cal vinists and consequently strict in their values and moral judg ments. At the same time he de plores the harsh treatment of French Catholic missionaries by the Hawaiian king and chiefs without explaining what belter interpretation of Chris tianity this mission might have to offer.

He wishes to see the natives preserved in their ‘natural’ state and isolated from the evils of ‘civilization’. At the same

time he sees the great natural resources of Hawaii capable of supporting an excellent ‘col onial’ agricultural economy, and one which can ‘only’ be de

veloped by the industry of

Europeans and Americans.

This book needs careful

reading to identify the point of

view of the writer first before attempting to see some aspects of Hawaii in 1836.

The present edition is well done in paperback with copies of the charming drawings of Barthelme Lauvergne and Theodore Auguste Fisquet, two artists on La Bonite. - Pauline King Joerger, Assistant

Professor of History, University

of Hawaii at Manoa.

Th6odore-Adolphe Barrot, UNLESS HASTE IS MADE, Press Pacifica, Kailua, Hawaii, 1978, 128 pp.

Running aground in the ‘Sandwich Islands’... illustration by Barthelme Lavergne in Unless Haste is Made

Trade

Winds

Island Airlines In

At Deep End

The Pacific Islands are facing their biggest marketing challenge since they accepted the importance of tourism to their economies, writes Rob Gwyther in Sydney. The prospect of being cast once again into the backwaters of the tourist tide by lower fares on trunk through-Pacific routes has thrown panic into the hearts of many Island tourism planners. The reality of today's situation, fortunately, was forced home some time ago by the new equipment which enabled end-market carriers like Qantas and Pan Am to begin overflying island stops.

The message was reinforced last year when the Australian Government went so far as to warn in advance that its pro posed new international avi ation policy would cause disadvantages to Pacific islands. The policy report recommended against Aus tralia attempting to ‘subsidise’ inter-island regional routes from its trunk operations to and from Australia.

It warned that Qantas should not operate direct flights to points which could not support ‘commercially viable’ traffic shared between the two coun tries’ airlines.

The report’s only concession was to allow Island carriers rights where there was a ‘genu-

ine need’ for new services to aid regional development.

The kneejerk response generated by such moves, and the overflying trend, was recog nised by Fiji’s new tourism chief, Fiji Visitors Bureau gen eral manager Malakai Gucake, in his first address to the indus try earlier this year.

He attempted to dispel the panic’ he found in Fiji’s tourist industry, over possible loss of

stopover traffic, by arguing

that Australia’s policy should work to Fiji’s advantage by strengthening its role as a tour ist destination. ‘Since 81% of our Australian visitors make Fiji their main destination, the new policy should work in our favour,’ he said.

His statement at once ident ified both the problem and a part-solution to countering the

attractions of competitive fares to destinations further away such as the US. He said Fiji

should become both more competitive in terms of its price and tourist lure, and must also look to new markets. But the eventual answer for other Pa cific countries could well be as varied as the visitors who presently visit their shores.

Main destinations such as Fiji, Papua New Guinea, and Tahiti have come to grips with the tourism issue long ago but each has the problem of facili ties which must now be kept utilised. Others, such as Tonga, New Hebrides and Western Samoa, are only now deciding where and when they want tourism. They are all finding out about the ‘how’.

The marketing challenge,

however, is common to all: to become more attractive desti nations in their own right as well as find new ways of tap ping the tourist dollar (or per

haps yen).

For instance, Fiji was handed a guiding beacon by its long-time supremo Paddy Doyle, whom Mr Gulacake replaced in January. Before leaving to run his own Fiji re sort, Mr Doyle called for new unity in the industry to im prove dealings with overseas travel packagers as well as overcome accommodation and image problems at home (the

recent rise in Fiji hotel prices is just one aspect).

Mr Doyle said countries whose tourist traffic was mainly stopovers faced a ‘lean time’ unless they became ‘des tination material’. He said Fiji’s visitor future under the new low fares lay more with the United States than with Aus tralia or New Zealand. From

the US, he said, there was a bet ter chance of getting both a lower fare and more traffic.

The US, he said, could stand up to 20 terminator flights a week. ‘A united Fiji tourist industry will be in a better position to press for more terminating

flights, plus a point-to-point air

fare with Fiji as one of the

points that is economically

comparable with the long-haul

fares now being touted.’

In saying so, he of course touched on the gulf between a country’s tourism aims and the ability of its airlines and indus try to carry them out. Air Pa cific has yet to prove itself an economic maverick, but it has

shown signs lately of becoming

much more aggressive in pick ing up the marketing gauntlet

since Qantas and Air New Zealand loosened their hold.

Air Pacific has negotiated strongly for its proposed ser vices to Hawaii, Sydney and Melbourne and has pinpointed ways of chartering larger air craft to get out and chase its own markets. Its success hinged on finding suitable aircraft to lease as both its finances and the lead-time on ordering new machines would delay replace ment of its BAC-llls until 1985, according to one source.

Because of the Australian Government’s preoccupation with other main routes, the vital question of a new bilateral

air rights agreement with Fiji has still to be tied up. The Fiji carrier hopes to start Sydney

and Melbourne flights some time after mid-year, and flights to Hawaii by year’s end.

It acknowledges, however that it will probably have to

change its opposition to

advance purchase air fares which are the basis of Aus tralia’s new lower rates. Fiji re jected Qantas proposals two years ago for an APEX fare to undercut the present SA3O6 return excursion fare because of its heavy dependence on package tour business and the fact that Fiji was still very much an ‘impulse market’ for Australians. They now concede there is ‘some room’ for a lower fare.

Mr Doyle estimated reopen ing of the Melbourne service alone would bring Fiji an extra 24000 visitors a year. (As a measure of the importance of visitor traffic, tourism last year earned Fiji SF9O million in rev enue plus $l2 million in foreign exchange, about half of which revenue stayed in the country. However, the fight for this business, as Air Nuigini, PNG’s national airline, has shown, can be played by some very hard rules.

Qantas showed how it

regarded bleating by disadvan

taged Islanders when its chair man, Sir Lenox Hewitt, produced figures to answer

criticism of its policies. They showed the airline’s Funjet traffic from Australia had risen steadily from 14000 in 1969 to 54543 last year, only dropping in 1977 because ‘Qantas pulled off the Brisbane—Nadi route in favour of Air Pacific’. It issued no forecasts for this year, how ever.

Air Niugini - in its fifth year one of the Pacific’s success

stories has fought hard to establish an extensive network which will soon include Port

Moresby-Hawaii. Recognising

that all its tourist eggs should never be in one basket, PNG has, like Fiji, established Japan. Australia and the US as key markets. The airline’s twin attack on these markets has

been to promote PNG heavily as an exciting frontier desti nation, as well as develop a route system to allow markets further afield to include the country as part of a wider circle-tour.

Thus Europeans and Asians can enter PNG via Indonesia or Japan and Americans via Hawaii, as part of circle itineraries which include Aus tralia and other destinations.

The same applies in theory to Australians visiting Hawaii or Asia, though again this

requires slick marketing to

overcome the temptation of cheaper direct fares. Because of

its geographical position, such

circle travel patterns are com paratively easy for PNG to

establish. They also recognise,

as many tour operators such as

United Touring International and Paradise Tours have predicted, that lower fares to one destination can help in stimulating overall traffic to a

region.

Americans, for instance, have long thought in terms of the ‘South Pacific’ as a desti nation rather than individual countries, and so are likely to travel accordingly.

The degree to which PNG succeeds will depend on its air line’s direction after present general manager Bryan Grey departs this month.

Tahiti, New Caledonia and New Hebrides on the other hand have relied on establish ing themselves as end desti nations. Tahiti has succeeded in attracting more Australians principally because of its Club

Mediterranee, and regardless of the fact that it lies on the South America trunk route.

But its fears of possible dilution from the new trans-Pacific fares to Hawaii and the US from Australia were shown by a recent visit to the island by six top Australian tour oper ators to discuss the need for lower fares from Australia.

New Caledonia, too, is reas

sessing its tourism promotion

under plans to concentrate on its main visitor-generating markets for future growth.

Noumea had a marketing bon anza with its casino and good quality hotels, but the New Hebrides is now planning to pick up much of this business by capitalising on the closure of the Chateau Royal hotel

(another lesson in tourism marketing!).

Pago Pago in American Samoa, meanwhile, has been thrust into the lucrative North American market more by luck than good management (thanks in particular to Con tinental Airlines). The ability of surrounding regions to capi talise on this depends largely on their own regional airline’s efforts to establish effective shuttle services to tap the Samoans’ stopover traffic.

Western Samoa-based Polynesian Airlines has a new Australian-built Nomad to op

erate 40-minute flights Apia-

Pago Pago, and hopes to win some American stopover visi tors, if only for short visits. The airline has also expanded its Auckland-Apia-via-Tonga ser vice to twice-weekly, adjusted its services to connect with Pan American flights, and intro-

duced 20% inter-island dis count fares.

So far Tonga has failed to provide the accommodation and facilities to enable it to tap the package-tour market or mature beyond its ‘exotic’

image. Apart from cruise ships calling it would be a waystop on most South Pacific itineraries. Tonga’s visitors bu reau. however, has become more active with increased pro motion and, like Solomon Islands and Cook Islands, is

starting to develop the

entrepreneurial talent needed to build tourist attractions.

Air Nauru has inaugurated a weekly Boeing 737 service be tween Tonga and Noumea, then on to Melbourne, at a time when visitors by air to Tonga have risen 10% in the past year.

The problems of Norfolk Island, meanwhile, were ident ified in a recent letter to a local newspaper as lower air fares, a new image and abandonment of uneconomical aircraft. The island’s other problem is to up grade its airport to take larger

planes.

Those islands on the South Pacific cruise circuit can take heart that lower international air fares show little sign of damaging the Australian and New Zealand cruise market.

The cruise market’s .confidence - now it has got rid of the

excess shipping capacity

around is symbolised by

P&O’s move to establish a

prestigious up-market liner,

the Sea Princess, as a per-

manent fixture alongside the Oriana, replacing the worn-out A rcadia.

At the time of writing Con tinental Airlines planned to begin its May 1 South Pacific services with low sector fares only from the US end. It was likely to apply the same low through fares as Qantas and Pan Am from Australia and haggle the sectors later. Thus it is heartening to see Air Pacific examining its charter costs to determine how it could com pete with Continental on the Honolulu-Nadi route. The low fares announced by Continen tal have not dampened the Fiji

Government’s enthusiasm for Air Pacific to fly the route.

Some in the airline business may harbour memories of American Airlines’ fate in the South Pacific and not be pre

pared to gamble again on their

future lying in the hands of the

‘big boys’. Continental Airlines

gave firm assurances that it was ‘an island hopper’ when its managing director (inter national) Frita Blayney, said tour packages would be com piled to utilise regional airlines like Polynesian and Air Pa cific.

He said Pago Pago was a ‘moral commitment’ and un likely to be dropped on any account, and both gateways would be heavily promoted in the US to bring real tourists.

The US carrier gave notice that the bulk of its tourist traffic

would be Americans rather than Australians.

But at the same time. Con tinental is likely to be very aware of the experience of American Airlines and control both its low-fare volume and stopover traffic carefully. It is aiming for an average seat kilometre cost of around six US cents and that means a tight rein on who and where its business will be. It may also re view its whole island strategy should it replace its older DC-10s with more efficient air craft, not dependent on island stops.

Hawaiian Airlines, too, is

taking a cautious approach.

The carrier has new rights be tween the US West Coast and Western Samoa also, but is likely to take at least a year of study before it takes them up.

The regional carriers will! thus need to think very care fully about plans to expandl

their route networks. It appears i unrealistic to expect them to I compete with Continental Air lines on sectors as they have neither the equipment nor expertise at present to make such services profitable. On the other hand Continental is by no means committed to lone-

term operation through Fiji,

and there is thus an inherent risk in reliance on outside poli cies.

There is no guarantee that

Continental’s island-hopping

will not see US tourists doing

more hopping than staying, with little tangible benefit for

the islands. Those who see Continental Airlines as a poss ible saviour in the present air line climate may well find them to be more of an un

balancing influence by merely

taking inter-island traffic away from the regional carriers.

Regional carriers’ future

long-haul operations also de

pend to some extent on Air New Zealand, which has its own problems with the Aus tralian policy. Air New

Zealand is well advanced in looking at ways to re-model its Pacific operations.

It is likely to see both an ag gressive inbound operation from the US and Asia, and strong regional operations, as ways of compensating for lost Australia/US rights. A possible lucrative Pacific round-circle fare, such as US/New Zea-

land/Australia/New Zealand, with Fiji and Tahiti stopovers outward and return, is one alternative foreshadowed by airline officials.

But, like Continental, Air New Zealand would seek to control the traffic from go to

whoa to make the operation vi able. Thus the regional carriers may well have to be content to remain just that.

The ultimate decision for the Islands in assessing their pos ition may well depend on which they rate highest: a healthy tourist industry, or an

active long-haul (though loss

making) national airline. It is

becoming increasingly clear

they cannot afford both.

Comment

Which rates first - tourism or communications?

It has taken time but the low air fare revolution is about to encompass the South Pacific.

Already planeloads of Australians are flying north to Honolulu and the US West Coast at fares that rate among the lowest in the world, and back down the reverse track growing numbers of planeloads of Americans are enjoying a similar low fare boom.

Beneath the wings of the 747 s and DClOs lie the Pacific Islands, where tourist interests would like to see the great travel boom in the sky come down to earth. Standing alongside the tourist interests are the small regional airlines which don’t see the low-fare explosion in the same rosy light as their col

leagues.

The division faces many governments with the dilemma should they try to tap this new boom in tourism, or should they work to maintain the identity of their own national airlines?

The airlines are characterised by being small, flying between sparsely populated centres, and operating equipment that is not only small in modern terms but one or two jumps behind in the technology that made the low fares possible.

Aircraft like the 747 can be operated profitably at ridiculously low fares - down to about 1.8 cents a seat/kilometre, or about a fifth the cost of a bus ride in Sydney because of their size, their 400-plus passenger capacity, and their highly efficient engines. There is no way that the BACII Is or Boeing 737 s opera-

ted in the Pacific can achieve anything like the economies of the big jets. So if tourism is to be enticed to or diverted through the Pacific Islands, the local carriers will have to see some of their rights to have access to an equal share of traffic into their home territory eroded. They will also have to be prepared to carry tourists from one airport to another at fares much lower

than at present, which, even with full aeroplanes, means they will be making book losses.

Airlines like Air Pacific, facing the dilemma of whether they will preserve their identity or act as ‘insurance’ for the tourism industry (as one opinion in the present debate in Suva defines the airline’s role), are talking about following Air Niugini’s example and buying used Boeing 707 s to participate in inter national routes.

But while this is a step up, it is by no means the answer. The older jets are less attractive to passengers and still have much higher operating costs than the newer airliners (which is why

airlines like Qantas and Air New Zealand are disposing of the

older jets).

Another solution is to charter capacity on somebody else’s aeroplane. Hypothetically, one cabin on a Qantas 747 operating to Sydney or Melbourne could be sold and staffed as Air Pacific.

But this does not go down well with the airlines and their staff.

They feel, at best, second rate.

Fortunately, a newer generation of aircraft is now taking shape on the drawing boards that may offer the ultimate solution to the Air Pacifies of this world. From Europe, the A3OO and A3lO offer passenger capacities of between 200 and 300, plus lots of freight space, and from the US the Boeing 767 is pitching for the same market. All these will offer competitive seat/km costs but will demand cripplingly high investments for small countries.

Beneath these is another categoy of 130-180 sealers, the first of which is the Boeing 757. These will also be expensive aero planes but may provide sizes more balanced to the requirements of the Pacific. At the bottom end of the size range, Fokker is briefing airlines on a 115-130 sealer development of its F2B that would be very attractive - but won’t be ready much before 1986.

There is no easy solution to the dilemma - which rates first, tourism or communications? There must be compromises. More importantly, there must be extremely skilled planning at a high level of technological understanding so that national priorities are met in the most efficient way in the difficult years to come.

Plays

It Cool

When Prime Minister Michael

; Somare brought John Kaputin

into his ministry, just before

the Pangu-People’s Progress Party split in November, a tremor or two ran through the Papua New Guinea expatriate business community. Es pecially so as Mr Kaputin’s portfolio was ‘national plan

ning and development’.

Although a businessman in his own right for several years, John Kaputin is better known for his radical utterances, par ticularly on the question of

Papua New Guinean partici

pation in the national econ omy, and as a bitter opponent of expatriates ready to take but reluctant to give.

When Mr Kaputin turned up in Sydney in February to talk about his government’s econ omic policies and its attitude

toward foreign investment, just

about everybody who was any body in the Pacific market place went along to listen to him. PNG officials were obviously delighted at the turn out.

And what Mr Kaputin had to say was not frightening in the least although he gave clear warning that in no way has he changed his longheld view that there’s no room for fly-by nighters in PNG’s economic

scheme of things.

From the outset he stressed that ‘there must be a continu

ing dialogue’ between PNG

and Australia because ‘lack of proper communication be tween our two countries can

only lead to misunderstanding

and distrust which are un necessary ingredients so far as

economic development is con

:erned’.

Mr Kaputin, drawing atten

tion to his own attitudes toward

economic development ex

pressed before independence,

said; T am deeply committed

to economic justice for Papua

Slew Guineans ... but there is

no reason why foreign invest

ment and the kind of develop

ment I favour cannot go

together.’

The break with its colonial past, he said, had allowed PNG to open up new opportunities for both Papua New Guineans and foreign investors but only for ‘investors who are prepared to respect our laws and people; investors who are prepared, in fact, to invest and are not just out for “a quick quid or kina”. .. We do want, indeed we need, overseas involvement in our economy, but it must be to our advantage . ..’

Mr Kaputin offered an econ omic record which had achieved an average annual real increase of 2.4% in gross domestic product since 1975; consumer price index ratings of 6% or less since 1976; and a 22% rise in domestic private investment in 1978 over the

previous year.

The main points of his government’s economic policy, he said, were; • to stabilise important private sector incomes such as coffee and cocoa; • to pursue an exchange rate policy which would maintain the purchasing power of the kina; • to hold down urban wages but allow modest increases in rural wages; • to hold down taxation levels to keep them attractive and in crease taxation revenue by

broadening the productive

base of the private sector;

• to develop merchant bank ing in PNG to fit in with its development strategies.

PNG’s was not an ‘open door policy to foreign investment’ he said, quoting an example: ‘We would give every assist ance to foreign investment coming into a fisheries venture, but would certainly not allow the same investment in setting up a gambling venture.’

Areas in which PNG was actively seeking investment, he said, were in minerals and pet roleum exploration; in agricul-

ture including oil palm, sugar, rice, rubber and cocoa; timber; and fishing. All of these come within the first category of the National Investment Priorities Schedule published by the National Investment and

Development Authority

(NIDA) in April last year. It is only in this category that foreign investors could expect active government support in getting their project off the ground.

Mr Kaputin said that in cer tain areas, where the private sector had not taken the initiat ive, ‘the government has formed the company, sub scribed initial capital, ident ified foreign investors, appointed project managers, and then, most important, phased out of active manage ment inputs, leaving the pro ject under private sector management’.

PNG offers no tax holidays because that would only attract ‘short term investors’. Tax incentives for primary pro ducers and the mining indus try, he said, were ‘more or less’ the same as in Australia, and ‘the writing off of certain items of capital expenditures and the indefinite carry forward of losses is incentive enough to long term investors’.

Three incentives recently introduced included the possi

bility of government meeting

costs of feasibility studies to set up an industry; a tax rebate of 50% on ‘profits related to any increases in exports in any year’; and government loan as sistance for ‘infant industry’ in its ‘initial, teething stages’.

The minister guaranteed foreign investment a free flow

John Kaputin... no room for fly by-nighters

I of funds and no expropriation ‘except on the payment of full

compensation’.

‘We have created a good track record in our relations with foreign investors,’ said Mr Kaputin, ‘and we will continue j to treat foreign investors in our 1 country in a fair and just man ner.’

The words are reassuring.

The track record is good. It will be interesting to see investment statistics in PNG this time next

year. Foreign capital invest

ment since the beginning of 1975 is pushing Kl5O million with nearly 1000 foreign enter

prises registered with NIDA.

Bob Hawkins

to big sister Hawaii

New levels of economic co operation between American Samoa and other Eastern Polynesian states and territories were highlighted by Governor Peter Tali Coleman in a recent speech to the State Senate of Hawaii.

The first elected governor of American Samoa was visiting Hawaii to meet representatives of the 20 000 American Samoans living in the state, and to discuss with state legislators stronger links between American Samoa and Hawaii.

He told the Hawaii senators: ‘A visible demonstration of American Samoa’s new role in the affairs of the region was the

January 8-12 meeting in Pago

Pago of the Pacific Islands

Development Commission.

The PIDC is an organisation composed of the chief execu tives of Guam, the Trust Terri tory of the Pacific Islands, the Northern Marianas, Hawaii and American Samoa, as well

as private interests, largely

from the fishing industry.

‘At my invitation the prime ninisters of Tonga and Tuvalu, he premiers of Niue and the lslands, and prominent ninisters from Western Samoa

md French Polynesia attended

he meeting.

‘While our formal meetings n Pago might be characterised

as “routine”, our “off the re cord” and personal discussions

were barrier-breaking.

‘As Premier Tom Davis of the Cooks said in a speech .. . to Pago Pago Rotary, we can work together constructively

by lowering our shortsighted

barriers to inter-island trade and intercourse, by encourag

ing private enterprise not by

talk alone, but by direct measures, by reducing over

lapping duplicatory services of

regional air carriers, processing plants, and so on. ‘American Samoa has two major fish canneries in ad dition to prime shipping and airport facilities it makes no sense to duplicate these facili ties in Apia, Rarotonga or Funafuti.’

Governor Coleman added: ‘Joint Pacific Island efforts on

controlling immigration, agri

cultural disease and other threats to the environment will be more productive than indi vidual efforts. There is no sense, either, in duplicating large capital facilities with high overheads eg, educational facilities, airports and major harbours. This is the sort of thing we talked about with other leaders of the South Pa cific at our Pago PIDC meet ing.’

In a wide-ranging review of the economic problems of Island countries, Governor Coleman told the Hawaii Sen ate: ‘Most small islands depend on a few main commodities to earn overseas exchange usually coconut products, fruit, sugar and spices, and in a few cases minerals or fish. In fact, the average Pacific Island de rives over half of its export earnings from one main com modity. We in American Samoa are dependent on our fish cannery exports about SUSIOO million in 1978. ‘For most Pacific countries primary exports are subject to extreme price fluctuations on the world market. The Pacific Islands’ share of production on the world market is too small to affect world prices in any of these commodities. ‘The only major operating scheme to help small islands with this problem is Stabex, signed under the ACP/EEC Lome Convention. It has pro

vided its four Pacific members

(Fiji, Tonga, Western Samoa

and Papua New Guinea) with very valuable stabilisation funds. ‘There are also some minor bilateral marketing agree

ments. Unfortunately,

American Samoa and other Island countries do not share in these benefits.’

On problems of trade and aid, the governor presented a

picture of his country’s situ ation which is far from squar ing with the common impression of it as the recipient of floods of US largesse. He said: ‘Because of existing trans port services and old colonial links. Pacific trade has been very tightly tied to particular metropolitan powers: exports are concentrated on traditional markets although these may not be the closest or most prof itable. ‘New Zealand and Australia, for example, are heavily con nected to the South Pacific Islands, while both US exports and imports are under

represented.

‘Only 3 per cent of Pacific trade is among the Islands themselves. Some attempts have been made through the South Pacific Bureau for Econ omic Co-operation (SPEC) to

arrange regional marketing

agreements. However, the di lemma of the Pacific Islands is that, unlike the Organisation of Petrol Exporting Countries (OPEC), they control only a tiny proportion of world pro duction.’

Governor Coleman noted

that foreign aid was

increasingly becoming the

most important source of funds for small island countries. ‘This aid is not without strings,’ he said. ‘Almost all aid in the Pa cific in bilateral. In 1976, on av erage, each country or territory received about 85 per cent of its aid from one donor country.

This pattern is also based on colonial ties. ‘For other Pacific Island nations this is now changing,

with Japan, Western Europe,

Canada and regional develop

ment organisations becoming

major donors. ‘American Samoa, however, has been totally dependent on the US for budgetary aid. For economic development pur poses we have received about SUSI million, and are not eli

gible for development loans by

international financing

bodies.’

Governor Coleman said that another problem is ‘the exploiting activities of multi

national private companies.

Foreign commercial firms can certainly affect Pacific econ omies, and there is evidence that some have done so,’ he said.

The governor quoted a re cent study, Hawaii and the other Pacific Islands saying: ‘As a gateway to the immense US market, Hawaii offers the other Pacific Islands an ideal market place for their exports. In turn Hawaii has the potential of serving as a convenient super market or department store for a wide variety of goods at

prices competitive with other

sources - that the Islands need from the US’.

He added: ‘We in American Samoa are the gateway to the South Pacific for Hawaii and in turn the gateway for our other

small island regional neigh

bours to trade with Hawaii and the Mainland US. We are

already an integral geographi

cal part of the South Pacific.

We are determined to become an integral economic part of the South Pacific.’

Governor Coleman closed with this appeal: ‘Little American Samoa needs a lot of help from its big sister state!

Fa’afatai tele lava, mahalo nuiloa and Aloha.''

Governor Coleman... totally dependent on US for aid

Pitcairn’S

Pallium’

Pitcairn Islands ‘Operation Pallium’ issue, depicting har

bour development in Bounty

Bay, are both pleasing (for

their colouring) and irritating

(for their lack of distinctness).

Operation Pallium was a team job between the British Army’s 62 (Construction) Company, Royal Engineers and the people of Pitcairn. The four stamps 15,20,30 and 35 cents were designed by Wadding tons Studio, England, and printed in multicolour lith ography by Bruder Rosen baum of Vienna.

Recent Cook Islands issues,

marking the 250th anniversary

of Captain James Cook’s birth and Cook Islands National Wildlife and Conservation

Day, are attractive offerings as are a Solomon Islands issue marking 50 years of scouting and a Papua New Guinea re lease featuring, in a four-stamp issue, indigenous musical instruments.

New Hebrides’ Christmas issue wouldn’t help anyone to guess where the condominium is. It appears unlikely that New Hebrideans have any part in the selection of designs for their country’s stamps.

Solomon Islands and Gilbert Islands have gone hand in hand with their issues commemorat ing Cook’s voyages in the Pacific' but the big format and tasteful design have resulted in handsome stamps.

Western Samoa has followed up its cowry shell issue with a series depicting cone shells.

The shells are enhanced by

pleasing background and a

subtle colour selection.

RH.

Cruising

PlM’s roving correspondent, Jimmy Cornell, has been ‘cycloning’ with wife Gwenda and children Doina and Ivan in New Zealand, their ketch AVENTURA resting up in Whangarei while they have been looking the country over.

He recently returned to Whan garei to check out the inter national mix which headed there to avoid the South Pa cific cyclone season; • DUEN, a traditional Nor wegian fishing vessel regis tered in the American Virgin Islands, on its second Pacific voyage which started in May last year. Duen (meaning

‘dove’), before reaching Whangarei, visited ports in French Polynesia, Suvorov in American Samoa, and Vavau and Tongatapu in Tonga.

Plans are to head either for Fiji or Micronesia, perhaps both.

On board are three gener ations: owners Albert and Dotty Fletcher, their son Toby, and daughter Vicky with hus band Jim Camp and son James. Built of pitch pine in 1942, Duen is a topsail ketch measuring 15.5 m on deck with a 6 m bowsprit.

• Incognito, An 11.6 M

sloop from Santa Barbara, California, built in Finland 31 years ago. Steve and Ruth Abney left home in 1974 for an open-ended cruise that first took them to Panama and

Costa Rica, where they spent two years working. In 1976 they spent nine months in French Polynesia before push ing on to the Cooks, Niue, Tonga before spending the 1977-78 cyclone season in New Zealand. Now they are back in New Zealand after spending most of 1978 cruis ing to the Kermadecs, Tonga, Fiji, New Hebrides and New Caledonia. Their plans now are to sail to Papua New Guinea. Forwarding: Marsh, 5 Bellevue Rd., Mt Edten, Auckland, NZ. • GALATEA IV, a 14.5 m cut ter from Vancouver, BC, Canada, which retired couple Bob and Marg Miller left in May last year bound for the Marquesas, Tuamotus, So ciety and Cook Islands, then Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand.

This year they intend to sail to Fiji, then on to the New Hebrides, Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea.

Mostly Bob and Marg sail their large yacht all alone but for the first part of this year’s cruise daughters Nancy and Beth will be with them.

• Chantalain A 10.3 M

French cutter registered in Noumea with Patrick and Kay Ifrah on board. A Morocco born Frenchman, Patrick worked for a while in New

Caledonia as a teacher while New Zealand-born Kay worked as a nurse. Last year they cruised in the New Hebrides, Chesterfield and Loyalty Islands. Now they plan to sail to Fiji, back to New Caledonia, then north to the New Hebrides, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and eventually to Japan. • MARUFFA, a 20 m yawl from Boothbay, Maine, US, on a world cruise with owner Katherine Greene, skipper Stephen Sewall, Michael and Stephen McDonnel, Sheila Viele, David Batchelder, Alex Logan and Michael Gillming as crew. Built in 1935, it was

rather neglected for a while until its present owner took over in 1977, bringing the Maruffa back to its original splendour. After transiting the Panama canal, Maruffa sailed to the Galapagos Islands, French Polynesia, Samoa, Fiji and New Zealand. Australia and Papua New Guinea are on this year’s programme. For warding: Mark Sewall, Booth bay, Maine, 04537, US • MACUSHLAH, a 9.3 m gaff ketch from Honolulu, in the Kittywake class, designed by Charley Davies. Owners Dave and Kay Malseed left Califor nia in 1970, cruising down the Central American coast to Panama, where they spent two years working in the Canal Zone. In 1977 they set off again, calling at the Galapagos Islands, Marquesas, Tuamotus, So ciety and Northern Cook Islands, American Samoa, Tonga and New Zealand. This year they plan to sail to Fiji, after which their plans are somewhat fluid.

• Tarrawarra, An 11,6 M

sloop from Melbourne. It spent 1978 cruising from Australia to Fiji, New Hebrides, New Caledonia and finally New Zealand and plans a return to the tropics soon. Four enthusi asts built the steel boat over a period of 414 years but two of them were left behind because of family commitments. The other two, Kim Proud and Tony Robinson have promised to see the world on behalf of those left behind. Steve Dunn is crewing. • RISING SUN, a 10 7 m sloop from Sidona, Arizona, which left Los Angeles in July 1977 bound for Hawaii where Dan and Denny Bache-Wiig spent a year replenishing the kitty before carrying on to both Samoas, Tonga, Fiji and New Zealand. This year they intend to sail to New Caledonia, New Hebrides, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea and poss ibly Japan.

• Endeavour A 12.5-

metre fibreglass sloop from San Diego, owned by Doug and Sandy Thompson, arrived at Tubuai in the Austral Islands writes Don Travers. The Thompsons had brought a gravely ill baby, accompanied by a nurse and the infant’s mother, from Raivavae. From Tubuai the baby was flown to Tahiti where it recovered. An almost identical incident oc curred about a year before with a Belgian yacht, KALAIS (RIM March 1978). After leav ing San Diego in May last year the Thompsons visited the Marquesas, Tuamotu and So ciety Islands before reaching the Austral Islands. The Endeavour was the first yacht to call at Tubuai since June 1978. It returned to Tahiti in January.

Duen... on second Pacific cruise

The Abneys and Port hole... PNG next

Chantalain’s crew... working trip

Maruffa... Australia bound

Rising Sun crew... maybe Japan

of Islands People

Paul Sa’Engeika

News of the death of Paul Sa’engeika of Bellona Island, south of Guadalcanal, evoked this tribute from Professor Tor ben Monberg. chief curator of

the department of ethnography

at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen; ‘Paul Sa’engeika was born in the years immediately prior to the turn of the century.

Although Bellona ‘lsland, in spite of its Polynesian culture, does not recognise “chiefs” in the usual Polynesian sense.

Sa’engeika came as close to

being one as the culture would permit. Truly, he was a “big man” in the proper sense of the word: an extremely impressive personality, firm in his

Dpinions. yet immensely toler

ant: witty, yet serious in his be liefs of right and wrong. ‘He was a famed gardener, fisherman, composer. and iancer. In spite of the turmoils ollowing the conversion to rhristianity on Bellona Island n 1938. he. having been one of he outstanding priests of the

)re-Christian religion, vividly

emembered the old rituals, eremonies and myths to the ninutest details until his leath. ‘I was fortunate enough to njoy a very close friendship /ith Sa’engeika for 20 years, ie has been my teacher and uardian during all these years, nd treated me like a true son. lis death is a great loss to us 11. and to the Solomon Islands

in general. Paul Sa’engeika can never be replaced.’

Louisa Miller

Louisa ‘Lulu’ Miller at

Vunapope Hospital, East New

Britain Province. PNG. after a long illness aged 84. Lulu Miller, born Louisa Schoevres. was a grand-niece of Queen Emma, the Samoan-American woman who won fame for the commercial empire she built across the South Pacific. Mrs Miller accompanied Queen Emma in 1910 on one of her

grand European tours, winning

much admiration for her

beauty.

Norman Dixon

A longtime president of the Boroko RSL in Papua New Guinea, Norman Dixon went to PNG in the fifties to work for the Department of Civil Aviation. At Greenslopes Mili tary Hospital, Brisbane.

Tau Boga

Tau Boga, an executive mem ber of the Central Province As sembly, Papua New Guinea, in Port Moresby, after a long ill ness. A bridge near his home,

Kapa Kapa Village, now under

construction is to be named after him in tribute to his ser vice to the Central Province.

Mr Tau Boga was for many years associated with the scout

ing movement.

Peni Tove

Corporal Peni Tove, who joined the Fiji Police Force in 1940. after a long illness, aged 58. He served until his death.

Tuala Paulo

Tuala Paulo, formerly a mem ber of parliament and cabinet minister in Western Samoa, aged 49. After a career in jour nalism. during which he be came editor of the Samoa

Bulletin, he entered parlia

ment. He was justice minister in 1970 and education minister from 1971 to 1973 in the Tamasese Government. He lost his seat in parliament in 1973 and went back to jour nalism as editor of the South Seas Star, and later as editor of the Catholic newspaper. Tau tai, a post he held until he died.

Paul Sa’engeika... truly a ‘big man’

Shipping

These listings do not necessarily cover all services to Island ports.

Should any shipping company wish to have its services cargo and passenger included in these list ings they should contact PIM.

Sydney - Lord Howe Is -

Norfolk Is

Compagnie des Chargeurs Caledoniens operates four-weekly cargo service Sydney - Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island, Details Hetherington Kingsbury Pty Ltd, 37-49 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-1671).

SYDNEY - NZ - FIJI - HAWAII -

Canada • Us

P & O liners call at Auckland, Suva, Honolulu and Vancouver on eastbound and westbound voyages between Syd ney and the US.

Details from P & O Booking Centre, World Travel Headquarters Pty Ltd, 33 Bligh Street, Sydney (231-6655).

AUSTRALIA - NZ - FIJI - TONGA

N. Hebrides - Noumea - Png

Solomons-Samoas

Sitmar Cruises operates a year-round cruise programme to include most of the above countries.

Details from Sitmar Cruises, 47 Elizabeth Street, Sydney (232-7511).

P & O liners call at Auckland, Bay of Islands, Honiara, Lautoka, Noumea, Nukualofa, Pago Pago, Papeete, Port Moresby, Santo, Savusavu, Suva,

Vavau and Vila on cruises from Aus tralia.

Details from P & O Booking Centre World Travel Headquarters Pty Ltd, 33 Bligh Street, Sydney (231-6655).

Australia - Fiji - Samoas -

New Hebrides - Tonga -

Norfolk Island

Pacific Navigation of Tonga operates a five-weekly refrigerated general car go/container service from Sydney and Brisbane, to Vila, Santo, Suva, Lautoka, Apia, Pago Pago, Nukualofa and Nor folk Island.

Details from Beaufort Shipping Agency Co, 2 Castlereagh Street, Syd ney (239-1022).

Australia - New Caledonia

(And/Or) New Hebrides

Karlander operates a monthly service from Sydney to Noumea.

Details from Karlander (Aust) Pty Ltd, 19-31 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-6301), Sofrana-Unilines ships serve Noumea every three weeks from the main ports along the east Australian coast.

Details from Sofrana-Unilines, 37 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-2031), Trans- Austral Shipping Pty Ltd, 570 Bourke Street, Melbourne (67-9162), ACTA Pty Ltd, Brisbane (221-3116), Elders-ANL Pty Ltd. Port Adelaide (47-5688), ANL, Newcastle (049-24364), Clements & Marshall, Burnie, Tasmania (31-1833).

Compagnie des Chargeurs Caledoniens operates a three-weekly containerised cargo service from Syd ney to Noumea.

Details Hetherington Kingsbury Pty Ltd, 37-49 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-1671).

Compagnie Generate Maritime oper ates a monthly service from Sydney to Noumea, Port Vila and Santo, usihg M/V 'Ymnos' a self-sustained fully con tainerised vessel.

Details Compagnie Generate Mari

time, 12 Castlereagh Street, Sydney (231-3700).

Australia - Fiji

Karlander (Aust) Pty Ltd operates monthly cargo services from Sydney to Suva and Lautoka.

Details from Karlander (Aust) Pty Ltd, 19-31 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-6301), Dalgety Shipping, 461 Bourke Street.

Melbourne (60-0731), Burns Philp (SS) Co Ltd, Suva and Lautoka.

Sofrana-Unilines (Fiji Express Line) operates to Suva and Lautoka every three weeks from the main ports on the east coast of Australia and monthly to Lautoka from Melbourne and Sydney.

Details from Sofrana-Unilines, 37 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-2031), Trans- Austral Shipping Pty Ltd, 570 Bourke Street, Melbourne (67-9162), ACTA Pty Ltd, Brisbane (221-3116), Elder-ANL Pty Ltd, Port Adelaide (47-5688), ANL, Newcastle (049-24364), Clements & Marshall, Burnie, Tasmania (31-1833).

Australia - W Samoa

Compagnie Generate Maritime oper ates a monthly service from Sydney to Apia, using M/V 'Ymnos' a self sustained fully containerised vessel.

Details Compagnie Generate Mari time, 12 Castlereagh Street, Sydney (231-3700).

Australia - Fiji - Tuvalu

Samoas - Tonga

Pacific Forum Line operates a con tainer, unitised/palletised and reefer cargo service from Melbourne and Syd ney to Lautoka, Suva, Funafuti, Pago Pago, Apia and Nukualofa. Other ports are included on inducement.

Details from ANL Melbourne and Brisbane, Union Bulkships, Sydney, Hobart, Port Adelaide and Fremantle, Burns Philp (SS) Company Ltd, GPO Box 355, Suva, Fiji (311-777); Polynesia Shipping Services, Pago Pago; Union Steam Ship Co of NZ Ltd, Nukualofa; PWD, Funafuti; or Pacific

Forum Line, PO Box 655, Apia, W Samoa.

Australia - Northern

Marianas - Micronesia

Nauru Pacific Line operates a regular container service from Melbourne to Saipan, Truk, Ponape and Kosrai.

Details Nauru Pacific Line, Nauru House, 80 Collins Street, Melbourne (653-5709), Nedlloyd Swire, 8 Spring Street, Sydney (2-0522).

Australia - Tonga -

Samoas - Tahiti

Karlander operates a monthly cargo service from Melbourne and Sydney to Nukualofa, Apia, Pago Pago, Papeete, US west coast.

Details: Karlander (Aust) Pty Ltd, 19-31 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-6301).

Australia - Tahiti

Daiwa Line offers a four-weekly ser vice from Australia to Papeete.

Details Meridian Shipping & Trans port Agencies Pty Ltd, Box 3410 GPO Sydney 2001 (29-4988), Tlx: AA25970 Compagnie Generate Maritime oper ates a monthly service from Sydney to Papeete using M/V ‘Ymnos' a self sustained fully containerised vessel.

Details Compagnie Generate Mari time, 12 Castlereagh Street, Sydney (231-3700).

Australia - Png

Containers Pacific Express (Burns Philp and AWP Line) and NGAL/PNGL Operate chief Container Service from Australia to PNG-Solomon Islands ports on joint slot sharing basis. Three con tainer vessels operate on 28-day turn around from Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane to Port Moresby, Lae, Rabaul, Kavieng, Wewak, Madang, Kieta and Honiara.

Details from Burns Philp & Co Ltd, 51 Pitt Street, Sydney (2-0547) and Interocean Swire, 8 Spring Street, Syd ney (2-0522).

New Guinea Express Lines operates

three-weekly conventional and con * tainer services Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Port Moresby, Lae, Rabaul, Alotau.

Details from New Guinea Express Lines. PO Box R 73, Royal Exchange PO, Sydney (241-3991) MacArthur Shipping Agency Co, 82-92 Eagle Street, Brisbane (229-3777), New Guinea Express Lines, 327 Collins ; Street, Melbourne (61-3053), Niugini Express Lines in Port Moresby (212466), Lae (42-1536), Rabtrad Niugini Pty Ltd, Rabaul (92-2911), Alo tau Stevedoring & T’sport (61-1318).

Karlander New Guinea Line’s cargo vessels call at Melbourne, Sydney, Port Moresby, Lae, Madang, Wewak, Manus, Kimbe, Rabaul, Popondetta.

Details from Karlander (Aust) Pty Ltd, 19-31 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-6301), Dalgety Shipping, 461 Bourke Street Melbourne (60-0731).

Australia - Solomons -

Northern Marianas - Taiwan -

Japan

Daiwa Line offers a four-weekly ser vice Sydney-Honiara-Guam-Taiwan- Japan with transhipment at Guam for Saipan.

Details Meridian Shipping & Trans port Agencies Pty Ltd, Box 3410 GPO, Sydney 2001 (29-4988), Tlx: AA25970.

Australia - Solomons -

Gilbert Is - Micronesia

Daiwa Line operates a container ser vice every 30 days from Sydney to Honiara, Kieta, Tarawa and Guam. Gizo cargoes transhipped at Honiara, Saipan, cargoes transhipped at Guam, Details Meridian Shipping & Trans port Agencies Pty Ltd, Box 3410 GPO, Sydney 2001 (29-4988), Tlx: AA25970.

Australia - Nauru -

Majuro

Nauru Pacific Line operates regular cargo /passenger service from Mel bourne to Nauru and Majuro.

Details Nauru Pacific Line, Nauru House, 80 Collins Street, Melbourne Nedlloyd Swire, 8 Spring Street, Sydney (2-0522)

Png - Uk/Continent

Bank Line operates regular cargo service from Kieta, Rabaul, Kimbe, Madang and Lae to Liverpool, Ham burg, Rotterdam, Antwerp and Lon don.

Details from Bank Line (A'asia) Pty Ltd, 1 York Street, Sydney (27-2041), Burns Philp (PNG) Ltd, PNG ports,

Png - Us

Bank Line operates regular cargo service from Kieta, Rabaul, Kimbe, Madang and Lae direct to New Orleans; calls at other US Gulf and East Coast ports on inducement.

Details from Bank Line (A’asia) Pty Ltd, 1 York Street. Sydney (27-2041); Burns Philp (PNG) Ltd, PNG ports,

Solomons - Usa -

Uk/Continent

Bank Line operates regular cargo service from Honiara, to New Orleans, Jverpool, Hamburg, Rotterdam and Antwerp.

Details from Bank Line (A’asia) Pty Jd, 1 York Street, Sydney (27-2041); rrading Co, Honiara (389).

Far East - Fiji - New

Zealand

New Zealand Unit Express (CNC, 4NOL, Nedlloyd) operates a three veekly cargo service from Hong Kong 0 Lautoka, Suva, NZ ports, Manila, (aoshiung, Keelung, Hong Kong.

Details from Nedlloyd, 8 Spring Street, Sydney (2-0522).

Nedlloyd operates monthly cargo lervice with three ships from Surabaya, Jakarta, Bangkok, Port Kelang and Singapore to Suva and NZ ports.

Details from Nedlloyd (Aust) Pty Ltd 1 Spring Street, Sydney (27-3801);

Burns Philp (SS) Co Ltd, Suva and Lau toka,

Japan - Nz - Png

China Navigation Co, with three ships operates a monthly cargo service from Japan to New Zealand calling at Lae on return journey.

Details Nedlloyd, 8 Spring Street, Sydney (2-0522).

Far East - Mid-S. Pacific

China Navigation Co's vessels oper ate a regular cargo service from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore to Rabaul, Wewak, Madang, Lae, Port Moresby, Honiara, New Hebrides, Noumea, Papeete and Samoa.

Details from Nedlloyd, 8 Spring Street, Sydney (2-0522).

Kyowa Shipping Co. Ltd, operates monthly services from Hong Kong, Taiwan, S. Korea and Japan, to Guam, Siapan, Solomons, New Caledonia, Fiji, Western and American Samoa, Tahiti, Cook Is., Tonga and New Hebrides.

Details: Hetherington Kingsbury Pty Ltd, 37-49 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-1671).

NYK Line, in conjunction with Daiwa Line, with container ships operates 30-day service from Moji, Kobe, Nagoya and Yokohama to Papeete, Pago Pago, Apia, Suva, Lautoka, Noumea, Sydney, Honiara, Kieta, Tarawa, Guam and Taiwan, Details: Union Bulkships Pty Ltd, 333-339 George Street, Sydney (2-0238).

North Europe - Tahiti -

New Caledonia

Hamburg-Sued operates monthly cargo services from Hamburg, Dunkirk and Le Havre to Papeete, Noumea, via Panama.

Details from Columbus Overseas Services Pty Ltd, 333 George Street, Sydney (290-2966), Columbus Mari time Services, 17 Albert Street, Auckland (77-3460).

Europe - Pacific Islands

Compagnie Generale Maritime oper ates services from Europe and Mediter ranean ports to Papeete and Noumea using three Ro-Ro and one multi purpose vessel thus ensuring a bi monthly sailing to and from.

Details Compagnie Generale Mari time, 12 Castlereagh Street, Sydney (231-3700).

Europe-Tahiti-W. Samoa

Fiji-N. Caledonia

Nedlloyd offers regular cargo ser vices from Northern Europe and UK to Papeete, Apia, Fiji and New Caledonia.

Details Nedlloyd (Aust) Pty Ltd, 8 Spring Street, Sydney (27-3801).

JAPAN - GUAM - FIJI - TAHITI -

Samoa - N. Caledonia -

Solomons - Gilberts

Daiwa Lines runs a monthly cargo service from Japan via Guam to Lau toka, Suva, Papeete, Pago Pago, Apia, Sydney, Noumea, Honiara, Tarawa, Guam.

Details from Burns Philp (SS) Co Ltd, Suva.

Nz-New Caledonia-Fiji

Pacific Forum Line operates a uni tised / palletised and reefer cargo ser vice from Lyttelton and Auckland to Napier, Noumea, Lautoka and Suva.

Other ports are included on inducement.

Details from Shipping Corporation of NZ Ltd, Auckland, Christchurch, Wellington, Burns Philp (SS) Company Ltd, GPO Box 355, Suva, Fiji (311 -777); Polynesia Shipping Services, Pago Pago; Union Steam Ship Co of NZ Ltd, Nukualofa or Pacific Forum Line, PO Box 655, Apia, W. Samoa.

NZ - N. CALEDONIA - N. HEBRIDES

-Png-Solomons

Sofrana Unilines with three ships op

erates to Vila and Santo, to Honiara and Papua New Guinea and to Noumea.

Details from Sofrana Unilines, 18 Customs Street, Auckland (773-279), PC Box 3614, Telex NZ2313.

Nz - Australia - New Caledonia

- Solomons - Gilberts -

Micronesia

Union Co/Daiwa Line operate a con tainer service from New Zealand through Sydney to Noumea, Honiara, Tarawa and Guam.

Details: Union Steam Ship Co of NZ Ltd, PC Box 12, Auckland, or Union Bulkships Pty Ltd, 333-339 George Street, Sydney, (2-0238).

NZ - FIJI - NORTH AMERICA (WC) Blue Star Line Crusader service to West Coast North America. Only direct service to and from New Zealand. Blue Star vessels call at Suva and Honolulu on NZ-US-West Coast voyages.

Details from Blueport ACT (NZ) Ltd, PC Box 192, Wellington (739-029), Burns Philp (SS) Co Ltd, GPO Box 355, Suva, Fiji (311-777).

Nz - Fiji

Reef operates a regular 18-day ser vice from Auckland to Suva and Lau toka.

Details from Reef Shipping Agencies Ltd. PC Box 3382, Auckland, NZ (77-1221-3).

Pacific Line with one ship operates fortnightly roro cargo service New Zealand, Lautoka, Suva.

Details: Sofrana Unilines, 18 Cus toms Street, Auckland (773-279) PC Box 3614, Telex: NZ2313.

Nz - Fiji - Gilberts

Solomons - Png

Pacific Forum Line operates a con

tainer, unitised/palletised and reefer cargo service from Lyttelton and Auckland to Suva, Port Moresby, Lae, Honiara, Tarawa, Madang, Lae and Moresby. Other ports are included on inducement.

Details from Shipping Corporation of NZ Ltd, Auckland, Christchurch and Wellington. Burns Philp (SS) Company Ltd, GPO Box 355, Suva, Fiji (311 -777) Sullivans, Honiara; Gilbert Islands Ship ping Corporation, Tarawa; Steamships Trading in Port Moresby, Lae and Madang or Pacific Forum Line, PC Box 655, Apia, W. Samoa Union Steam Ship Co of NZ operates a roll-on, roll-off, container/unitised service from Auckland to Lautoka- Suva-Pago Pago-Apia-Nuku’alofa on a 14 day frequency.

Details from Union Steam Ship Co of NZ Ltd, PC Box 12, Auckland or from Branch offices/agents in Fiji, Tonga and the Samoas.

Nz- Samoa - Tonga

Pacific Navigation of Tonga operates a four-weekly cargo service, Auckland - Nukualofa - Pago Pago - Apia - Auckland.

Details from McKay Shipping Ltd, Downtown House, Oueen Street, Auckland (33-656).

Warner Pacific Line services Onehunga (Auck) - Nukualofa/Vavau/ Apia fortnightly carrying general and freezer cargoes. Also Timaru - Nukualofa/Vavau/Apia every 21 days carrying freezer cargo.

Details from Air Marine Services (NZ) Ltd. PC Box 2505, Auckland (796-841), Telex NZ 21555.

NZ - COOK IS - NIUE -

Tahiti

Shipping Corporation of NZ Ltd oper ates cargo services based on pallets

and similar units from Auckland to Niue, • Cook Islands and Tahiti.

Details from the Shipping Corp of NZ Ltd, PO Box 3420, Auckland (797-210); Waterfront Commission, PO Box 61, Rarotonga, Lighterage and Stevedoring Co, Aitutaki, Niue Govt Offices, Niue Island, Compagnie Mari time Polynesienne, B’P’ 368, Papeete, Tahiti.

Uk - Fiji

The Bank Line operates a direct, fast monthly service from Hull to Suva and Lautoka.

Details from The Bank Line (Aus tralasia) Pty Ltd, 1 York St, Sydney (27-2041); Burns Philp (South Sea) Co Ltd, Suva and Lautoka.

Uk/N. Continent - Tahiti -

N. Caledonia - N. Hebrides

Bank Line operates regular cargo service from Hull, Hamburg, Bremen, Antwerp and Rotterdam to Papeete and Noumea.

Details from Bank Line (A’asia) Pty Ltd, 1 York Street, Sydney (27-2041); Ets A M Fare UTE, Papeete; Ets Ballande, Noumea.

Uk/N. Continent - Png -

Solomons

Bank Line operates regular cargo service from Hull, Hamburg, Bremen, Antwerp and Rotterdam to Port Moresby, Lae, Madang, Kimbe, Rabaul, Kieta and Honiara and on inducement to Yandina.

Details from Bank Line (A’asia) Pty Ltd. 1 York Street, Sydney (27-2041); Burns Philp (PNG) Ltd, PNG ports; Trading Co Honiara.

Honolulu - Samoas - Tonga

Warner Pacific Line operates a unit

ized/palletized and reefer cargo ser vice Honolulu-Pago Pago-Apia- Nuku’alofa. Line Islands and Suva are included on inducement.

Details from Hawaii-Pacific Maritime, Inc, PO Box 3264 Honolulu, HI (531-4841) Tlx: 723330.

San Francisco - Honolulu -

Nauru - Micronesia

Nauru Pacific Line operates regular conventional/container service from San Francisco and Honolulu to Majuro, Nauru, Ponape, Truk and Saipan.

Details from Nauru Pacific Line, Nauru House, 80 Collins Street, Mel bourne (653-5709); North American Maritime Agencies, 100 California Street, San Francisco, California 9411 (981-0343).

US - FIJI - TAHITI - NZ -

Australia

Bank and Savill Line Ltd, operates regular cargo services from US Gulf ports to Australia and NZ. Calls at Suva, Lautoka and Papeete on demand.

Details from Bank Line (A’asia) Pty Ltd, 1 York Street. Sydney (27-2041) or Howard Smith Industries Pty Ltd, 1 York Street, Sydney (27-5611).

Us - Tahiti ■ Samoa

Pacific Islands Transport operates a 'five/six weekly cargo service from North America west coast ports to Papeete, Pago Pago, Apia.

Details from Trans-Austral Shipping Pty Ltd, 19 Pitt Street, Sydney (27-2441).

Polynesia Line operates container and general cargo service from US west coast ports to Papeete and Pago Pago, Details from Polynesia Shipping Ser vices Inc,. PO Box 1478, Pago Pago (9-6799).

revival

The sandalwood trade, a major reason for a foreign presence in the South Pacific in the last century, is being revived in

Tonga.

The Tonga Chronicle reports that ‘sandalwood, one of Ton

ga’s most priceless culture

trees, is currently being

shipped to overseas markets in

large quantities at an alarming

rate for a very low price’. ’Anau Vuna, manager of Vuna and Tam Company Lim ited of Nukualofa, a sandal wood trader, said his firm

began exporting sandalwood

about seven months ago and

was operating profitably.

Forty workers were employed, he said, at a new factory at Halaleva. They were scraping the outer bark from the sandalwood leaving only the prized scented pith for export. Main supplies were being drawn from the small island of ’Eua.

The Tonga Forest Division has been doing its best in recent years to protect sandalwood and other culture trees.