"Turning The

Is Tonga Really

Corner?"

Letter to the Editor.

IT is with a certain reluctance that I encroach upon your valuable space to make some comment upon the con tribution from your own correspondent, appearing, in the December issue of your journal, on the subject of Finance.

So far is the tone of the article from the acknowledged acceptance of the real situation by every section of the commu* nity, except the Government and its em ployees, that it is obviously either Gov ernment-inspired or actually written by one of the complacent crew.

In a Kingdom of a few scattered is lands containing a population of 32,860 (about as many, say, as would be in and about George Street, Sydney, on any day except Sunday), to have a budget in the neighbourhood of £56,000. is in itself ar imposition. And on such a budget, to have a surplus of £17,534, so far from being a matter of exultation, should cause the Government to hide its head in shame, alike for its gross inefficiency, as its brutal heartlessness.

It is not possible within the limits of available space to recount in full the dreary story of how the exploitation of the Tongans has been developed into the fine art it is to-day, of the sacrifice

of British interests, and of the building up of a top-heavy, largely inefficient and highly expensive governmental structure which spreads its baneful influence and leans its oppressive weight upon a hitherto free and happy people.

Suffice it to say that, during the inflated prices for copra, just after the war, when the Kingdom’s exports were worth about £300,000 per annum (as against £58.591 in 1936 and £97,762 in 1937, according to your correspondent), the then British Agent and Consul, with his two satellites and place-hunters which he elevated to the Tongan Cabinet, con-

ceived and put into being the gigantic racket that is to-day crushing the very soul out of these natives. All very well, perhaps, on an earning capacity of a third of a million sterling; but brutal, heartless and disgusting on the little country’s annual wealth for several years past, and what it is likely to be in the future.

There are at this moment thousands of summonses out, or about to be issued, against Tongans for not paying their head tax. Some of these taxes are years in arrear, and will never be got. Two or three large native houses to accommodate

some hundreds of defaulters in relays are to be erected, and the men turned on public works, such as improving the waterfront. But what is the use of ap plying a bit of plaster when the limb re quires amputation? While writing, news has been received of the suicide of one of these taxpayers.

At the village of Veitogo, 5J miles from Nukualofa, two policemen had arrested one Uhfia to bring him to Court for stealing. He was in arrears to the ex tent of a year’s head tax. He complained of thirst and asked to be allowed to climb a coconut tree to get a nut, a request with which the police complied. When at the top of the tree he Informed those beneath that he was not going with the police, and notwithstanding repeated re quests to come down, he threw himself away from the trunk and fell to the ground. He was taken into Nukualofa to the hospital where he expired shortly after admission.

It is to be hoped this will prove an iso lated case, but the murmurings of dis content, and even of revolt, among the population are audible.

I am, etc.,

De Bunk.

Tonga, 22 2/’3B.