governing ’ themselves^'That* l is 1 why
pp. 5-6 · Read in the full issue
“Australian New Guinea" —Or What?
JHE prevailing idea that the Terri- A tory of Australian New Guinea has taken the place of Papua and the nandated Terntory of New Guinea, and that it already has passed under a semi-permanent military administration, is quite wrong.
Some military gentlemen, in the exuberance of their new administrative responsibility, began to use the term “Australian New Guinea,” without authority, and this went on for many months But it has been noticed lately that the official use of the term has disappeared—it is used now, if at all, merely for purposes of non-official convenience.
It is the obvious name for the united territories, and there is no doubt that, some day, when union is complete, it will be adopted. But a great deal must happen before that day dawns.
Australia has the Papua Act, which creates the Territory of Papua, and the Mandate from the League of Nations, under which she holds New Guinea. The Papua Act could be amended, of course; but what of the League of Nations Mandate? jyrANDATES can be ignored and force substituted. Japan did that, when she walked out of the League in 1935, and tore up the Mandate which gave her the authority to rule over the Marshall and Caroline Islands, and which she had promised honourably to observe. But even if Great Britain and Australia were not bound by considerations of honour to
observe the Mandate over New Guinea, they would be bound by considera tions of expediency.
No leader of the United Nations has made any pronouncement or offered any opinion about the future of the League of Nations—probably because two of the greatest among them, United States and Russia, were not members of the League. But, when the war is over, the position of both the League, and of the Terri tories which it disposed by mandate, must receive the most serious con sideration of the United Nations.
The use of the elaborate and ex pensive structure of the League, as a means of keeping world affairs from drifting again to chaos and war, will certainly be urged. And there seems to be no practicable reason why it should not be used—always provided, of course, that the nations can agree upon a way of putting teeth into the League. Of all the anachronisms of the period between the two World Wars, none was more tragic and pitiful than “the toothless old lady of Geneva,” who watched the Japs over run Manchuria, the Italians seize Abyssinia, and the Nazis smash down upon their neighbours, and could do nothing about it.
BUT, whether the League is or is not revived, the Mandated Territories must go into the inter national melting pot, for disposal at the peace conference table. Terri tories like New Guinea, incapable of self-government, must be taken care
governing ’ themselves^'That* l is 1 why Britain’s hands must be kept clear and clean. She dare not compromise her Self, at this stage, by allowing any rhangp nuinea ndminis tration guinea aammis In p ac ifi c there are three Mandated Territories—New Guinea (Australia) Western Samoa (New Zealand) and Marshall and Caroline islands ’ (Japan). New Guinea obviously must be administered by a competent State, and that will be either Australia or some new tropical Dominion or State formed out of the many small Territories of similar character which lie just south of the equator. The future of the Marshall- Caroline Territory depends entirely upon the condition of Japan at the en d of the war. gut the future of Western Samoa may be very interesting. At present, New Zealand holds Samoa under a “c” class Mandate, which presumes that the Samoans are a primitive people (like those of New Guinea) and incapable of governing them selves. That, of course, is nonsense.
The Samoan people are as competent to govern themselves as are the Tongans—with, probably, some kind of sympathetic European guidance, such as Tonga receives from the British Colonial Office. New Zealand Bumbledom will advance a dozen reasons why the Samoans should not have self-government; but the final word will lie with the Americans, whose influence will dominate Poly nesia, for a long time to come.
IT may be seen, therefore, that until the Mandated Territories have been through the post-war melting pot, it is futile to speculate about the future of “Australian New Guinea.”
The Territories may not be “moulded nearer to our heart’s desire” until existing machinery has been shat tered; and the latter includes the Papua Act, of Australia; the Mandate of the League of Nations; and the formal appointments of Sir Walter McNicoll, as Administrator of New Guinea, and of Mr. Leonard Murray, as Administrator of Papua. It is significant that, although the ad ministrative services of both Terri tories have been suspended, the appointments of the two Adminis trators have not been cancelled or interfered with.
The Territories necessarily are under military rule. But, despite all the joyous hopes and ambitions of the many officials who cluster around Port Moresby, in military uniforms, it clearly is the present intention of the Australian Labour Government to revert to the Papuan and New Guinea civil administrations as soon as practicable, and to permit the in evitable changes to take place on that basis, rather than to dump all the Territories’ machinery into a melting pot now, under the control of semi-, military cliques which often have only a vague notion of what they are doing.