Late O. F. Nelson
p. 45 · Read in the full issue
He Created the Mau and the Mau Made Samoa a Nation
IN its issue of March 3, the Christ church “Press” paid a remarkable tribute to the late Hon. O. F. Nelson, of whom it said; “Nelson had many of the qualities that go to make greatness—the indefinable but unmistakable ability to dominate other men. penetrating shrewdness, a persistence that wore down opposition, a gift of imagination that at times turned his speeches into high oratory, and a remarkable turn for organisation. If he fell short of greatness, it was less because of anything he lacked than because fate compelled him to play out his part on a miniature stage.”
The Mau
CONCERNING Mr. Nelson’s services to Samoa, “The Press” said: For a European it is difficult, perhaps impossible, to estimate the value of the work Nelson did for Western Samoa. His enemies have accused him of exploiting the Samoan people commercially and using them politically to further his many feuds with officialdom. His friends have pictured him as a patriot willing to suffer long exiles for his convictions and argued that he could, by becoming a political conformist, have lived out his life in comfort and affluence.
On the political side, his great achieve ment was to build up the Mau from an obscure revolutionary group to a political movement commanding the allegiance of all but an insignificant minority of the Samoan people.
To the political scientist, the Mau is as interesting a political organisation as is to be found in any part of the world.
Grafted on to the Samoan hierarchy of chiefs, it has in the brief space of 20 years, and without disturbing the basic structure of the village community, changed the Samoans from a loosely-knit group of tribes to something very close to a nation.
In New Zealand, the Mau has a bad name. It has twice been proscribed as an illegal organisation. On occasions it has brought the Territory to the verge
of serious troubles. Another charge against it is that it has hampered the development qf necessary health services in the village's.
Against this must be set the important fact that the Samoans, alone among the Polynesians, are adapting their social system to changed conditions and are showing the beginnings of political con sciousness and capacity for self-govern ment. The credit for this % goes almost entirely to the Mau, and scarcely at all to the fumbling and timid efforts of the New Zealand Government and the Ad ministration to apprentice the Samoans to politics.
And the Mau, in its present form, is mainly the result of Nelson’s genius for leading and organising the Samoans.
Will it fall to pieces without him? When enough time has elapsed to enable that question to be answered, some estimate will be possible of the worth of Nelson’s achievement.
In the meantime , his career should serve as a warning that if the Dominion assumes responsibilities in the field of tropical administration it must be armed with knowledge and understanding as well as with good intentions.