Magazine Section

Territories Talk-Talk

By "Tolala"

AS this is the season of Peace on Earth, Goodwill to all Men, let me wish you as happy a Christmas as it is possible to have with East and West snarling at each other, and trite remarks being bandied about concerning the use of the atom bomb.

Reference to the present snarling re minds me of remarks made to me in 1944 by an Indian Medical Officer (we were both guests of the Japs at the time) re lating to India’s New Messiah, who had foretold in detail (according to my in formant) the Second World War some years before it broke, and stated also that following it, another war would break out between the USA and the USSR with ultimate victory for the former.

We’ll let it go at that, and change the subject.

I SEE where one Arthur Westhoven, a former War Disposals Commission executive “will remove war goods from the Rabaul-Kokopo area.” Apparently he has tendered for the job and the govern ment will have first right to buy all goods found. The report adds; “The new ten der basis marks the end of the days when speculators made fortunes out of army goods.”

Tut, tut! Surely not! —Any way, it’s nice to know the game is to be kept clean.

I wonder if there is a family connection between Arthur and Joseph Charles of the same name; the latter was at one time chairman of the Disposals Committefe of the Ministry of Munitions; Public Service Arbitrator and so forth? There should still be a few good pickings left in some of those outsized Jap fox-holes around Rabaul.

FLYING saucers are everyday news, but now we have flying houses. A Lae report tells of Qantas flying out housing material from Bulolo to Lae, and a complete house is landed in Lae in five DC3 trips. The Qantas settlement was officially opened early this month and has 23 houses for staff quarters. Setting a good example to the Administration it seems.

SOUTH PACIFIC” is a small periodical produced monthly by the Australian School of Pacific Administration, and usually consists of articles of a high-brow nature, dealing with colonial administra tion. In the November issue, however, there is an illuminating extract taken from the “Report of the United Nations Visiting Mission to Trust Territories in the Pacific on New Guinea, August 15, 1950.”

Personally, I have seen little reference to the activities of this Mission, but ap parently it delved into the doings of one Paliau of Manus, an indigene of that group who collected six months hard labour in April, 1950, for spreading false reports and what-have-you. I strongly suspect that the famed Paliau is closely related to, if not the same gent who was an ex-police boy during the Jap regime in Rabaul, and more familiarly known as Sam. He was popular with the Jap Kempei Tai and one of those who were re ported to have witnessed many of the executions of our airmen and others.

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P w^r lb ir srm5 rm , ed “ i for the sowing Had the native never discovered that the whiteman had feet of clay there would never have been all this social and political mutiny in the form of cults and so forth. We only have ourselves to blame for a great deal of the trouble as a result of the attitude adopted by so many Europeans towards the native. A quality we can never recover in a black country, once it is lost, is prestige. Nowadays there are so many who have no desire to recover it; some who have never known it existed.

A , er RRENT example of the changed attitude in native countries is the fact that the British Colonial Office cannot find applicants for hundreds of luxurious jobs with annual salaries rangmg from £2,000 to £2,500. In an endeavour to secure applicants the Colonial Office issued a booklet painting rosy pictures of hfe m the outposts of the Empire,” but frankly stated “There is no longer such a thing as the Whiteman’s prestige.”

That is a grim statement, to say the least, and from a nation upon whose flag the sun never sets!

(CHANNELS choked in Moresby and J Canberra” reads a cross-heading in one of Editor Robson’s articles on the Territory (PIM, November) and quotes informed people as suggesting decentral isation and delegation of authority to escape the many bottle-necks.

I have often wondered whether the Territory would not have been far better off if its High Authority had been located about 10,000 miles farther away than Can berra. In German times with no radio, and the nearest cable station at Yap in the Carolines, Governor Hahl adminis tered the colony with little interference from Berlin. He had the power and was expected to carry on according to the broad lines of policy. He also had the ability. Ever since the Territory came under Melbourne and then Canberra, it has been the shuttle-cock of political battledores.

THE inadequate salary of the Adminis trator —as compared with his oppo sites in British Malaya and Nigeria —was mentioned not so long ago by Mr.

Osborne, MHR, in the House when the estimates were under discussion, and £5 million was ear-marked for P-NG, which he claimed was by no means enough for the needs of the Territory.

Remember that TNG was self-support ing and building up a reserve in the B 4 years?

The same member referred to the Ad ministration Service as “patchy,” except at the top where there were men “of whom any Colonial administration could be proud.”

More recent events, judging by com plaints from the Public Service rank and file in PM seem to indicate that if salaries and working conditions for the lower grades are not vastly improved there soon will be no service in the Territory at all. (Continued next page.)

!n fact had they been wharfles or coal miners they would have been out on strike years ago. The Head of the Public Service in P-NG is by no means a winner in the Popularity Stakes.

A DOLLAR-SAVING plan recently evolved by the Australian Govern ment. may not be accepted as a popular idea by Territories’ motorists ac customed to having the latest stream-lined cars from the US.

The plan is to import North American chassis to Australia, fit them with bodies there, then ship the assembled units to P-NG. I can see some of the more choosey Asiatics (accustomed in these days to nothing but the best) taking rather a dim view of this procedure and wondering why dollar-earning copra can not foot the bill. (Ed. Note: Before the war, if not now, cars imported direct from the United States to New Guinea were, because of favourable tariff, very much cheaper than similar cars in Australia. This passion for forcing everything through the Aus tralian bottleneck will probably mean that Territories residents will wait two or three years for a car, if they get it then.

It is doubtful if the saving in dollars will do much to restore the balance of trade.) BITS AND PIECES . . . World traveller and author, Hakon Mielche of Den mark has published another book, "After you, Colombus.” He wrote some good stuff about the islands several years ago. . . . Minister Spender told the House recently that second-hand copra sacks were now allowed to enter P-NG and that if any planter could not get them to let the Minister know about it.