The Generosity Of Banabans
pp. 49-51 · Read in the full issue
Of Rabi
Suva, Mar. 23.
rHE Banabans of Ocean Island, approximately 1,000 of whom loved to Rabi, the Fijian island they ad bought, soon after the end of le Pacific War, are probably the lost prosperous of all the native copies of the South Pacific.
Not only are they doing well on abi with copra-production, but their ;serve funds, built up with Ocean >land phosphate royalties, continue j accumulate.
But if the Banabans are affluent icy are also remarkably generous, nd they have just made a new and haracteristic gesture. They have ;cently given £3,000 to the Fijians -half of it is to go to general urricane relief purposes in Fiji (Rabi scaped the hurricane) and the other alf towards the welfare of the Fijian attalion in Malaya.
Such Banaban generosity is not ew. The story is told of how, early i the Second World War, when ritish territories in the South Pacific ere raising a fund to pay for addi onal fighter planes for the Royal ,ir Force, the Banabans, then still n Ocean Is., told the Western acific High Commission that they anted to give £lO,OOO in Aus alian currency.
It is said that the Commission ictfully suggested that this sum was ither a large gift for the little com lunity. But the Banabans had made p their minds to give £lO,OOO to le RAF and they insised on giving 1110,000 —only this time they made Sterling instead of Australian urrency.
Since the Banabans moved to Rabi ley have weighed in substantially i such matters as the Colony’s oyal wedding gift in 1948, and the /ar Memorial Anti-Tuberculosis ppeal in 1949, as well as in several nailer campaigns. Individual Bana ans have said that they welcome ay opportunity to show their ppreciation of the way in which le Fijian people willingly allowed a ranger-community to take over a aluable island of the Fijian home nd after the phosphate workings had lade Ocean Island incapable of ipporting its indigenous people.
Editorial Note
Before the Second World War, as ie phosphate workings curtailed lore and more of the Banabans’ ving area. Rabi, a fertile island ist north of Taveuni in Fiji was
purchased by community funds. But before any planned migration could begin, war came and in 1942 Ocean Island was occupied by the Japs.
At the time there were 700 Banabans (Ocean Islanders) plus a similar number of Gilbertese labourers together with their wives and families. The Japs retained some of these people as fishermen but de ported the rest to Nauru, the Caro lines and Tarawa. They were all cruelly treated. In 1945 the task of
collecting the survivors of these exiled people began and in December of that year about 600 Banabans and 300 Gilbertese moved into Rabi, their new possession, and there, after the initial period of adjustment, they appear to have settled down.
The adjustment they made should not be underestimated. The fact that Rabi was fertile and beautiful and Ocean Island barren and un productive did not prevent the older Banabans pining for their old home land. Rabi had been a Lever Bros, plantation and was taken over as such, as a going concern. But the Banabans had not previously been :opra producers nor did they know anything of* the business of growing Eheir own food in rich Rabi soil— -3r much of working at all, for that natter. About 50 Fijians remained Dn Rabi to teach the Banabans ;omething of these unknown arts, aut even this was apparently re garded by the Banabans with mixed ; eelings.
According to a high WPHC afficial they are not too sure of the arge, bushy-haired Fijians whom egend has taught them are .fight lappy, hungry cannibals and at irst, were far from happy at the bought of settling on a small island n the heart of a Group inhabited by hese wild men.
Presumably, however, they are learning that they have little to fear from the Fijians. The Banabans are learning to grow and to eat new foods; are making good incomes out of copra and are still enjoying the royalties from phosphate mined back in Ocean Island. They are the richest of the Pacific Islands peoples and have their own ideas of spend ing their money, some of which do not always meet with the approval of their mentors, the Western Pacific High Commission. The Banabans have made some mistakes in learn ing to live on Rabi but most ob servers are agreed that the trans plantation has been a most successful experiment.