Denies Allegations by Critic

Captain Hughes Rebuffed

GEIC Resident Commissioner Denies Allegations by Critic

Allegations made by Captain W. H. Hughes that the “British way of life” was being forced on the Gilbert and Ellice Islanders and that the indigenous people of the Colony were still “living in the Stone Age” were emphatically denied by the Resident Commissioner (Mr. M. L. Bernacchi) when he arrived at New Plymouth, New Zealand, on August 15.

M* R. BERNACCHI, en route to the United Kingdom on leave, travelled to New Zealand ;from Ocean Island in the Norwegian phosphate ship Arna.

I Captain Hughes’s allegations, made in June, when he was also en route to Britain, were widely pub licised in New Zealand and quoted in PIM. f They had caused the greatest presentment among the Islanders, said Mr. Bernacchi, and he had [.received many requests from New Zealand for a denial.

I The Gilbert and Ellice Islanders, he added, were among the most ,loyal of the Queen’s subjects in the British Commonwealth.

Captain Hughes, Mr. Bernacchi continued, had been described m some reports as a missionary. He was not. He was an employee of the London Missionary Society, and his work had been primarily to look after the teacher-training of the mission pastors, who were schoolteachers in the villages. \ The pastors, at the request of the Government, were given a year’s teacher-training during their three years’ training. (The UK Colonial Development and Welfare Fund had aided the sending of two missionary students to Christchurch, NZ. for teacher-training. Both students had objected strongly to what Captain Hughes had said).

Mr. Bernacchi said he had never before heard of the title “Director of Missionary Education and the Teachers’ Training College.” Full time teacher-training was under taken by the GEIC Government. Captain Hughes also looked after other educational matters in which the mission was interested, but, other than having a Government grant towards his salary, he was not connected with the Government.

WHEN making a statement to the NZ Press Association, Mr.

Bernacchi produced a telegram from the London Missionary Society’s foreign secretary in London which stated: “Regret press reports purporting carry statements of Hughes. Dissociate ourselves entirely from views there expressed.

Letter following”. The telgram was signed by the Rev. C. S. Craig.

The Gilbert and Ellice Islanders were exceptionally intelligent and were not, as Captain Hughes had said, thousands of years behind the times, Mr. Bernacchi continued.

At the moment the percentage of fully literate Gibertese was 89 and of Ellice Islanders 97, in their own languages.

The Civil Service, clerical admini stration, teaching and professional positions were manned entirely by indigenous Islanders, except for some key positions.

CAPTAIN HUGHES had said that until five years ago the Islanders were happy under the rule of “a couple of Englishmen and a native clerk.”

The Resident Commissioner replied that in 1950 there were 45 European officers and 58 native clerks in the Colony. Now, five years later, there were 41 European officers and 56 native clerks.

The policy was to replace European officers with natives as the Islanders were brought to a sufficient education standard.

Even the principles of British

justice were applied by natives and in native courts.

Lastly, Mr. Bernacchi denied Captain Hughes’s statement that the GEIC people were taxed more heavily than those of any other British Colony. He said that there was no tax on basic foodstuffs imported into the Colony, and the indigenous people did not pay rates.

All tax revenue was returned to the islands in services.