[?]Moa Faces Constitutional

[?]ble, Bubble— and Trouble!

Changes-And Seethes A Little

n information supplied by Mr. C. Gardiner, of Malua, Western Samoa, in a letter dated April 11.

SN with 60 years’ experience of this Territory tell me that if the Samoans here get self rnment, civil war is inevitable, 5 not easy to convey all the nt facts and background in a r—but here are some of them, e body which will be elected or inated to act for the Samoans under present conditions, almost inly be unbalanced —too many ie section and too few of another i these sections are hopelessly jonistic one to another, jryone knows that the Samoans iivided up as followers of one her of the three chiefly families masese, Malietoa and Mataafa. argument is that, until these ms, reconcile their differences viewpoints, Samoa cannot be ssfully governed by a united, ;d body, which is the basis of cracy. s held here that the present Bt -up—apparently quiet and on the surface—is lopsided

and dominated by the Nelson family and connections.

It is claimed that all the Samoan MLA’s are related to each other by marriage, to the Nelson family and Tamasese group. In the Assembly itself, Mr. Betham is Tamasese’s brother-in-law, Mr, Moors is his uncle, Mr. Gurau’s daughter is married to Tualaulelei, and Mr.

Plowman is married to a member of the Mann family which, in turn, is understood to be related to the Nelsons.

When the Constitutional Conven tion was called together, the Euro peans elected nine additional Euro peans to assist the Convention. Only about half the electorate voted. Of the nine elected, seven or perhaps eight were either husbands of the Nelson girls, or first cousins or uncles. It has been stated here that only one of the nine—Mr. R. P.

Berking, a former German planter —was not a connection of the Nelsons.

There is no reproach upon these

elected people. On the contrary, they are generally esteemed. But if you accept those divisions of the Samoans among the chiefly families as fundamental, the dominance of the Tamasese-Nelson connections looms as a big difficulty in the country’s political future.

As is well known, the Reparations Estates were recently handed over to the Samoan Government. It be comes an important section of the Administration. The Directors of the new Trust Corporation are Tamasese, Mr. Meyer Snr., (father-in-law of one of the Nelson girls), and Mr. E.

Annandale (who is married to another Nelson girl). Not a word

can be said against the social or commercial standing of these three —but they all are members of the Tamasese group. Surely the choice was wide enough to have permitted the NZ authorities to have mixed the selection a little, and thus to have avoided political embarrass ment.

THE New Zealanders argue that these ancient chiefly divisions must be ignored, if Samoa is to make progress in the future as a united country. They may be right.

But the Samoan commoners talk constantly among themselves. The things that have been done—maybe unconsciously— by the NZ author ities in creating all this preliminary governmental machinery seem to point all the one way—and the Samoans are unhappy and disturbed.

The votes of the part-Europeans in this Territory, numbering thousands, are an important factor in future government. Politically, these people are quite unsophisti cated, and can be easily misled.

Strong feeling, based on the chiefly divisions, has been expressed among the Samoans in both Savaii and Upolu. One report is that Savaii may seek administrative separation from Upolu. Another is that a prominent Samoan leader remarked publicly that, as there now was a connection between the Tamasese and Mataafa families by marriage,

he hoped there would be no civil war.

Mataafa has just concluded a tour of Upolu, the declared purpose of which was to recruit members for his Planters’ Union, which has as its objectives the building of cocoa

driers, bulk sale of their proc and indenting of goods on a mission basis for the small Sar, stores. That seems reason enough, on a surface; but son the older Europeans wonder whi the organisation ends there, t

i some villages, there has been : of throwing out the chiefs and lishing the whole Matai system. the New Zealanders are wise jid skilful enough, they may get hrough this difficult period of isition without civil trouble. But laps their difficulty is not lack flsdom and skill, but lack of a >er appreciation of the ancient il systems upon which Samoan as a whole is built, le most conscientious product he best British schools can go y astray here if he does not ‘rstand Samoan history and ition —the implications of which blose to the core of their lives.