Mr. Powles And

A Reader Disagrees—

Samoan Service

• The article in “PIM”, Fehrua: page 25, in praise of Mr. G.

Powles, for nine years High Cox missioner for New Zealand Western Samoa, has been criticisi hy an Apia reader. In a letter “PIM” editors, he writes : THE PIM article has cause considerable surprise in Wests Samoa where the opinioc stated by the writer are in way shared by the public, Samoaf and European alike.

The fact is that Samoa or rath the Samoan Government is facii the worst financial crisis it has ev experienced and that this state affairs is solely due to fc unrealistic and blundering poll for which the High Commission and the Financial Secretary, N L. M. Cook, were responsible. T financial policy of the past ft years amounted practically to spending spree, without regard the economic resources of a pun agricultural country subject to the hazards of an agricultui economy—bad crops, bad prices a; other troubles. All this in spite frequent warnings from Samo< leaders and the Legislati Assembly. In addition, the inclusii of the expected grant of £126,0 from the Western Samoan Tru Estates, without any defim promise or guarantee that suchj grant was in fact possible, coc stituted an additional blunder whii brought the financial difficulties a climax and necessitated mo stringent retrenchment in Goven ment expenditure and the dismiss; of hundreds of Governme employees—schoolteachers, nursE employees of the Public Won Department and others.

"Accumulation"

Past financial policy for whii the High Commissioner and ti Financial Secretary were responsiT resulted in the wholly unwarrantt accumulation of a large and e cessive amount of stores, main building materials, water pipe lumber, etc. These stores cann be used in the foreseeable futu owing to the abandonment by tt Government of practically economic development work, a i are at present deteriorating fas requiring additional staff to tas care of the large compounds.

Further evidence of the r efficiency of the Executive Goven ment is its failure to introdu commercial advertising at tt Western Samoan broadcasts station 2AP, as resolved by tt previous Legislative Assembly

arch April last year. The Govern ent at that time indicated that venue from Commercial Advertis g would practically pay for the lole cost of the station 2AP and us relieve the Government of e financial burden of spending me £6,000 to £B,OOO on broad sting.

There are numerous other stances of financial maladmini •ation in the recent past, many ses of dishonesty and straight t theft by Government employees e to complete lack of control and pervision by senior officials in arly all Government departments, h the Annual Report of the ntroller and Auditor-General on j Public Accounts of Western tnoa for the financial year ended cember 31, 1956, no less than 39 es of irregularities in connection h public moneys and stores are ;d. he opinions of Mr. Alan Gordon 21, February, PIM ) and his a that New Zealand should ke available large grants and ns of money to keep the social /ices in Western Samoa going, not shared by Samoan leaders d believe it preferable for the ritory to remain self-sustaining n when stringent retrenchment st be enforced for years to come.

"Lack of Planning"

he main weakness of the loan Government headed by the h Commissioner, Mr. G. R. des, has always been the com e lack of planning for economic slopment and the spreading of requisite expenditure over a iber of years so as to remain lin the normal revenue of the itry. istead, major and minor pro > were rushed through with utmost speed regardless not of the financial and economic urces available, but also dis rding the capacity of the Public ks Department to cope with e works efficiently and omically. This resulted in mous losses in road building, truction of Government build and Hydro-electric installa 5. ie whole financial policy of the eminent was based on senti t and appeasement rather than commonsense and realistic [deration of the available irces of Western Samoa and ffore, inevitably, led to financial ter and the collapse of existing 1 services. e Samoan public is in full rnient with PlM’s praise of er Administrator Sir Alfred bull who, when he departed Samoa left behind him an •ly Administration and a Tal Reserve Fund of £500,000.

Powles can possibly be ted with good intentions in ng social services in Western

Samoa regardless of realities; and he has a pleasing personality. But to call his service in Samoa

“distinguished” and praise his work in the Territory is unwarranted and not justified by the results of his administration. The Samoan public wishes Mr. Powles well and it would like to see him appointed to a New Zealand diplomatic post abroad. But as far as Western Samoa is concerned, Mr. Powles’ administration cannot by any stretch of imagination be called successful and beneficial and the appointment of a new High Com missioner, if possible with some business experience, would be sincerely welcomed.

I am, etc.,

A. M. Gurau.

Apia, W. Samoa.

March 31, 1957.