Morning After The Night Before
p. 51 · Read in the full issue
From R. F. Rankin, in Apia.
A cocktail party the night before, a new beer hall catering to politicians, and balmy tropical weather, all proved too much for Western Samoa’s parliamentarians on November 24.
Noticing an unusual number of empty chairs when Parliament opened as usual at 9 a.m., Speaker Amoa Tausilia demanded a roll call.
This revealed that of 47 members only 20 had turned up for work.
With 50 per cent, attendance required for a quorum, the Speaker adjourned the House until the following morning.
Parliament had been convened only the day before to discuss the 1966 Budget.
Still echoing round the empty chamber were the words of the Minister of Finance Mr. G. F. D. Betham, when he had presented his Budget two weeks earlier.
“In the four years of independence, Parliament has recognised its responsibility to the people of our country to provide them and their children with an economy designed to raise the standards of living which they have every right to expect,” he said.
Obviously members agreed with Mr. Betham that any suggestion that a state of panic or crisis existed was merely a figment of the imagination.