'to the South Seas vision'

New Zealand needs to return 'to the South Seas vision'

A strong call to New Zealand to take a more realistic policy in the South Seas—to re-establish the early vision of New Zealand as the heart and centre of Polynesia—was made by Sir Guy Powles, a former High Commissioner of Western Samoa, in Auckland in August.

UR GUY said New Zealand had to ) re-assess its priorities over the hole field of foreign aid, but parti ilarly the extent to which it should ve aid to Asia at the expense of e Pacific Islands. Asia aid was eded, certainly.

But New Zealand was not part of >uth-East Asia. While closer as eiation with any Asian country auld naturally be welcomed, this ight not to be achieved at the ex use of New Zealand’s more im ediate destiny in the South-West icific.

Sir Guy’s statements were made in major address to the triennial con rence of the New Zealand Federa >n of University Women on August Since 1962, Sir Guy has been sw Zealand’s official Ombudsman, it was speaking in his private pacity. He was in charge in West n Samoa from 1949-60, and NZ gh Commissioner to India from 60-62.

In his address, which was on New aland’s role in the world, he rveyed New Zealand’s external airs. He said New Zealand and istralia had three similar anxieties the future of their relations with ia, the extent to which they should d could rely on the United States, d their capacity to survive as ible economies with relatively high ndards of living.

Dependent

Any instability of Australia’s sition could communicate itself to ;w Zealand. But there was a sharp ntrast between Australia’s present f-reliance and New Zealand’s Inerability. The majority of Aus lia’s exports now went to the cific area. For Australia Japan had :ome the new Britain of Pacific de.

No doubt New Zealand hoped to low Australia’s footsteps, but ile the prospect of Britain’s entry o the Common Market was only itating to Australia it was

“positively frightening” to New Zea land.

“There is no effective substitute anywhere in the world today for our lamb and butter market in Britain,”

Sir Guy said, “and if we lose this we are lost indeed.”

New Zealanders were now face to face with the fact that the country was in economic difficulties, and had to put its house in order. But the cleaning had to be of its external policies too, and those policies that were no longer of any use had to be thrown away.

New Zealand had to give more aid to those people who needed her aid, and one of her roles was to act as a bridge towards the long distance goal of world racial harmony. The country might well establish some thing like an External Aid Board to co-ordinate and plan.

On New Zealand’s role in the South Seas Sir Guy said (and the following quotes are verbatim);

South Seas aid

The Maori people share the characteristics of intelligence, courage and good humour with the rest of the Polynesian race, who live among our island screen to the north and east. Here New Zealand suffers from a curious blindness. The average New Zealander, and most of the media of public information, pay little attention to our immediate area of interest and concern—the Pacific Islands.

Our papers are full of the riots in America, the Vietnam war, the Middle East crisis, the perennial British problem over the EEC, but the Pacific Islands are almost never mentioned, and when they are many reports are bedevilled by inaccuracies which betray a lack of knowledge and understanding.

I suggest that we have a clear role of guidance and assistance to those territories with which we have parti cular association—namely Western Samoa, the Cook Islands, Niue and

the Tokelau Islands, and to this group should be added Tonga— making a predominantly Polynesian area, peopled by our own race. Then we should also include Fiji— not Polynesian in race, but intimately associated in history and interest with ourselves and with the Island groups I have just mentioned.

Our grandfathers had the vision— of New Zealand as the heart and centre of all Polynesia. The vision has faded.

It was only partly an imperialist vision—it was mainly idealistic.

There was a strong Christian con tent —and there still is. The links the Christian churches of all denomi nations provide today between us and these islands are invaluable.

Of course, it is to our advantage to have the Islanders friendly to us —we would not look very well in the eyes of the world if they, or some of them, became our enemies, or subject to hostile interests.

Indeed much of the respect we gained in the United Nations and in the emerging Commonwealth was because of what were thought to be our enlightened policies towards our island territories, but we cannot ride that particular wave indefinitely.

NZ representation wanted

Then there are the British, Austra lian, and French territories—the Solo mons, New Guinea, New Hebrides, New Caledonia, and Tahiti, and the sweep of the French Islands. In none of these, nor in Fiji, do we have any diplomatic representations. Apart from some very real church contacts, we know nothing of them.

We ought therefore to re-examine

New Zealand’s role in the Pacific Islands and see how it ought to be changed.

Governmental aid to the Cook Islands, Niue, and the Tokelaus con stitutes the largest single item of New Zealand aid overseas—about one quarter to one-third of the total.

It exceeds aid given to the whole of South and South-East Asia under the Colombo Plan, SEATO, and the Government contribution to VSA.

Actually it should not be counted as external aid at all—these islands are New Zealand territory and their inhabitants are New Zealanders, just as for the Chatham Islands.

A recent research writer compared Government aid to Niue at £63/15/per person, and to the Cook Islands at £45/18/- per head in 1965, with the per capita figure of less than £1 in the case of India, which was receiving about a fifth of all the aid given by Western countries in 1964.

NZ forgets history

The average aid per person in the remaining British colonies at that time evidently was under £5. Other South Pacific aid figures quoted for the same year were Fiji (£3/11/6) Papua-New Guinea (£l2/19/-) and Western Samoa (£1). Commenting on the low level of aid to Western Samoa, the writer observed: “This might have been considered the price of independence, as only Tonga, the other independent country of the South Pacific, received less”.

Whether or not this is a valid comment, the level of New Zealand aid to Western Samoa is surely quite unjustifiably low.

We forget history. By our own act we captured Western Samoa from the Germans by force of arms; we actively secured for ourselves the League of Nations mandate over Samoa; and then the United Nations Trusteeship.

We deliberately injected ourselves into Samoan history, without the con sent of the Samoans, and by doing so we took on our shoulders a per petual responsibility for their well being; a responsibility which is not released by their independence, any more than the responsibility for the well-being of the Cook Islanders is released by their self-government.

Furthermore, it is sad that this historic partnership as it used to be called, which has had so many re warding features for both New Zea land and Samoa, seems to be losing vitality.

Our Pacific role must change there fore to a more balanced and realistic one. We should do much more for Samoa, and more for Tonga and Fiji. A recent far-seeing speech of the Minister of Island Territories, Hon. Mr, Hanan, has given a valuable lead here.

We need a re-assessment of prio rities, needs, and duties, over the whole field of our foreign aid, parti cularly the extent to which we should give to Asia at the expense of our Pacific Islands. Which has the greater claim to our attention— malnutrition in Vietnam or malnu trition in Samoa?

We should not forget that in our neighbouring Pacific Islands our aid could be crucial and have a profound effect, altering the course of history in our favour, and for their benefit,

whereas, in the large and distressfu scene of Asia, our aid, comparatively small as it must be, may be lost.

Further, a really thrusting suppor by New Zealand of the internationa organisation which belongs to th« South Pacific, the South Pacific Com mission, would have great influence but in ECAFE we have to take < minor role. These are difficul matters, where an External Aid Boan would be most useful.

Warm hearts needed

In addition to aid, is there anythin* else we should do? Can we offei these islands really sympathetn advice in their problems?

These people, too, have beei rushed into the 20th century as ou: Maori people have. For them, too we can talk of “social revolution’ and “explosive population growth”.

Over the whole of the islands are< we are talking about, 47 per cent, o the population are under 15—mud the same as for the Maoris. Thei; cultures have not been suffocated by that of a white majority, as had th< Maori culture, but their educationa

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facilities are well below those of th Maori—there are children today i Samoa who do not go to school £ all, and never will go to school; an for those who do go to school, thei parents have to pay fees.

No matter what we are able t do, a warm-hearted approach goe a long way. But to be able to offe this we must at least know, and tr to understand.

This means official representation particularly in Fiji, which is a urgent necessity, certainly in Noumei the headquarters of French Oceank and also in Tonga.

The last conference of th National Party passed a remit: “Th£ the Government be urged to tak the initiative in extending New Ze£ land’s influence in the Islands of th South Pacific”. This indeed is wh£ we should do—take the initiative and the passing of the remit by th Conference is in itself a most er couraging initiative.

The old answer will be that w can’t afford this—l suggest that i the long run we can’t afford not t do it, and in any case the cost, fo us, would be minimal. We coul begin straightaway by giving ou representative in Samoa wider func tions.

Work with Australia

In carrying out this role, Ne\ Zealand would be doing somethin pre-eminently her own. No othe country in the world can do this Others can aid the Asians, suppor the United Nations, send troop away to foreign lands, but only Ne\ Zealand can play this Polynesia! role.

In pursuing our Asia-Pacifi regionalism, we ought and must dea with the Asian side along with Aus tralia —closely aligned with her, an< steadily more so as time goes on In this large region we cannot stan< alone.

But the Pacific Islands area i where we must look to our own duO —our moral responsibility—and Nev Zealand may, perhaps, in doing some thing she ought to do, for the sak< of others, not for herself, at las find maturity as a nation. This shouk be her constant endeavour, and no her changing role. • The Papua-New Guinea tele phone directory has been increasec in size by 17 pages, these beinj needed to contain the entries foi more than 1,000 new subscribers.