are Ellice Islanders

Some of their best friends are Ellice Islanders

A leading Gilbertese has written us this commentary on our report describing the ill-feeling between Gilbertese and the Ellice Islanders, which appeared in February PIM. He asks us not to dis close his name.

I read with interest the February PIM in which there were many articles and photographs about the GEIC, and for this I would like to thank your “roving staff writer”.

There is, however, a point on which I would like to add my com ments, and that is on the article “Gilbertese, Ellice in Need of Unifica tion, too” on page 33. Your staff writer mentioned that “. . . the Ellice Islanders take life more seriously than the Gilbertese. They are politic ally aware and concerned about the future of the colony ...” I wonder where your staff writer has obtained his information from as it is not correct and should never have been printed.

Instead of unifying Gilbertese and Ellice Islanders at this time of political advancement in the colony, the article has created a lot of ill feelings amongst the Gilbertese.

Does your writer mean to say that all the Gilbertese are lazy people and all the Ellice Islanders are hard working people? Of course there are some Gilbertese who are lazy—but not all. The same is true of the Ellice people. Obviously one cannot judge a group of people from a few bad ones.

Unfortunately your roving staff writer stayed here for only a few weeks and I feel that in his attempt to collect as much information as possible during his very short stay, he might have consulted people who are very pro-Ellice and very anti- Gilbertese.

The copra question

Had he been here longer, he might not have overlooked the fact that the Gilbertese people work hard to pro duce copra, which is the main source of revenue (apart from phosphate mined on Ocean Island), whereas the Ellice have little to do with copra.

The Gilbertese copra cutters produce almost the entire copra for export while the Ellice people only produce a very small percentage because most of them drink their green coconuts before they become brown and suit able for copra.

As a matter of fact, the Gilbertese islands of Kuria or Abemama can each produce up to twice as much copra as the whole of the Ellice Islands. This has always made the Gilbertese very angry because they want co-operation from the Ellice people to increase the colony’s revenue.

Would this fact justify your roving writer’s statement that the Ellice people are politically aware and more concerned about the future of the colony?

Your staff writer went on to say that “. . . the Gilbertese prefer to talk fishing, or to dance or drink . . .” It is true that the Gilbertese, being very good fishermen, often talk about fishing, but certainly not about dancing or drinking.

Prefer to fish

For one thing, the Gilbertese pre fer to go out fishing rather than to buy expensive tins of meat or fish from the store. They want to save money in order to buy valuable things like boats and outboard motors (I wonder if there is an Ellice Islander on Tarawa who owns one?), sewing machines and above all, to buy a house built with permanent materials.

Most of the Ellice people, on the other hand, prefer to spend their money just for pleasure and are often “broke” before the next pay-day.

That “a Gilbertese ‘can’t afford’ his land or his copra tax, he can’t pay for his children’s schooling” is absolutely nonsense, and this can be explained and proved in the above paragraphs. The reverse is the truth.

It is true that the Ellice Islands were lucky not to have their schools closed during the Japanese invasion of the colony during World War 11.

All Ellice Islanders who received their education in those schools (especially the one which used to be at Vaitupu) are probably holding

Gilbertese achievements

good jobs. But they may be the last ones with good jobs.

One could prove these days that in every government department or in the Wholesale Society, there are only a few Ellice Islanders and the rest are Gilbertese. In our secondary schools, there are only a few Ellice Islanders. If the government’s policy of localising as many posts as pos sible is fulfilled, the first to hold these localised posts will be Gil bertese.

We have, in the medical depart ment, a Gilbertese medical officer who is the senior local doctor; the first colony person to hold the post of assistant superintendent of police is a Gilbertese; the first colony teacher to get an A 1 salary scale (equivalent to salaries of some ex patriate officers) is also a Gilbertese.

In addition, there are four Gilbertese captains who are masters of colony vessels, and many others.

Even in other Pacific territories, the Gilbertese are doing very well in their jobs. In the BSIP, the Gil bertese are holding very good jobs and the director of medical services in the US Trust Territory (Marshall Islands) is Dr. John laman who is pure Gilbertese.

"Letting mates down"

Turning to the academic field, the only two colony people to obtain gold medals for very good results in the Fiji School of Medicine were Gilbertese, and the only colony student to obtain a university degree is also a Gilbertese.

I think your staff writer is right in saying that the Ellice people are ambitious because it is generally felt here that they always want to be better off than the Gilbertese. But they don’t usually go about getting their promotions in the right way.

Whenever a Gilbertese and an Ellice Islander start to work together in one department, an Ellice Islander will always try to find ways of letting his Gilbertese mate down by report ing anything bad about him to their boss, who, in most cases is a Euro pean, or he will offer presents and gifts to the boss in order to be liked better—all this for the sake of getting a quick promotion. Because of this the Ellice Islanders are often re garded by the Gilbertese as snobs.

I must admit here that there are only a few exceptions among the Ellice people—and they have been brought up in the Gilberts.

The Gilbertese, who are quite inde-

pendent and more reserved people than the Ellice Islanders, will work hard for their promotion in a fair way and not by offering presents or doing any other dirty things to please their European bosses.

I do not want to commit myself to make comments on what your staff writer mentioned about Gilbertese as “more superstitious . . . and . . . won’t venture outside their huts at night for fear of spirits and ghosts”.

I only wish to refer your readers to an article in the same issue of PIM in “From Islands Press” (page 115) about the case in the Senior Magistrate’s Court at Tarawa, The woman referred to in the news item is an Ellice woman who had got pain in her stomach and believed that a ghost was the cause. She had been looking for an expert witch doctor all oyer South Tarawa and finally met a Gilbertese man who only pretended to know something about magic in order to see the woman’s white belly.

Would this not be considered “super stitious” on the part of an Ellice Islander?

I am not personally against the Ellice people, but I only try to wipe out from the minds of all those who have read last month’s PIM all the false statements about Gilbertese who are just as good and hard working as any other race.

Rosie Kum Kee, 20, who marries Peter Barker, manager of the Otintai Hotel, Tarawa, in May doesn't seen unhappy about life in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands. The wedding promises to be one of the biggest in years.