Pacific Islands Monthly

GEIC WILL STEER ITS OWN CANOE BUT

Britain Still Foots The Bill

The separation of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony from the West ern Pacific High Commission after 80 years, brings a new era and a new set of problems. The separation took place on January 1.

Resident Commissioner Sir John Field was sworn in as the first Governor by the colony’s Senior Magistrate, acting on behalf of the Chief Justice for the Western Pacific.

With the elevation of the colony’s top administrative post, and its new “separate” status, some other senior positions in the colony’s civil service will also be upgraded.

It has been suggested that, in fact, the $lO,OOO which has been the colony’s contribution to the WPHC over the past few years will be more than absorbed at home by the salary increases that will accompany the new gradings at the top end of the pecking order.

The colony will retain its judicial link with the other WPHC territories (the Solomons and New Hebrides) but administratively the colony will now deal direct with London, thus severing a connection that began in 1892.

In that year, in response to pres sure from the German Government (the latter feared the expansion of American influence in the region) the British Government agreed to place the Gilbert Islands, and later the Ellice Islands, under its protec tion. Then, in 1915, the two groups were joined to form a colony; other pieces of (relatively) adjacent British real estate—Ocean Island, the Northern Line Islands, the Phoenix Islands and, for a period, the Tokelaus—were subsequently added.

For decades the link with the WPHC was a tenuous one—distance, lack of transport, and relative poverty ensured that it was so. On January 1, 1953, the office of the High Com missioner was transferred to Honiara, in the Solomons. Previously, the post had been conjoint with the governor ship of Fiji.

It was inevitable that over a span

of 80 years the interest in, and knowledge of, the Gilbert and Ellice Islands Colony on the part of suc cessive High Commissioners would vary a great deal. Some were able and perceptive administrators, others chose to ignore it as far as possible, leaving effective decision making to their subordinates; yet others, with mixed success, tried to impose policies that had been found suitable in Fiji, or the Solomons, or West Africa, or . . .

In recent years, improved com munications have allowed more fre quent visits and discussions, and the sharing of personnel with specialised skills but, at the same time, there has been a gradual loosening of the ties.

Increasingly the colony has been dealing direct with London with the High Commissioner exercising only a general oversight for GEIC affairs.

The preparations for separation have been made over a period of some years. It was inevitable that, sooner or later, the GEIC and the BSIP would progress at least to internal self-government (if not to full independence on which neither appears to be over-keen) and that the office of High Commissioner would become an anachronism. But will it entirely?

The ultimate fate of the New Hebrides is as much in doubt as ever and perhaps protocol will demand that the British and French hierarchies remain parallel.

Pressure for separation from the WPHC had been building up for some years when, in November, 1970, a motion on the subject was brought before the House of Representatives by Reuben Uatioa (then Chief Elected Member and now Leader of Govern ment Business). It stated that dependence on the WPHC was “in compatible with the legitimate aspirations of the people of the colony towards more constitutional progress and greater political freedom” and called upon the Secretary of State to remedy the situation.

The supporting arguments were

familiar: a desire to deal direct with London when internal self-govern ment is achieved and a consequent need to establish the machinery of communication; delays in the High Commissioner’s office; that sometimes the High Commissioner’s limited knowledge of the GEIC worked to the colony’s detriment.

The practicalities involved in effecting the transfer have thus taken a year. The British Government has taken almost as long to answer another motion passed at the Nov ember, 1970, meeting of the House.

Again, it was Reuben Uatioa who initiated the request for a clarifica tion of future British aid policy for the GEIC. The answer has only recently been released, and then in a statement by Lord Lothian to the House of Lords before the people of the colony or their representatives were informed.

Although the British Government is not prepared to commit itself or its successors to any specific level of aid, the Gilbertese and Ellice Islanders need not feel too des pondent. After the exhaustion of the Ocean Island phosphates the British Government has promised it “will continue to make substantial funds and other forms of assistance avail able for developing the economy in other directions”. There are the usual catches and qualifications, of course— levels of aid will be determined by the “needs and circumstances prevail ing at that time”; and aid will be in “the form appropriate to the economic circumstances of the GEIC”, but no matter.

The British Government has, in effect, restated its 1964 pledge that, whatever the colony’s future political status, living standards will be main tained.

Naturally the British Government is hoping that economic diversifica tion and development will obviate at least part of the need for aid. It is doubtful, however, whether the land will be significant in providing a solution despite a steady consolidation of land plots for co-operative agri

cultural ventures over the past couple of years. With a rapidly growing population, increased coconut pro duction will be able to give those living on the outer islands their sub sistence and a small cash income, but how much more than this remains to be seen.

If there is a solution, it seems to lie in, or on, the sea.

Under a research and profit sharing scheme vessels owned by the GEIC and the Van Camp Seafood Company are conducting a programme to in vestigate the prospects for a com mercial fishing industry. And the marine training scheme continues to provide crews for overseas shipping companies. These men do not work in the GEIC and, to date, little at tention has been paid to the social effects of a drain of adult males from the community, but the remit tances from the seamen are a very real factor in the economy. It will take some years to fill the labour shortage on German vessels alone, and the advice of those who would

switch training facilities for this assured market into a locally-based fishing industry must be questioned.

Thus 1972 brings the GEIC a year closer to the time when the phospha.es are exhausted and the relative roles of coconuts, aid, fisheries and remit tances in the economy will work themselves out.

It should be noted, however, that the Banabans, formerly of Ocean Island and now of Rabi, in the Fiji group, are reported to be making renewed efforts to claim what they believe to be rightfully theirs. They deny a quarrel with the GEIC but argue that for 70 years the British Government has been using Banaban money to finance a non-viable colony.

The Banabans are aware that for them (like the GEIC) time is running out. Should this campaign of the Banabans meet with success the economy of the GEIC will have to be re-structured a little earlier than anticipated with, no doubt, an in crease in aid to offset the loss of phosphate royalties.