Gilbertese split on Ocean Island future?

Ocean Island future?

A surprise development that could bring about a complete reversal of Britain’s attitude toward the possibV separation of Ocean Island (Banaba) from the Gilbert Islands has excited Banaban leaders in Fiji and their advisers in London.

Britain has repeatedly rejected Banaban separation submissions on the ground that she could not go against the wishes of the Gilbertese people. The Gilberts Government, as representative of the people, has repeatedly declared that Banaba is an in tegral part of the colony and must remain so.

But now, out of the blue, comes a startling contention from reputable politicians in the Gilberts that their outer islands favour the separation of Banaba because they do not believe that the Gilberts have any right to it.

Messages reaching Banaban advisers in London claim that 99% of the Gilbertese in the outer islands who form a ma jority of the Gilberts’ population are against their government in this matter. The way in which this appraisal of feeling in the Gilberts came to the Banabans is interesting and seems to indicate a genuine compulsion on the part of those who reached it to make it known to the world.

A Gilbertese politician made a special journey to Fiji a dis tance of about 2 250 km to tell the Banabans, who now live there. He was sent on his mission by the opposition party in the Gilberts, to which he belongs, and the vital information that he brought was not simply an un substantiated impression of Gilbertese sentiment.

Its bearer has close links with a parliamentary committee charg ed with constitutional duties in readiness for the Gilberts’ ap proaching independence. He said that whenever the future of Banaba had been discussed at public meetings in the outer is lands there had been no room for

doubt about what the mass of people believed.

His party’s suggestion was that an impartial observer should go from Britain to confirm what he said. One observer from Britain has already visited the Pacific Mr Richard Posnett, a former colonial governor. He was sent out by the government earlier this year to examine at close range the Banaban case for sepa ration and to report back to the Minister for Foreign and Com monwealth Affairs.

He told the minister that his visit had convinced him that the Gilbertese would not agree to the separation of Ocean Island in any circumstances. He described a three-and-a-half hour public meeting in Bairiki, attended by 300 people, from which emerged an emphatic refusal even to con template it.

But the emissary who went to Fiji to pass on his important in formation to the Banabans re ported another viewpoint (not mentioned by Mr Posnett) that came from a man named Itaia.

He said that Itaia, speaking at the same meeting for himself and others, declared; “We would be wrong and un-Christian to hold

on to Ocean Island because it is written ‘Thou shalt not covet the properties of others’ and Banaba is not ours.’’

Only government ministers, civil servants and an insignificant number of Gilbertese oppose separation, the emissary said. His approach to the Banabans took them by surprise but they are satisfied of its good faith. His news confirmed their own assess ment of feeling on the part of or dinary Gilbertese in islands dis tant from their seat of govern ment.

They have not overlooked the fact that a pre-independence election is due in the Gilberts next year, or the possibility that anti-separationists will try to dis credit the opposition party’s tim ing and motives in making these disclosures.

At this stage, separation hardly seems likely to become an elec tion issue, but in Banaban reckoning that is beside the point. To them, the crux of the matter is the weight of support now reported. They do not believe that Britain could ignore proof of it without going back on her earlier reasons for rejecting their claims.

And if the majority view is as the opposition party claims and is held as strongly as it says, the ordinary Gilbertese might yet decide that the ballot box would be a good way of showing it, offi cial issue or not.