Samoa’s unlucky

survivors of another age

O Tama Uli. Melanesians in Samoa. By Malama Meleisea.

Published by Institute of Pacific Studies, University of the South Pacific, Box 1168, Suva, Fiji. No price or ISBN provided.

This 56-page monograph is significant for two main reasons.

First, within its limited compass it summarises the social history of a selected group of recruited Melanesian labourers in a Polynesian environment, and, by including four first-person accounts from survivors of that period spanning 75 years of Samoan history under German, New Zealand and independent rule it records vividly the life and conditions of these strangers under the successive administrations, and provides an interesting commentary upon the interaction of the different racial entities thus thrown together.

Second, it highlights the disabilities under which the few survivors of that experience and their descendants still suffer in Samoa. The author clearly sympathises with them in their plight.

The German annexation of

north-eastern New Guinea in 1884 gave the German trading firms a monopoly of the recruit ment of Melanesian labour for their plantations, and when, by the international settlement of 1900, the Germans annexed Western Samoa, for the plan tations in Samoa also, where such labour was essential for the profitable conduct of the copra industry.

The author considers that while in a general sense this recruitment of labour was a form of exploitation, he points out that, at that time and to the labourers so engaged, it did not seem so. On the contrary as these survivors emphasise when interviewed at this distance in time they were, at least initially, delighted with the conditions, and especially with the quantity and quality of the food supplied. Moreover not only did some re-enlist for a further term, but the excite ment engendered in New Guinea by the sight of the time expired labourers returning laden with their boxes of ‘cargo’ tempted many youths to enlist and even to stow away on the recruiter’s vessels.

This was not, of course, in any

sense a ‘blackbirding’ enter prise. The labour was regularly recruited under very specific conditions of selection, and con tracts which ensured their wel fare and nutrition during both transit and overseas residence, and provided for repatriation on completion of contract.

The German administration in Samoa under Dr Solf identified itself with the DHPG enterprise, and established a monopoly of Melanesian labour for that firm, much to the annoyance of other European planters who were thus forced to employ Chinese labour at higher cost, with less stringent control, and for cash wages (which did not apply to the Melanesians).

In general the Melanesians seemed to have considered their German employers fair, but very strict, not only in discipline occasionally enforced by physical punishment but also in their insistence on complete segregation from the Samoans.

Moreover, unlike the Chinese who had a consul in Apia, they had neither political nor social status, nor independent rep resentation.

At the time of the capture of Samoa by the New Zealand forces in 1914 there were 877 Melanesians working on the German plantations many time-expired and by 1921 about 145 still had not been repatriated as provided for in their contracts. The official New Zealand records imply that by 1929 all who so wished had been repatriated, but it seems that with the take-over of the German plantations by the New Zealand administration as reparations, they discovered the need to retain the Melanesian labour to maintain the economy of the country, and the author considers that ‘the failure of the New Zealand administration to repatriate 125 Melanesians after 1921 was probably a breach of contract and an act of gross exploitation’. In the event, the need for this expatriate labour was so great that New Zealand appealed to the Aust ralian administration of German New Guinea to make a further 200 recruits available for the Samoan plantations, a request that was refused.

Th£ transfer of Samoa to

New Zealand administration liberalised the conditions of the Melanesian labourers, mainly in that segregation was not en forced, and thus they could, and did, fraternise with the Samoans, especially through the churches. However, under New Zealand rule, and notwith standing that they were long time-expired, they were still denied freedom of choice, and, in fact, 12 were imprisoned at Vaimea without trial for refus ing to work for the Reparation Estates.

Although in general the rank and status-conscious Samoans accepted the Melanesians, they continued to adopt a patronis ing attitude towards them, and the author comments that even today ‘it would not be unfair to say that the Samoan attitude to most foreigners is ethnocentric’.

In some instances physical con frontation occurred between the Samoans and Melanesians.

However, this did not prevent most of the remaining Melanesians from taking Samoan wives, or from support ing the Samoans in the Mau against the New Zealand ad ministration. The author con cludes that there still remains some disparagement by the Samoans of the recruited Melanesians and their descend ants. More importantly, he points out that to the present day they remain gravely disad vantaged in that they cannot acquire either matai status or the right to own land. On the contrary, they live precariously on sufferance, with no security of tenure, on the plantations where they laboured for so many years (one is reduced to living in a shed at Vailele), or upon the generosity of their Samoan-Melanesian descend ants.

There remain 13 of the orig inal Melanesians who were not repatriated, and 43 descendants still working on the Mulafanua plantation. Attempts to per suade the government to grant these old men some of the land they have worked for a lifetime have so far proved unsuccessful, but, in response to an appeal by Albert Wendt to the prime minister, their pensions have been raised from SWSIO to SWS2S each month, and Pro fessor Ron Crocombe has ob

tained a contribution of cash from New Zealand Catholic Aid.

But this is not enough, and it is to be hoped that this short monograph, illustrated by old and new photographs, and in cluding a comprehensive bibli ography, will stimulate the Western Samoan Government to further action in caring for these few very old men, who contributed so much to that industry upon which the

country’s economy so largely depends.

The author is to be congratu lated, not only for a succinct survey of an almost forgotten facet of Samoan history, but also for drawing attention to the plight of these under-privileged survivors of another age. If it succeeds in mitigating their present situation, the small size of this book will belie its

significance.

Leonard Good-

man.