Pacific Report

‘Fruitful’ Talks With Mitterrand Pidjot

‘Fruitful and positive’ was how Roch Pidjot, New Caledonian deputy to the French National Assembly and Independence Front leader, described his October 26 talks with President Mitterrand in Paris. Leaving the Elysee Palace, he said: ‘There is an understanding by the president of our demands that is definite progress for us.’ Another spokesman for Mr Pidjot’s party, the Union Caledonienne, Frangois Burck, said in Noumea: ‘Mitterrand has understood that our demand for Kanak independence is not racist, as some would have him believe. This is a step forward for us.’ Mr Burck said that following the talks, the Independence Front might now be willing to delay by six months or a year its plan for a unilateral declaration of independence on September 24, 1982, 129th anniversary of the French take-over of New Caledonia. But, he added, planned occupations of a number of white-owned farms and plantations would go ahead as planned, in mid-November. This plan received further endorsement at the UC congress held on the island of Lifou, in the Loyalty Group, on November 14-15. The new note of understanding following the Paris talks was marred by bomb explosions in a Paris restaurant and an airport car park for which a so-called ‘Kanak Liberation Army’ claimed responsibility. But pro-independence Kanak spokesmen in both Paris and Noumea denied that any such body existed, and suggested the explosions were provocations orchestrated by the Rightwing MOP organis ation in New Caledonia, and a like-minded movement, the Ordre Nouveau, in France. Pro-independence spokesmen also dis owned responsibility for a bomb attack on a French monument in Noumea on November 7, which was followed by rioting in which 102 people were arrested by police. The incidents were apparently touched off when a number of young Melanesians attacked some Wallisians towards the end of the annual Noumea street fair. —Chris Ray.

Jakarta Denies Guerrilla Activity

Australian press reports in September-October spoke of a revival of activity by anti-Indonesian guerrillas in the province of Irian Jaya. On September 21, the Melbourne daily The Age reported that guerrillas had fired on an aircraft of the Garuda airline, the Indonesian flag-carrier. On October 15 the same paper carried a despatch from Port Moresby saying that guerrillas had raided a gaol in Irian Jaya in an attempt to release imprisoned comrades.

Both reports were denied by the Indonesian Government

U.S. Army Instructors In Fiji

Eleven US Army instructors arrived in Fiji in late October to train local army instructors in the handling of special weapons and equipment they will be required to use as part of the Sinai peace keeping force. A Fiji Government spokesman said that the US team had come ‘to help familiarise our instructors with the equipment, and not to train the soldiers’. Training of local soldiers would be done by Fiji instructors, he said. A Fijian soldier with the United Nations peace-keeping force in Lebanon was killed in October. He was checking a confiscated rifle which accidentally discharged.

FIRST RURAL LAND LEASE SIGNED IN VANUATU History was made in Vanuatu on October 9 when the first rural land lease to an alienator was signed by the custom owners of Eton village on the island of Efate. The lease was in favour of Pacific Grazing (NH) Ltd, and was over a property of more than 3000 hectares, La Cressoniere. The lease is for 75 years, an exception having been made to the 50-year maximum rule because of the targe capital investment made and envisaged by Pacific Grazing. Lease payments are an average of VTIOO (about SAI) per hectare. Payment was made from Independence Day (July 30, 1980), and for six months in advance.

Big Noumea March For ‘Peace, Fraternity’

An estimated 25 000 people took part in a November 11 march in Noumea organised by the Caledonian Fraternal Association.

Members of all races in the territory took part. On the east coast a purely Melanesian region, a similar march of 400 people took place. Theme of the marches was peace, fraternity and security.

Banners proclaimed ‘Three colours, a single people’. The

Noumea march extended over five kilometres. President Biciv of the CFA, a Melanesian, told the crowd: ‘We should not feel we are condemned to live together, but on the contrary we should be happy that we can live in harmony. We decided to organise this march of Caledonian solidarity and fraternity to bring people together, not to divide them.’ Proceeding to the residence of the High Commissioner, the marchers presented a petition demand ing government action to prevent ‘acts of aggression against peaceful citizens of all races who ask for nothing but to be left to live in harmony with others’. It appealed to the HC to state ‘with the greatest candour’ the direction in which he intended to guide the territory. HC Claude Charbonniaud undertook to despatch the message to Paris at once. Replying to an accusation by pro independence member of the Territorial Assembly, Nidoishe Naisseline, President Biciv later denied that his association was ‘political’. ‘lt is, and will remain, non-political,’ he said. Daniel Tardieu in Noumea.

Radioactivity Lowest Since 1960’

The latest Environmental Radioactivity Annual Report of the New Zealand National Radiation Laboratory found that radioactivity in the South Pacific is at its lowest level since 1960. The report, based on monitoring activity at a total of nine stations in New Zealand and the Islands, states: ‘The concentration of fission products in air at New Zealand stations was latitude-dependent during the French South Pacific atmospheric tests (1966-74). For example, concentrations were usually higher at Auckland than at Christchurch. Moreover, in the Pacific Islands concentrations were significantly higher. . . Since mid-1975, about nine months after the termination of the French atmospheric tests, concen trations have been near or below the limit of detection at all stations. No fresh fission products have been detected since underground testing started’. The report sums up: ‘The concentrations of strontium-90 and caesium-137 in New Zealand milk have reflected the changes in fallout deposition. The average concentrations during the past few years have been the lowest recorded since measurements commenced (in 1960).’

Australia-Chile Cargo Service Reopened?

At press time it was still unclear whether a service designed to end an eight-year freeze on shipping contacts between Australia and Chile would actually get under way. A company known as Kapal Pacifico (KP) Pty Ltd planned to inaugurate the service in mid- November using the 16 250-tonne German-registered vessel, MV Luise Bornhofen. According to plans, the vessel, with 245-container capacity, was to operate a two-month turn-around service between east coast Australian ports and Pacific-coast South American countries such as Peru and Chile. But whether Australian maritime trade unions’ politically-based opposition to contacts with junta-ruled Chile had been effectively overcome was unclear. A trade union source contacted by PIM said the Luise Bornhofen had arrived in Sydney from Canada with a cargo of paper, had then come under a new charter, and was, at the time of the interview, at the Victorian port of Geelong loading cargo, all of which was marked as destined for Peru. Another shipping source outside the union movement suggested that the ship would not be making the trans-Pacific journey because there was not enough cargo on offer to make it economic. The source claimed that only about 1000 tonnes of cargo was available

Unity Eludes New Caledonia’S Socialists

New Caledonia’s Socialist Party split down the middle on the issue of independence for the territory when it held its annual congress in October. Delegates rejected by 219 votes to 181 a move to commit the party to ‘prepare for independence’.

Spokesmen for the losing faction claimed that their opponents had stacked’ the congress with anti-independence immigrants from Wallis Island, and that only a quarter of the delegates were Melanesians. The spokesman said his group would be forming a new party.

Tonga Still Thrashes About On Passports

The Tongan Government failed again in October to gain parliamentary approval for its proposal to sell passports at a suggested price of STIO 000 to nationals of other countries designated as Tongan Protected Persons’. The original Passport Act Amendment Bill, introduced by Minister of Police the Hon Akau’ola in October 1980, was defeated by one vote after heated debate. On March 31, 1981, an amended version was published in the Tonga Government Gazette as an ordinance. But this was invalidated a month later by a further gazetted notice stating that the ordinance had not been approved by the Privy Council and was therefore not law (PIM Jul 1981 p 6). The bill,

with amended wording, was again introduced by the police minister in October 1981. He withdrew it after two days of debate when it became clear that the government still lacked the required numbers. It then went back to the Privy Council which will decide whether to drop it altogether, or try again after further amendments. Penny Hodgkinson in Nukualofa.

RATU MARA BACKS TONGAN OIL STORAGE PLAN The Tongan Government’s idea of establishing a bulk oil storage depot at Nukualofa in co-operation with the government of oil rich Kuwait (PIM Nov p 67) was discussed in the corridors of the October meeting of Commonwealth Heads of Government in Melbourne. If the depot were established, oil from it would be sold to Pacific nations at prices below those asked by major oil companies in the region. Fiji Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara told journalists in Melbourne that not all leaders had been able to make a firm commitment in support of the plan without more consultation at home, but most thought it was a good idea.

Fiji was in favour of it. The energy problem faced by small island states was one of the issues considered by the meeting. The heads of government called for immediate consideration of special arrangements to help them, and supported a plan for a World Bank energy affiliate. Sue Green.

Marshalls To Vote Soon On Compact

The Compact of Free Association with the United States should be finished by the end of the year, and a vote on it held in the Marshall Islands in March or April, 1982, according to the Marshalls representatives at the October talks held in Hawaii between US and Micronesian representatives. They made their prediction in a report given to the Nitijela (parliament) on their return.

Fiji: Case Of The Unwanted Lottery

A flopped lottery for a $35 000 Mercedes saloon has landed Fiji’s ruling Alliance Party with a $250 000 albatross around its neck that could seriously embarrass it in raising funds to fight the general election set for next July. At its annual convention in November, the party approved a $166 000 budget for 1982, including $153 000 for the election, and then spent some time worrying how to raise what it wanted. Having approved the budget, the party was hit by a bombshell when militant trade union leader and defector from the opposition National Federation Party, Apisai Tora, now a vice-president of the Fijian Association, admitted that a lottery organised on his own initiative to raise money for the Alliance was in a ‘critical’ situation. With only a month to the draw of the already twice postponed lottery, tickets worth $257 710 were ‘outstanding’ because he had been unable to persuade ticket sellers to turn in the cash. Me added that of $l2 000 received, only $6OOO was left in the bank after expenses. These had included a trip to Australia by him in an effort to unload $22 000 worth of tickets on the Fiji community there. A dismayed Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, and party treasurer Sir Charles Stinson, warned that the Alliance had no choice but to salvage the lottery and guarantee the prizes if it was to save its face and credibility. ‘This lottery will go against the party in the general election,’ Stinson said. ‘I don’t think we are going to get the whole country to accept that we are not responsible.’ The Alliance’s management board is to appoint a special lottery salvage committee, and has meanwhile postponed indefinitely the lottery it had planned to run itself to cover a $55 000 deficit in its budget anticipated next year.

Robert Keith-Reid in Suva.

Turuola Efi In Melanesia

Western Samoa Prime Minister Tupuola Efi visited Vanuatu on October 22-24. In a conversation with Willie Bongmatur, chairman of Vanuatu’s national council of chiefs, Tupuola recalled that Samoan missionaries had been among those who brought Christianity to Vanuatu in the 19th century. On a visit to Erakor island, Tupuola laid a wreath on the grave of a Samoan missionary who arrived on Efate in 1885, and worked and died there. Earlier, Tupuola had paid similar brief visits to Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands. He was returning to Apia from the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Melbourne.

Polynesia’S Senator Miscues

French Polynesia’s Senator Daniel Millaud in October placed a question on notice in the Senate in Paris in the course of which he denounced the ‘shocking’ racism of Australia’s immigration procedures. The senator claimed that, although they are French citizens, Polynesians visiting Australia are allowed to stay only 72 hours in the country without a visa, whereas white French citizens from France may stay a month. PlM’s inquiries with officials in

Canberra indicate that the senator’s criticism is wide of the mark responsible sources in the Australian capital say that Polynesians and French people from France are treated in exactly the same way as, indeed, are all citizens of non-communist countries arriving in Australia: they are granted an automatic 72-hour transit visa. Senator Millaud’s claim seems to be part of an orchestrated propaganda effort by some circles in French Pacific territories to paint Australia as the region’s arch-villain following criticisms of aspects of France’s policies in the Pacific by Australian Government spokesmen.

INDIRA’S DIPLOMACY TO THE FORE IN FIJI During her October stop-over in Fiji (PIM Nov p 5), Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi effectively endorsed the multi-racial policies of Prime Minister Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara. A commen tator in the Suva-based monthly South Pacific Islands Business News wrote: ‘Mrs Gandhi made it clear she had come to visit all the people of Fiji, not just the Indians. She uttered salutations in the Fijian language before speaking in Hindi. She spoke of the need to accept checks and balances to keep a multi-racial society peaceful and stable. Such a society, she said, would not survive unless each part of it was prepared to accommodate the others. Fiji, she told the Indians, was their home and it should command their loyalty. She spoke of Progress and Prosperity words which the Alliance Party (of Ratu Mara) uses in its election slogan . . . One political analyst was heard to murmur after Mrs Gandhi’s first speech in Fiji: “It sounded like a campaign speech for the Alliance.’’ ’ Fiji goes to the polls in a general election in July 1982. y

Hoaxers At Work In Mount Hagen

A so-called ‘monkey-man’ put on display in October at the Mount Hagen show in Papua New Guinea’s Highlands turned out to be a showman’s hoax. At the centre of attention was a metre-tall dwarf with facial deformities, Alu Seke, who shortly before had been over-run and captured by clansmen from Kwamei village in the Western Highlands. The hoaxers glued the fur of a cus cus, a possum native to PNG, over Alu Seke’s back to substantiate their claim that he was, variously, a ‘monkey-man’, a ‘pig-man’, an unknown aberration of creation, or a feral man raised by wild pigs. Thousands were taken in by the hoax, and scientists showed keen interest. Apparently unruffled by his experience, 40-year-old Alu Seke drank his first beer, smoked newspaper twisted cigarettes, and, after it was all over, returned to take up his normal life with his midget parents in one of the remotest parts of Western Highlands province.

SISTER S DEATH CLOUDS AGGIE GREY’S 84th Aggie Grey, probably the Pacific’s most famous hoteliere, celebrated her 84th birthday on October 31. Many hundreds of guests attended her birthday party at her hotel. However, the occasion was saddened for Aggie by the death the day before of her sister, Maggie Fabricius (see Deaths of Islands People).

Seven Survive 45-Day Drift

Seven inhabitants of Gau Island, Fiji, in September-October survived a 45-day, 1286-kilometre drift in a disabled punt. They were discovered in an advanced state of exhaustion on October 16 by Solomon Islanders only a few hundred metres off Reef Island. The Fiji Marine Department abandoned rescue attempts after six days, following the sighting of a wrecked vessel which was taken to be the punt from Gau. The seven had been given up for dead by relatives, who had conducted funeral ceremonies for them.

SIR TOM TAKES A SWIPE AT WELLINGTON Cook Islands Premier Sir Thomas Davis lashed out in October at what he called New Zealand’s ‘unsympathetic’ government. He said Wellington had ‘shown a complete lack of care’ by constantly changing Air New Zealand’s flight schedules to the Cook Islands during the past year. The latest move chopping out Rarotonga as a stop-over for its international flights, and withdrawing one Boeing 737 flight every second week was the last straw, Sir Thomas said.

Now Perjury Charges For Samoa Mp

The suspended Western Samoa MP Leota Leuluaialii Ituau Ale (PIM Nov p 37) now faces two charges of perjury arising from the Supreme Court case which led to his suspension from parliament.

Chief Justice R. J. B. St John in his summing-up had described Leota’s evidence as ‘a farrago of blatant lies’. Leota’s suspension arose from a violation of section 10 (j) of Western Samoa’s electoral act. The clause prohibits incumbent MPs from having sexual intercourse with a person ‘other than his spouse by valid marriage’.