Hurdles in the islands

Wellington

By David Robie

IN his recent book Lo Bilong Yumi Yet, Papua New Guinea Justice Minis ter Bernard Narakobi tells an anec dote about a group of villagers who want to take their young people to court. The youth had taken off to the city and re fused to send any money back to the village to assist the old folk.

According to custom it is right that the old people insist that the youth send them payments. After all, if the young people were still in the village the fruits of their labour from the gardens, forests on the sea would automatically be shared.

However faced with the problems of living in an urban environment, the youth found it difficult to accept that their pay packets should be handed over to their parents, grandparents, siblings and even cousins.

In Western Samoa, a distraught young man searching for his runaway wife turned to a local church social worker for help. When the worker offered to put a discreet message on a radio prog ramme, however, the young man re fused. He believed the message would bring shame to his village and he would risk being ostracised for having being in capable of “keeping” his wife.

In Fiji, a high chief beat up a com moner as was his customary right with a walking stick for a minor offence against himself. The commoner, claim ing his right under the law, took the chief to court.

These are some examples of the grow ing conflict between traditional commun al rights and the rights of individuals in the South Pacific cited by Suliana Siwati bau at May’s Aotearoa and Asia- Pacific Human Rights conference in Wellington. In a keynote speech on Paci fic human rights at the New Zealand

government-sponsored conference, she outlined serious problems facing the re

gion.

Mrs Siwatibau, a Fijian United Nations consultant now living in Port Vila, advo cates the establishment of a Human Rights Commission and Human Rights Charter for the Pacific, an idea already proposed by a Lawasia research group.

She also appealed for better rights for

women, youth, handicapped people, the

elderly and other disadvantaged groups “only then will Pacific societies be tru ly free”.

During recent years Pacific islanders have become increasingly concerned over the growing erosion of their cultu

ral integrity.

“This has been manifest, for example, in discussions on the formal incorpora tion of indigenous custom-based laws into the laws of the land in various Paci fic states, and in the surge of interest in native languages,” Mrs Siwatibau says.

“It was one of the main justifications of the military coup that overthrew the democratically elected government of Fiji in 1987.” °