Sunday
p. 19 · Read in the full issue
Hawaii
Sunday protest
AT the same time that the Baltic States were demanding greater freedom from the Soviet Union, hundreds of Hawaiians gathered to de monstrate for Hawaiian sovereignty on the 97th anniversary of the overthrow of the indigenous Hawaiian monarchy in 1894. The protest, called “Sovereign Sunday”, was held on the grounds of the lolani Palace in downtown Honolulu on January 14.
The day long demonstration featured Native speakers and singers stressing de mands for Hawaiian self determination and the re-establishment of the Polyne sian nation. M.C. Kawaipuna Prejean, a dissident who has travelled to Libya, periodically led the crowd in “Sovereign ty Now!” chants. Activist attorney Milila ni Trask, the Kia Aina (governor) of Ka La Hui Hawaii (the Sovereign Hawaiian Nation) delivered a stirring address, call ing for the return of lands lost after the military overthrow of Queen Liliuokalani in 1893.
Trask denounced the state agency in charge of native concerns, the Office of Hawaiian Affai rs (OHA) and John \\ aihee, the Hawaiian governor of the Aloha State, as sell-outs to the sovereignty cause and urged the people to vote them out of office. Trask prom ised “direct actions” in early 1990 to im plement Ka La Hui’s nationhood prog ramme.
Another speaker, Dr Kekuni Blaisdell, said that on January 17, 1893, 200
marines and sailors of the USS Boston, anchored in Honolulu harbour, marched to the gates of the lolani Palace, heavily armed with gattling guns and artillery.
The Americans forced Queen Luliuoka lani to “yield under protest”, and give up her nation to plantation owners.
Since then, Hawaiians have become an oppressed minority, landless and often homeless in their own ancestral home land, with serious health, crime, and other problems. Symptomatic of these social ills is Mama Loa, a pure Hawaiian who performed graceful hulas during Sovereign Sunday. Mama Loa lives in an
abandoned bus and her daughter lives in a shack, illegally squatting at a North Shore beach. □
Sovereignty Sunday: protesters demonstrate in front of the statue of Queen Liliuokalani in Honolulu.