SAMOA'S WELFARE

Evening Post, Volume CXX, Issue 12, 13 July 1935, Page 11

SAMOA'S WELFARE

SURPLUS OF £2303

ADMINISTRATOR'S TERM CONCLUDING

Writing from Apia on July 5, the Samoa correspondent of the Press Association states that the Administrator, Brigadier-General Hart, had just returned to. Apia after his annual tour of the group. Early in June he visited eight centres in Upolu and Manono and during the last we.ek-three centres, in Savaii. The attendances at the various receptions' throughout were much larger than in'previous years;. interest being added by reason of these being his Excellency's farewell visits to the outer districts.

In the native speeches repeated reference was made to the improved and peaceful state of affairs now obtaining at the end of. the Administrator's term, or, as the native idiom expresses it, "not a banana leaf has been split," the banana being a plant very susceptible to damage under stormy conditions.

The Queen of Tonga is a through passenger to Suva on the Monowai, arriving on July 14. During her jtay in Samoa she will be the guest of the Administrator and Lady Hart.

The Methodist Mission will celebrate the centenary of the arrival of the first European Methodist. missionary in Samoa. The festivities will be held on the island of Manono. The Rev. J. W. Burton, general secretary of the Methodist Missionary Society of Australia, has arrived.to attend the centenary gatherings and to inspect the different branches of the mission's activities.'

The Samoan Budget for 1934-35 shows that the revenue collected Was £78,808 and expenditure £76,505, leaving a surplus of £2303. A deficit was fully expected. The advance in the price of copra enabled the Administrator to again impose the export tax which had been taken off when the price fell to around about £9 a ton.

Brigadier-General and Mrs. Hart will leave by the Maui Pomare on July 25. Mr. A. C. Turnbull, secretary to the Administration, will act as Administrator until a new appointment is made.