WILL BE KEPT.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 156, 3 July 1937, Page 12

WILL BE KEPT.

. REPLY RECEIVED. PROMISE TO MAORIS. ORAKEI PROBLEM. MR. RAVAGE'S PLEDGE. Following a message sent by the Prime Minister, the Right Hon. M. J. Savage, who is returning to New Zealand in the Hangitata. it is now not quite certain that the <ioverninent has said the la*t word concerning the position of the Maoris at Orakei. The acting-Prime Minister, the Hon. P. Fratser, has replied to Mr. Savage that "the promise given by you at Xgaruawahia will be honoured,'* and at Xgaruawahia the Prime Minister promised the Maoris that he would settle the Orakei problem when he returned from England. The chief of the Orakei people. Xia Hira. this morning gave the text of the messages which had passed between him, Mr. Savage and Mr. Fraser. On June 20, he said, the following radiogram w»is sent to Mr. Savage 011 board the Rangitata: "The Maoris have been ordered to leave Orakei before the position has been considered by von, r».a promised at Xgaruawahia before your departure. Please reply.—Xia Hira, Orakei Chief." The reply from the Prime Minister the next day stated that the message had been received, and that he w,i« communicating with the acting-Prime Minister on the subject. Message From Mr. Fraser. r Then, on July 1, Mr. Fraser sent a telegram to Hira, which stated: "I have j received from the Rt. Hon. the Prime Minister a radiogram regarding the objection of the natives at Orakei to being removed from Crown land required for j housing purposes. I have replied in the t following terms: 'I am informing Nia Hira that the natives occupying houses on Crown land need not be perturbed in I the meantime, as the decision to remove them to make way for the housing pro-

ject which is now in pr&gresa will not be enforced without the offer of establishment elsewhere. Pending a settlement of this aspect of the: matter, preliminary roading and draining must be proceeded with, and action is being taken accordingly. The promise given to you at Ngaruawahia will be kept.'" [ Commenting on the messages rei ceived, Nia Hira first of all expressed • satisfaction that the Prime Minister . would honour the promise made at Ngaruawahia. Meeting at Orakei. ' After the discussion by the Auckland p City Council, and the publication of the l - letter to that body from the Hon. F. > Langstone, acting-Minister in Charge of Native Affairs, a meeting had been held at Orakei of natives in the near Auckland district and of the Orakei natives. What had been said at that meeting he did not wish to make public for the present, but it was decided to. send a radiogram to Mr. Savage. The' correspondence given above had resulted. The reference to roading and drainage . on the hill, however, tended to cloud the issue, because, with the exception of the church site on the hill, the land on the hill had nothing to do with the mati ter. It was the 40 acres on the flat with which the Maoris were concerned, and nothing had been said about that part of Orakei at all. ; The chief recalled what he had said a week ago, as reported in the "Star" [ last Saturday, that as an inducement ! to the natives to sell the area on the hill they were promised an area of 40 ■ acres on the flat. The documents con- '■ taining that promise, however, had not . been produced. When Judge Acheson, during a Court of Inquiry into the t matter, had asked that they be prol duced, the Government representatives t had refused and had left the Court. He added that Mr. Savage had made i a promise to the Maoris not only at Ngaruawahia. When he had met the . Maoris at Orakei on January 5, 1936, he ' had made a promise that justice would ? be done. "This was the firet time he I liad spoken on a Maori marne big ! . M 111 |»1 : "*l of t' l pl\ fu'.io CI - ...I.L--«Auai- ," l\ui Hira said.

Mr. Flaser's statement that the hill at Orakei was needed for a housing scheme came as a complete surprise to him, Xia Hira said. it was the first time that the Government housing scheme had been mentioned in connection with the future of the Maoris at Orakei. whereas the deplorable living conditions of the natives bad been continually 111 the mouths of the authorities. "Can it be that titey are using the'condition of our houses as the pretext, when the real reason they want us to leave is that we are ill the way of their housing scheme?'' lie asked. In support of his statement that the housing-scheme was something new he referred to the letter to the Auckland City Council from Mr. Fraser, presented to the council meeting on June 24. Xo mention was made in that letter of any housing scheme. "I merely mention this as an incidental point," Xia llira added, "because, as I have already sai l, with the exception of the church site, we are not concerned with the hill hut with the area on the flat."