LOYALTY OF THE MAORIS

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22467, 30 July 1938, Page 7

LOYALTY OF THE MAORIS

“NO PROPAGANDA FROM JAPAN”

COMMENT ON SUGGESTION OF MAJOR WESTMACOTT

[THE PRESS Special Service.] WELLINGTON, July 29. “That is rot,” remarked the Hon. Sir Apirana Ngata, M.P. for Eastern Maori, when asked to-day to comment on the assertion made by Major H. S. Westmacott, of Otorohaiiga, at the New Zealand Returned Soldiers’ conference yesterday that Japanese propaganda was going on in. New Zealand, and that a big section of the Maori people was being impregnated with it. Similar denials were given by Mr E. T. Tirikatene, the member for Southern Maori, and Mr H. T. Ratana, the member for Western Maori, as well as the Acting-Minister in Charge of Native Affairs, the Hon. F. Langstone. Mr Langstone said he had never heard of any such propaganda being disseminated among the Maori people. A further statement made by Major Westmacott yesterday was that the Maoris were asking their friends to subscribe to a movement which was going to give them back their own lands. Contacts had been made with Japanese through socalled priests who were stirring the Maoris up.

' “Some Eastern Philosophy” “I have never heard of any religious movement, I presume from Japan, which is impregnating the Maoris with Japanese propaganda,” said Mr Langstone. “Major Westmacott may be referring to propaganda which is being sent out by Japan in the endeavour to justify her occupation of China and setting out the cause of the war from the Japanese point of view. There is a flood of that literature coming into New Zealand. I don’t know of any propaganda whereby the Japanese are impregnating the Maoris with some eastern religious philosophy. “The Maoris have still got their lands. The lands that the Maoris own total about 4,500,000 acres, and most of them are leased. Idle and waste lands suitable for development we are developing now as their leases fall due. It is competent for Maoris through the Maori Lands Board to re-lease, or to take occupancy and farm, lands themselves. No land has been taken from the Maoris other than confiscation in the sixties.” Sir Apirana Ngata said that when the prophet Ratana went Home in 1924 over Maori grievances the party returned by way of Japan. It had often been suggested that there were racial similarities between the Japanese and the Maoris, although he himself did not think that wai well founded. Some years subsequent to Ratana’s visit to Japan, a Japanese bishop came to New Zealand and paid a visit to Ratana. It might be because of those two factors that the present suggestion was made, but he had heard nothing of any such movement in any part of New Zealand. “No Maori Response” “You will not find any Maori response to any Japanese overtures,” Sir Apirana added with emphasis. “I know nothing about this sort of thing,” said Mr Tirikatene. “There is a lot of propaganda among the Maoris in different ways, but this is news to me.” He suggested that Bishop Cherrington’s proposal to settle 5,000,000 Japanese in New Zealand might have a bearing on the position which Major Westmacott claimed existed among the Maoris. “We, as Maori people, are, I suppose, the most friendly people under the sun,” he added, “and when it or any other nationality, they are pakeha, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, or any other nationality they are always treated with that hospitality which is characteristic of the Maori. However, there is absolutely no doubt of the loyalty of the Maori people to the Empire.” Mr Ratana endorsed Mr Tirikatene’s remarks, and said that in his own electorate he had heard no mention of the Japanese propaganda alleged.