Race relations

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32540, 25 February 1971, Page 10

Race relations

Sir, —Gross population increases and negligible educational facilities in Western Samoa, as reported by the Rev. K. Faletoese, spell trouble for us in the Pacific, but your correspondence columns reveal little public interest in Polynesian problems. A fale near Apia houses 30 people, young and old, with a total income of a few (hundred dollars. But 30 young adult Polynesians, living fale-fashion in a small Sydenham house, can be only half employed yet share $30,000 a year, little of this going towards better housing or other desirable amenities of our culture. The Polynesian cultures are not wrong—merely incompatible with life in our cities. Fiji, with ail its problems, demonstrates a pattern of hope. All races there seek education, better housing, and, generally, a European way of life—probably not the best way, but more likely to work than the racial and cultural anarchy which apathy breeds here.— Yours, etc., “JIM ABELSON.” February 24, 1971.