NEW HEBRIDES

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 55, 29 November 1923, Page 8

NEW HEBRIDES

EVILS OF CONDOMINIUM GOVERNMENT REPORT TO PRESBYTERIAN ASSEMBLY •kouvioossv ssauj—iidvauEmj, MI Christchurch, November 28. Speaking of the conditions prevailing in the New Hebrides at to-day’s session of the Presbyterian General Assembly, tho Rev. G. 11. Jupp, convener of the Foreign Missions Commitee, made some trenchant remarks. “The terrible nature of the evils that condominium government is bringing to the islands has occupied the attention of the committee,” said Mr Jupp. He expressed thankfulness that the Prime Minister (Mr. Massey) had received a deputation before going to England and had raised the question at the Conference of Prime Ministers. The committee was anxiously awaiting full details of the representations made in London by Mr. Massey. The memorandum on the subject which was handed to Mr. Massey by the Public Questions Committee prior to his departure for London, stated: “The Public Questions Committee of the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand desires to call attention to the miseries suffered by the natives of tho New Hebrides and the hinderance. to the cause of Church and of civilisation through the dual control in the government of these islands, and it is affirmed by all British subjects in the group and even bv some of the Frei*:h that the condominium has been an utter failure. . . . The honest settler has no security of tenure, end the 'natives have no protection from the dishonest. Alcohol is still supplied with ruinous effect to tho people, ihe abuse of women is widespread. French offenders against the law are winked at; only nominal penalities are decreed against them, and these penalities are never enforced. There is not so much as a pretence of bringing the northern islands of the group under the sweep of the law. Even murder, the murder of a native by a native, is not a punishable offence. Lawlessness in the northern islands helps recruiting and for this reason tho French insist upon its continuance. The condominium has further failed to grapple with epidemic diseases and indeed with any form of disease, and the northern islands are in consequence being seriously depopulated. The committee respectfully ask that you should personally bring the whole matter under the attention of the Imperial Government with a view to an amicable and honourable arrangement with France, by which the New Hebrides may pass under sole British control, or if this should prove impracticable that the intervention of the League of Nations should be solicited. The existing state of affairs is a scandal alike to Britain, to civilisation and to Christianity/’