MAU'S ACTIVITY

Evening Post, Volume CXII, Issue 105, 30 October 1931, Page 11

MAU'S ACTIVITY

TOKEST HAS DIED OUT

CHIEFS LOSING AUTHORITY

MORE PEACE IN SAMOA

Native unrest in Western Samoa has steadily diminished during the past year, and interest in the movement has died out, according to the annual report of the Administrator, tabled in the House of Representatives yesterday. The report also states that as the unrest has died away several of the known agitators have loft the country, with the result that the discordant clement has becouio less conspicuous. "The. position now is generally satisfactory," the report records. "Increasing peace and harmony prevail. The active- phase of the Mau appears to havo ended, and there are few Samoans taking any interest in it. There is still a passive phase, in which co-operation with the Administration is not complete, but in almost every district the Samoans are now working together and uniting in all their formal relations, among themselves and with the Administration officials, in all local affairs. The movement itself has changed in character with the loss of strength, and is engaged, so far as it exists at all, in the collection of money for the purposes of propaganda in Auckland. While the Mau hus ceased for the time to be of practical importance, it may be expected to revive a little for the benefit of tourists as each dry season recurs, and its complete end may be delayed if the financial returns from visitors are sufficient." A WORD OF CAUTION. Commenting further on native affairs, the report utters a word of caution. "The system of government in the past," it 6tates, "has been largely paternal, depending on the influence of the Administrator working through^ the Native office and acting on the chiefs. Tho influence of the chief, in turn, has been paramount in his own family, and tho lesser chiefs havo submitted to those of higher standing. The authority of the chiefs is crumbling, and they do not receive the same implicit obedience and respect as formerly. The effect of the Mau has been to hasten the decay of the social structure, by undermining the influence of the chiefs through divisions in the family and through setting up a vague outside authority as an excuse for disobedience to the Matai. This.process was probably inevitable, and in the advance of every similar community towards civilisation there occurs a period when the rule of the chiefs begins to decline and to be replaced by outside forces. Such a period of transition must always be one of difficulty, and care is necessary, on the one hand, to check a too rapid development, and to maintain the system of parental control so loug as it remains useful, and, on the other hand, to guide and direct, rather than to antagonise, the influences which may soino day replace the patriarchal system."