SEDDON ON THE FIJI'S

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 8 January 1901, Page 3

SEDDON ON THE FIJI'S

&. Munroe Doctrine in the South Pacific.

(PER PRESS ASSOCIATION. —COPYRIGHT.)

Sydney, December 8. Seddon interviewed in referonce to Fiji said New Zoalandcrs as well as Austral. ian3 had suffered injustice through Samoa being virtually handed over to Germany but tho Imperial authorities had compensated this to some degroo by tho extension "of British protectorate in tho South Sea Islands but peoplo in Now Zealand did not think this went far enough. His Government had fixed as part of tho policy, an idea that all islands in tho Southern Pacific should become Colonialised. His views were by no means aggressive. He cared not one jot for tho trade of Fiji, but did want to see the Fijian and Tongan group mado Colonial. Ho desired that self government should be given to Fiji in. terms of the convention of 1885, but had never sought its annexation by New Zealand. In his opinion, O'Brien's policy had created a disturbance in the niinda of the Natives, and set back the matter of Self-Govcrnmcnt of the Islands for years; because ho had given the Natives to understand that the object of the whitemen was to take the lands from them. France, Germany, and America had a naval, or will have a military base in the Pacific. It was time that the British people, as represented by the colonies, looked after themselves.