GOVERNOR O'BRIEN'S DE PARTURE FROM FIJI.

Lake County Press, Issue 975, 15 August 1901, Page 7

GOVERNOR O'BRIEN'S DE PARTURE FROM FIJI.

AUCKLAND, August 9. Sir George O’Brien left Fiji on July 17. An address was presented by a native chief, who said: “We are aware that certain people have thought fit to criticise your Excellency and your actions, and I desire today to personally assure your Excellency that we are in no way in sympathy with such people. We are quite satisfied that no one has our well-being at heart in any way to be compared with your Excellency, and it is imposs'ble for us ever to forget what your Excellency has done for us. We now tender your Excellency our most hearty thanks, and deeply regret that the time has come for your Excellency to leave us. We pray that God will bless your life.” In reply, Sir George O’Brien said: “ I have spent great sums in providing you with water supplies, hospitals, and other works. In this I only did what was right, for, apart from your owning the land and giving it to the Great Queen, you have become much the largest contributors to the revenue. Therefore, it was doubly right to spend the revenue for your benefit. This did not at all please the New Zealand party, who wished to take away the land which you gave the Great Queen and give it to New Zealand in order that they might break up your communal system, so as to separate you from the land, and thus get the Fijian land and labor cheap for themselves. Few of you have read all the letters which the New Zealand party have published in the ‘Fiji Times’ advocating the abolition of your communal system —otherwise the destruction of the Fijian people. Most of you are aware of what has been done to further this object—the sending out of emissaries, chiefly renegade Fijians of a vile and base sort, into the provinces to try to create disaffection towards the Government amongst the good-for-nothing and worthless characters found here and there, and to cause dissension—possibly disturbance—to the detriment of the loyal and well-conducted majority. That can now no longer be done with impunity, as a law was passed making such acts penal. In the future, if any such thing be done, both the emissary and the man who sends him will bo liable to six months’ imprisonment, with hard labor. Let ever man go about his own lawful business peaceably ; pay no attention to the efforts of the New Zealand party to bring about the destruction of your communal system, for all those efforts will fail.” * The ‘ Fiji Times,’ commenting on the departure of Sir George O’Brien, says that he retires “unloved and unregretted.” Few were present besides the officials. As a parting shot at the New Zealand party many hundred natives were invited to Suva in a neat speech which was put into their hands for presentation. The ‘ Times ’ says that his reference to the New Zealand party was a libel on the colony, and that when a Governor so degrades his office as to descend to procedure of the kind his must be a hard case. ________________