Manawatu Evening Standard. WEDNESDAY, APRIL ,16, 1930 THE SAMOAN SITUATION.

Manawatu Standard, Volume L, Issue 119, 16 April 1930, Page 8

Manawatu Evening Standard. WEDNESDAY, APRIL ,16, 1930 THE SAMOAN SITUATION.

It is not reassuring to learn from Apia that the Samoan chief, Tuimalealiifano, and seventy-two other Samoans have been sentenced to three months imprisonment for ‘ ‘identifying themselves with a seditious organisation by wearing Mau uniforms.” It was hoped and thought that the visit paid by Hon. J. G. Cobbe, Minister of Defence, to Apia, and the conferences held by that gentleman and the Administrator with the Mau would have had the effect of smoothing out the differences existing'between that organisation and the the Administration. The position was clearly defined at those conferences and there was good reason for believing that the trouble was at an end. The Samoans charged with criminal offences who had been protected by the Mau had been surrendered, and there -was an absence of the concerted action against the authorities which had caused so much trouble and anxiety. But it is evident that the Matt did ,not disband as was expected in. view of its declared seditious character, otherwise the seventythree Samoans convicted and sei£ tenced to imprisonment would pot have been brought before the court. With the withdrawal of the Dunedin from Apia, and the disbandment of the special police force which had been in training at Trentham (a fact of which the Mau was made well aware), there seems to have been a recrudescence of Mau agitation against the Administration and a continued defiance of its authority. It may be surmised that this is in part due to the uncertain state of New Zealand politics, and to the belief with which .the Mau has been sustained through all these months of. uncertainty, that the New Zealand Labour Party is in a position to successfully challenge the existence of the'Government, and that its leader, Mr H. E. Holland, who has all along' taken sides against the Administration, will enable the Mau to achieve the victory which Mr 0. F. Nelson promised'its members in his farewell message to the assembled Samoans, when he accepted banishment for five years at the Administrator’s, hands. Th4re are grounds for believing that the information sent to Western Samoan from time to time of protests made by Mr Holland and others, and their condemnation of Government action, has both heartened and strengthened the Mau in its opposition to the Administration.. It. is unfortunate that this Samoan .trouble is being

made the of; party politics in New Zealand, and that members of the Labour Party in the Dominion appear, to have definitely aligned themselves against both the United Government and the Reform Opposition, the supporters of both, generally speaking, being agreed that Western Samoa must be governed under the terms of the mandate entrusted to the New Zealand Government by the League of Nations, and that the illegal activities of the Mau must cease. In this matter the good name and fair fame of New Zealand is being dragged in the dust by party politicians who, for a mere temporary advantage over their political opponents, are helping to discredit the Administration of Western jSamoa which has, if anything, been too kind and lenient in its treatment of the Samoans, a single minded, yet restless race, amenable to any suggestions made by interested Europeans and others that they are not receiving the fair treatment they are entitled to,