TYRANNY IN FIJI

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1617, 25 February 1903, Page 59

TYRANNY IN FIJI

AN OUTSIDE OPINION ON THE SUBJECT. (By “Observer.”) It is a favourite device cf the Opposition press at the present time, when referring to the Premier’s farsecing and statesmanlike endeavour to secure better government for the people of Fiji and, indirectly, to foster the development of Fijian trade with New Zealand, to quote only one set of authorities on the main question at issue'. It is most amusing to notice the avidity with which Mr Seddon’s critics have pounced upon the bald and unsupported statements made (to what is naturally a sympathetic audience in Sydney), by Mr Allaruyce, Assistant Secretary of Fiji, and other members of the little official clique against whom, so it is now notorious, the majority of European traders in .Fiji, and the Fijian natives to a man, are practically in open revolt. No one could expect Mr Allardyce and the official element generally to support a movement the first, and to them, most direct result of which would be the loss of their positions, and large salaries, and it is not unnatural that these gentlemen should be somewhat perturbed of spirit. It is not from the official element that we can get any true statement of the position. Let us turn, then, to the calm dispassionate evidence of the perfectly disinterested outsider. This evidence I found the other day in a recently published book of travel, entitled "Sunshine and Surf—a Year’s in the South Seas,” the authors of which are Mr Douglas Hall and Lord Albert Osborne. The book was published in 1901. In chapter xviii. the authors relate tlieir experiences in Fiji, and th® reader is soon made most unmistakeably aware of the disappointment and disgust with which the two English travellers became aware of tlie misgovernment of which the Fijians, both white and brown-skinned, are the victims.

On page 223 I find the following: “The whole islands are little better than a British slave colony. Not only do the natives pay the only direct taxation in the islands—white men paying none—but they also have to pay. indirectly, the heavy Custom duties, and in addition to all. are bound to do unlimited forced labour in public works, at the will of the Governor, avlio sends his orders through their roko. For' instance, if a road requires building, 500 or 600 natives will be commandeered to work on it. for which they not only get no pay of any kind, but are not even fed while they are doing the work. If they refuse to work, they’ can get two or three months' imprisonment under the law against disobedience, which punishes by fine or imprisonment any one who refuses to obey the orders of liis chief." One hears from the Opposition press and from “authorities" (Heaven save the mark of the Allardyce kind) that the Crown Government of Fiji has been most beneficial to the natives, but apparently the natives are singularly inappreciative. And no wonder. Read what the authors of “Sunshine and Surf" have to say of the methods adopted in the collection of taxes:—“The natives, too, are not allowed to pay their taxes in money (the

Government get about 000 a year out of these poor wretched natives), but they have to provide so much produce to the requisite value —generally either sugar or copra, chiefly the former. Every village has its patch of ‘tax sugar,’ and m the evening the native policeman goes round —as we ourselves heard him this verynight—calling out the orders for work for the next day. It is also a senseless way, certainly in one respect, of collecting these taxes, as supposing a little weeding has to be done' in the sugar-field, necessitating only a tew hands, the whole village will be summoned to attend in the tax field, for fear there should be a few shirkers who would evade doing their share of the work; so lots of them have to sit round idly, or a dozen people have to pretend to do the work cf one, when thev might be more profitably employed.”

The Fijian Government is indeed, a fearful and wonderful institution. There is the Governor and the Council. This precious Council, which, with, the Go veil or, makes the laws for the whole population, is composed of the six heads of departments and six presumably “leading” white inhabitants, appointed by the Governor, but only during ‘‘good behaviour,” which practically means that when a member of the Council Is auuacious enough, to have an opinion of his own, he is promptly- invested with whatever is the T iiian synonym for the ‘‘order of the sack.” That under such conditions there can, of course, be no such thing as public liberty has been amply proved. Of the Governor who, mainly through the efforts of the very "New Zealand party.” which the "Past.” with its usual strong Australian bias tries to represent as an insignificant, u.Minfluential section of the community, has had to retire to London. Mr ITall and Lord Osborne remark that he “is a man with very strong ideas, which are not always successful, and it was commonly reported to us that if a deputation of merchants or others came to sec him on any subject lie scarcely received them with common politeness.” The travellers assert that "it is no wonder that the great bulk of the population are anxious for + k'.ioration wiin New Zealand, as a good many of them are from that very independent and well-governed colony, and are net accustomed to this mediaeval state of things.”

They then quote a letter from the Eewa district which appeared in the “Fiji Tinfes ” and which dealt with an instance of really abominable oppression of certain natives, a case which has already been made by Mr Humphrey Berkeley. Commenting on this, the authors cf “Sunshine and Surf” remark: “The case of Tavu Tavu Wali, mentioned therein is, if I remember rightly, rather a hard one-. It appears a young white a. sort of sanitary inspector, appeared at his village and ordered most of the bread-fruit trees in the village to be cut down, as he stated they shaded the village or made it unhealthy in some way. Although they prize their bread-fruit trees., one of their sole means of sustenance more than anything else, they obeyed the white man and cut them down. Not - content with this, a little while afterwards ho ordered them to remove their village entirely, and join it to another village. At this arbitrary command the poor natives struck, and the bull left his district and came to Suva to petition the Governor against the order. For this, as you will see in the above letter, he and the whole village were severely punished. “Of course,” they add later on. "a large clique of officials are strongly averse to federation, .as they are a nice little family party, and a good many of them would lose itheir billets. I am speaking from memory, but I believe the revenue of the colony is about ~£90,000 a year, out of which <£38,000 a year at least goes in direct salaries to white men. This would correspond to more than <£40,000,000 of salaries in our English budget, and of course, they have no army or navy to keep up.” There can be little doubt that Mr Hall and Lord Albert Osborne hit the right nail on the head in the above paragraph, and they quote quite a number of instances to show how shamefully the Fijians are misgoverned. Out of 6000 cases tried in the Courts, 5000 were not for criminal offences, but for offences against the regulations. The voice of indignant protest is quietly but firmly suppressed in the official reports, the only chance of the sufferers from official tyranny being heard being in the columns of the* New Zealand press, and through the medum of Mr Seddon’s chivalrous espousal of their just cause. A white merchant told Mr Hull. ‘‘We a.re thousands of miles from England. The Governor’s salary is paid by the colony, but nothing of any sort about Fiji ever goes up before Parliament. TVe know nobody in authority in England, and there is nobody to take our part.” Luckily for Fiji, there lias now sprung up somebody to take the part of the Fijians, and it is precisely because he lias taken up the role of champion and would-be reformer with all his natural earnestness and vigour, that Mr Seddon is now being so virulently attacked by the Fijian official clique and by a section of the New Zealand Opposition press, which cares not one rap about Fiji, or the Fijians, but which is palpably actuated by the basest motives of political partisanship.