| Politics: ANOTHER REFERENDUM FOR NZ'S LAST COLONY? |
Islanders reject self-government.
Michael Field
| Ballot boxes leave Nukunonu... UNDP Representative Joyce Yu sits on one. With Tokelau's 'No' vote, UNDP's involvement with Tokelau ended. |
On Fakaofo, Tokelau's southern atoll, everybody lives so close to each other on a tiny patch of land that there can never be any secrets. All the same, you might have thought that some of the 500 souls might have made the short walk to watch a piece of history unfold before them.
In the event, only a couple of children lingered near the island fale as electoral officials counted 584 votes on whether Tokelau should become self-governing in free association with New Zealand.
In the event, 60 percent of the registered voters approved, short of the two thirds majority the General Fono had set for approval.
So for now Tokelau remains New Zealand's last colony, benignly run from a distance-the same awesome loneliness which made the whole concept of self-government seemed strangely odd in the first place.
The exercise began in Apia, Samoa, in February, by chance the 80th anniversary of Britain handing Tokelau-which it called the Union Islands-to New Zealand which was at the time the disastrous administering power of Samoa. With three atolls-Atafu, Nukunonu and Fakaofo-and no harbour or airport, it never looked viable as a nation.
But with New Zealand citizenship they had access to help and an outlet for its surging population. Today, just 1500 Tokelauans live on the atolls; another 8000 live mainly in New Zealand.
The New Zealand and Tokelauan Administration, complete with officials from the United Nations and the biggest media pack in Tokelauan history (including a staff writer from the New Yorker), left Apia aboard the Samoan inter-island ferry Lady Naomi for the rough 36-hour voyage to Atafu.
Although all 186 voters on Atafu, population 600, voted, it was not a happy time for them to do so with bitter division among islanders over the Congregational Church Pastor Iosua Faamoani. A decade back he was involved in an ill-defined, un-prosecuted sex scandal and left the atoll.
Recently he returned to take up leadership of the church after a public apology. But many were not happy and refused to attend the island's only church.
As referendum vote counting was on a national basis, it was never clear how each island voted. But officials were in no doubt that Atafu's divisions made winning a two thirds majority for self-government very difficult.
Nukunonu, Catholic and home to the then Ulu, Pio Tuia had strongly endorsed self-government and in keeping with the remarkable order and cleanliness apparent, handled the referendum with a 100 percent turnout.
Why Tokelau's been voting has been a matter of dispute. The United Nations long ago declared the end of colonialism but, vexingly, 16 non-self-governing territories remain before the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation. It's an odd list: French Polynesia is not on it, American Samoa is and doesn't want to be.
New Zealand, a liberal democracy, was always embarrassed to find itself on the list and pushed Tokelau towards the referendum.
In some ways the officials were right to do so; Tokelau is already almost completely self-governing now.
Another referendum
Administrator Neil Walter, a veteran diplomat, plainly did not lord himself over the Tokelauans. He showed impressive respect and admiration for the island and its people.
The voting at Fakaofo took place in a big traditional fale decorated with no less than five New Zealand flags. The electoral officials running the show left them in place.
When the results came out, Tuia made it clear this was not the final word and they would be back for another referendum.
“We feel ashamed that we cannot stand up and determine our own future. That really hurts us, we cannot be free men.”
Tuia said that while the people had spoken, the numbers gave him hope that they could return to the ballot box inside two years.
“It won't be long before we come out again, we are nearly there,” he said.
In the meantime, he said, Tokelau would have to continue living as a colony.
“We continue being a colony of New Zealand, it is very hard.”
Administrator Walter expressed disappointment at the outcome.
Challenge
“This was always going to be something of a challenge,” he said.
“The people were understandably cautious about change.”
He said some of the accompanying documents, a constitution and a treaty of free association with New Zealand, may have been complex and confusing for voters.
“I thought the constitution and the treaty combined to give Tokelau the best of both worlds.”
Papua New Guinean diplomat Robert Aisi, representing the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation, said the result was very fair and transparent.
“The people have spoken, we have just seen democracy in action.
“The threshold was pegged at such a height, but we didn't get it. We might have to look at other ways of assisting them if that is what they want.”
New Zealand academic Anthony Hooper argued that the process had been flawed because not all Tokelauans who could have voted bothered to register.
“Anyone who knows Tokelau will be familiar with the fact that people who disagree with a proposition will simply stay away from the fono or other processes set up to decide on an issue,” he says.
“When this happens, Tokelauans speak of a lack of 'maopoopo'-“togetherness”-or “unity of purpose”, and are discouraged by it. They know, however, how to interpret this lack of maopoopo. It means that people wish to avoid the whole run around or in this case, No.”
He reckons that only around 43 percent of all who could have voted were in favour of self-government.
In New Zealand, Opposition National Party's foreign affairs spokesperson, former diplomat John Hayes slammed the whole exercise, saying it was “nothing more than an exercise in stupidity.
“How on Earth did anyone ever think that the 1500 people living on three atolls 400 kilometres across the ocean from Samoa would have sufficient cash surplus as a group to afford the cost of self-government?
“The bureaucrats who recommended the process and the ministers who blindly accepted it have lost their grip on common sense and reality.
“Foreign Affairs, it seems, does not learn from its mistakes. Niue was forced down the same path and the same process failed them.
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