Samoans hear plea to end law that 'should make NZ ashamed'

By THERESA GARNER

A "racist" law robbed Samoans of New Zealand citizenship and will continue to shame the country unless it is repealed, a parliamentary select committee has been told.

Memories of a time of dawn raids and taunts of "coconut" and "overstayer" emerged at a historic hearing which linked Samoans in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, Hawaii and Apia by satellite.

About 2000 people watched on video screens as the committee heard submissions on a petition signed by 100,000 people to repeal the 1982 Citizenship (Western Samoa) Act.

Central to the claim was that it was wrong to retrospectively deprive Samoans of the human right to reside in New Zealand.

The law was rushed through to override a Privy Council ruling which confirmed that Samoans born between 1924 and 1948 were New Zealand citizens.

Repealing the act would mean these Samoans and their children would be able to gain New Zealand citizenship.

At the Mangere community centre, babies cried and children ran up and down the aisles as the contingent of 700 strained to hear, intermittently bursting into harmonious song during breaks in the video link.

As they recognised familiar faces in Apia, cries of joy and laughter boomed round the room.

Most beamed throughout the transmission, and clapped enthusiastically as the speakers brought 20 years of pain into the parliamentary arena.

Lead petitioner George Barton, QC, who took the Privy Council case, said the act was a blot on the statute law.

"The act should make New Zealanders ashamed and determined to do all they can to right an obvious injustice."

Dr Barton said it was rare for citizenship to be retrospectively removed.

"One of the significant examples where nationality was stripped from people retrospectively was in Nazi Germany in relation to the Jews.

"I would be ashamed if anyone were to suggest we were doing that sort of thing."

The opposition to the law 20 years ago by the then-backbencher Helen Clark was referred to several times. "The present Prime Minister labelled the 1982 bill as racist," Dr Barton said. "She was absolutely correct."

Helen Clark said through an official in March that she saw no need for the law to be revisited.

Former National MP Arthur Anae, whose attempt at a private member's bill was rejected by his party caucus, said people had been deprived of their rights for too long.

"If Western Samoa was a European country, would such a bill ever have been introduced?

"Why then would the New Zealand Parliament not repeal such a racist act?"

Mr Anae said New Zealand held its head up high as a guardian of human rights issues "when there is a rotting smell in the closet at home that needs to be addressed".

"Between 1991 and 2001, 85,000 Asian migrants came to New Zealand and we haven't got a problem with that. Why then does the New Zealand Government continue to discriminate against its own people?"

The committee was told by several submitters that the law had torn Samoan families apart.

In Apia, Maiva Visekota Peteru, a former MP, said the quota immigration system was a farce, and that Samoan families were adopting out their children for a better life in New Zealand.

She became a lawyer after witnessing as a child in Auckland the dawn raids on people referred to as "overstayers" and "coconuts".

The law was born in a "climate of racial prejudice and fear", but she believed the climate had changed.

Former Human Rights Commissioner Pat Downey said the issue needed to be resolved.

"Bearing in mind our troublesome experiences of the Treaty of Waitangi injustices of the 19th century, one would have expected a more correct, sensitive approach."

The petitioners could not say how many Samoans could potentially come to New Zealand if the law were repealed. However, several submitters said New Zealand would not be swamped by a tide of migrants.

The select committee will hear evidence from the Department of Internal Affairs, then report to Parliament.


Where Samoans live

In Samoa: 174,140

In New Zealand: 120,000 (half NZ's Pacific Island population)

New Samoan permanent residents in NZ each year: 1100