Land Tenure in the Cook Islands
The progress of Court investigations
The progress of Court investigations
Investigations of title can only be initiated on the application of one or more of the persons claiming a right in the land concerned. 1 This has seldom slowed down the work of the Court, for once one person from any particular district lodges an application, others are forced to do likewise in order to protect their interests, and soon all are involved. 2 Though in the initial stages Makea Ariki supported the work of the Court 3 she became strongly opposed to it once she had seen it in operation. 4 It was not long, however, before Makea decided that she must ‘put all of her lands through the Court in self-defence’. 5
1 ‘Rules and Regulations…’ 1902 clauses 5–7; ‘Cook Islands Act’ 1915 section 379. The latter enactment also makes provision for the Resident Commissioner to initiate investigations.
2 The island of Mangaia has remained throughout an exception to this rule. There, despite occasional individual applications for Court investigations, the Mangaian leaders (and probably a high proportion of the people themselves) are unanimously opposed to the Land Court and have been able to stop applicants from prosecuting their claims, and thus to forestall the entry of the Land Court to the island.
3 Gudgeon, NZPP A3 1903:24.
4 Gudgeon to Mills 23.12.1904 NZPP A3 1905.
5 Gudgeon to Mills 30.3.1905 NZPP A3 1905.
Outstanding applications grew steadily and by 1938 there were 1,237 cases waiting to be dealt with, a number of which had been outstanding for more than twenty years. A fulltime judge was appointed in 1939 to deal with High Court and Land Court work, but the accumulation of outstanding applications nevertheless remained consistently over one thousand until 1955, when the figure dropped to 857. During more than half of this period there was one full-time judge of the Land Court, in addition to the Chief Judge who had High Court responsibilities as well.
1 NZPP A3 1927:15.
2 NZPP A3 1959:17.