page 10

Article "Grieved and Amazed" Fijian Students

(In answer to the article entitled, " Fijian Students Keeping to Themselves," that appeared in the last issue of " Salient.")

It grieved ana amazed us to read of the unwarranted and misleading article accusing the Fiji Students" Association of practising discrimination and keeping to themselves. Let us analyze the various indictments. We have been told that we hold separate functions. Let it be clear at the outset that this is no secret society. We entered a float in the University Capping procession. This shows that we do not hesitate to participate in varsity functions. Further, the author may not know, but quite a few people who took part on the float were non-Fijians. Our bulletin contains articles from people who are non-Fijians. It is distributed to our friends. At our dinner there were about 50 people who, were Kiwis or non-Fijians and only 35 from Fiji. We had a debate with the V.U.W. debating club. Are these, not evidence enough of the fact that we welcome and encourage contact with people of non-Fijian origin?

True enough, we are not affiliated with the V.U.W. Students' Association. There are many reasons for this. Firstly, over one third of our members are not students at Victoria. This is evident from our name. It is not, as B.T.M. put it "Fiji Students' Association of Victoria" but rather the Fiji Students' Association of Wellington. In other words it is an association of all students from Fiji who are in Wellington. The fact that the majority of its students attend V.U.W. is Incidental. It is not a university club. This in itself rules out any question of affiliation with the V.U.W.S.A.

Further we do like to keep our distinct identity. In this way we can present Fiji, its problems and peoples, to our Kiwi friends in the best way possible, so that knowing our problems, a better insight can be secured by them, thereby resulting in greater all-round understanding.

We are not alone in this. There are many associations whose membership is based on common interest. We have the Chambers of Commerce for business people, the Dutch Club, the various Old Boys' Associations, ad nauseum. Surely B.T.M. Is not suggesting that there should be no sectional associations. Carrying his argument to its logical conclusion we find that there is room for only one Association of any kind whatsoever in this whole world.

It is a travesty of the truth to say that we encourage our students to stick to themselves. At all our functions we welcome and try to the best of our ability to entertain our Kiwi friends. And we may tell B.T.M, that we have quite a few Kiwi friends. It is at these functions that we make contacts and develop friendly relationships with other people. We feel (and we think rightly) that we can better promote friendly relationships if we make a concerted effort as a group rather than as individuals.

We state categorically that this association was not born of any feeling of rejection on the part of the Fijian boys, as the psychologist in B.T.M. seems to Imply. It grew out of a desire on the part of the Fijian boys to have a group where they could discuss and solve problems peculiar to them. This docs not imply any dislike or abhorrence of anyone. There is no question of shunning any Kiwi and we are happy to say that the Fiji boys are very approachable and accessible and they mix very well with others. The gathering of friends of our members at our annual dinner bore ample testimony to this.

B.T.M. mentions that we cook up prejudices to salvage our ego. One gets the distinct impression that B.T.M. is trying to salvage his own ego by blaming us.

B.T.M. also mentions the failure of Fiji students to establish contact with outside organisations. This is consistent with the rest of his article in that it Is entirely erroneous. Fiji students are active members of many other clubs. In the last 6 years our members have supplied 4 presidents of the International Club. This year we have our boys on the executives of the World Affairs Council and the International Club. Our members arc active participants in the affairs of the Historical Society, the E.U., Debating Club, Education Society and Geography Society as well. We have boys playing in the University rugby, soccer and hockey teams. Our members have been on the Executive of the V.U.W.S.A. This list could be quite long. Further, we have as our Patron, Dr. Watters of the Geography Dept. Our boys have gone to primary schools to talk on Fiji. Are we then "keeping to ourselves?" This is not only contrary to all fact, but terribly unjust.

Finally we accuse "Salient" of violating one of the cardinal principles of journalistic courtesy. In fairness, the article, before being published, should have been referred to us, so that this reply could have been published simultaneously with the grossly unkind allegations made by B.T.M.