Muldoon sure knows how to pick his moments. Just as the term was breaking up the Government announced that not only is Trevor Richards a dissident but so is everyone else who disagrees with the united front of MPs. Even papal infallibility is not invoked all the time: are we really meant to develop an unshakeable faith in Parliamentary infallibility now?

Next came the decision not to allow the NZUSA Southern Africa scholar into New Zealand unless an undertaking was given that s/he would not engage in political activities. Widespread opposition to this decision came pouring in (even the Dominion was moved to editorialise) but the group who would normally have been most vocal in its criticism and active in demonstrating its opposition, students, were on holiday. However a delegation did get to see the Minister of Immigration Frank Gill (I'll come back to an account of that incredible episode).

Developing a Taste for it

By this time the Government was really into its stride, and announced that an official representative of the East Timorese Fretilin Government, Jose Ramos Horta could only come to New Zealand if he did not talk about politics either! Brian Talboys' explanation, that New Zealand did not recognise Fretilin and therefore was under no obligation to listen to it, is full of blatant flaws. First off, it is the NZ Government which does not recognise Fretilin. The Government can choose at any time it likes who it will listen to, but this does not give it the right to deny New Zealand people the right to make up their own minds.

The Indonesian Government suppresses the democratic rights of the East Timorese and of its own people. By denying Horta the right to speak on this Muldoon demonstrated his own Government's acceptance of anti-democratic methods and gave implicit support to a fascist regime. Remember what he claims to have told a Nigerian UN representative concerning Trevor Richards? In your country you lock up people like him ...

It is not true, of course, that the Government waits until students are on holiday especially so it can reveal a little bit more of its anti-democratic nature. But there is a long history of coincidence, and it seems clear that the potential lack of organised student activity is a factor in deciding the timing of Government action Last year's SIS legislation is a case in point. Things like this won't change, but it does point to the importance of the role student politics play in New Zealand. In fact, MPs have long acknowledged the strength of the student movement as a pressure group.

Who's a Paranoid?

After the Horta decision, more was to come. Abraham Ordia went on television denouncing the New Zealand Government's non-compliance with the Gleneagles agreement. He was taking a stand on a matter of principle, and was promptly and predictably branded as a paranoid. However this does not invalidate his claims.

A mark of the difference between New Zealand and other countries can be seen in the respective financial policies. Canada, for example, immediately cuts off all money to any sports group which has or proposes to have ties with South Africa. New Zealand and Britain are the only two countries not to have adopted this policy. It is not true to say that sport in New Zealand is non-government financed. The Ministry of Sport and Recreation doesn't spend all its money on adventure playgrounds and students' holiday work schemes.

Gill in the Morning

But back to the Southern Africa Scholarship, Gill agreed to meet the delegation at 8.30 am. A discouraging time to meet anyone, but moreover one which he knew would not get him into too much trouble, for the bells summoning him would be rung at 8.50. Due to the last minute xeroxing of necessary information the delegation arrived ten minutes late. This was unfortunate and should not have happened, and gave Gill a good excuse to delay things even further. It wasn't enough that we had lost time, we had to lose even more while he continually reminded us of it.

Once questioning started Gill was quick to display that particular inability to grasp more than one idea at a time or respond with reason and civility which marks him out as one of the more intransigent members of Parliament. He was asked, for the record and to establish a basis on which the discussion could proceed, why the Cabinet had introduced the regulation restricting the scholar's speaking rights.

The answer was expected to revolve around the two reasons already made public; that academic study would suffer and that the scholar's safety would be endangered when s/he returned home. But Gill took another tack, essentially the same one he took earlier in the year over the Movick affair. He claimed that the regulation was not new and had been the custom for many years, both in New Zealand and everywhere else in the Commonwealth.

The Government is the People

Gill was referring to Government sponsored students. When it was pointed out to him that the SA scholarship was a private award he disagreed on the grounds that New Zealanders were involved in the selection. The old "the people and the Government are the same" argument. Gill's insistence that the scholarship was not a private one formed the basis of his replies.

He claimed that the only recipient to date, Henry Isaacs, had devoted far too much time to politics and far too little time to his studies. The fact that Isaacs has done well in his academic life did not influence this opinion. Isaacs, claimed Gill, was "an irritant in the community". It's not hard to see just whom he has been irritating.

Clause 5d of the terms of the scholarship then came under examination. This states. "That recipients be willing to speak in New Zealand to any groups interested in Southern Africa bearing in mind that the scholarship is primarily to support the recipient's course of study". Gill claimed that the clause "required" the recipient to speak on politics, then said it said s/he should be "prepared" to speak, and generally did his best to steer the discussion into a semantic dead end.

He was asked why no other scholarships had such a restriction placed on them. They did, he claimed. Rotary and American Field Scholars were obliged to speak on the situation in their home countries, he was told. This was different. The SA scholarship wasn't private, it was given by special arrangement, he replied. It covered an area from which we don't usually take students. Well, we may not take many students from Southern Africa but we do take more immigrants from there than anywhere else.

Talboys vs Gill

A letter from Brian Talboys was quoted. In it Talboys had said he considered that to introduce an on-going provision for the scholarship had merit and was "consistent with the Government's attitude towards the problems of South Africa". The letter continued, "We have expressed on many occasions our opposition to apartheid in South Africa and our support for majority rule in Rhodesia and independence for Namibia." Gill was asked why he did not think, in the light of such statements, that the scholarship was something that should be encouraged. The bells rang and Gill sat back in his chair. You've asked your question, he announced, and now you'll have to go.

A great many other points were not made during the interview. Gill seems unaware that the scholarship favours people who are already restricted in their own countries because of their political beliefs or activities. It is thus nonsense to claim they would be endangered when they returned home. Effectively, they are already political refugees. Gill has made it clear in a press release to RNZ that the restriction only applies to private SA students who are black. Perhaps we are meant to assume that black students are incapable of engaging in both academic and political pursuits.

The Future for Frank

Anyone who has met Frank Gill might be excused for considering his days are numbered. The rumours which circulated at the time of his hospitalisation for "exhaustion" during the last Christmas vacation certainly give no cause for comfort to those who support him in high office. But Gill is not retiring. In a recent television interview he remarked that people in his electorate would be voting for the party not the man. The irony, it seemed, escaped him.

Gill is a good man for Muldoon to have around. He may be embarrassingly open about his reactionary views every now and then, but because it is so difficult to get past him or get him to reverse a decision once he has made it, he acts as a very efficient shield for any deeper purpose which might be accrued to a government action.

The Movick issue, for example, was quite plainly prompted by James Movick's efficiency as a leader of overseas students. The reasons for getting rid of him were primarily political. The confusion over permits was merely the convenient way to go about it. Gill was instrumental in creating that confusion and in fact managed to develop a classic Catch 22 out of the whole affair. Because James was a student he ruled the case would have to be heard by the Education Advisory Committee (EAC). Yet the EAC had no authority to make decisions, and no jurisdiction over people who did not hold or apply for a student permit. James was applying for a special work permit.

The National Party propaganda glossy "Years of Lightning" euphemistically credits Gill with administrative expertise and great strength of conviction. So assuming National gets back in what is Muldoon going to use these qualities for next year? The latest rumour: dear old Frank will become Minister of Education. (Gandar is tipped to succeed Gordon in the Labour hot seat, if he wins against Beetham).

Gill has had a lengthy interest in educational matters: he strongly supports the back to basics campaign and is especially concerned about the lack of religious values in the schools' curricular. In other ways too it is a logical step. Gill has already demonstrated a predilection for picking on those who cannot easily defend themselves (like Pacific Island immigrants). What more appropriate than children, who cannot defend themselves at all?

Simon Wilson