Christchurch Press Editorial 4.8.78

Overseas Students and Politics

Any suggestion that an overseas student studying in New Zealand should be denied the basic rights or freedoms enjoyed by the New Zealand students should not be countenanced. The restraints of the law should be the only ones imposed on overseas students who may live here as members of the New Zealand community for some yean.

Unfortunately, many overseas students are subject to a restraint which is not imposed on their New Zealand colleagues. Government-sponsored students have been required to agree that if they are accepted for study in New Zealand they will refrain from engaging in political activity.

The practical effect of this does not seem to have been great. "Political activity" has been interpreted narrowly, so that the ban has not extended to activities which, in the eyes of some, have political implication!. No attempt appears to have been made to prevent overseas students from talking to groups about the conditions or circumstances in their own countries. Joining or supporting a political party on attempting vigorously to change New Zealand policy might, however, be seen rather differently. Given the latitude of its interpretation, this policy of requiring that overseas students refrain from political activity is wrong. The Government should quickly reverse its intention to extend the restriction to a student who is to enter New Zealand privately. If the policy is to be altered it should be in the other direction, towards doing away with the restriction imposed on Government sponsored or supported students.

Charges have been made that the Government has imposed the restriction on a student, originally from South Africa, because it is reluctant to allow the student to speak out [unclear: frist] apartheid. The question should not be clouded by reference to the opinions of the particular student or to the alleged opinions of the present Government about apartheid. But the Minister of Immigration, Mr Gill, has not given any persuasive grounds for imposing the restriction on this student. It is not for the Government to attempt to judge in advance whether any of the student's activities in New Zealand, political or otherwise, might interfere with the student's studies. The educational institute alone must be the judge of this, and then only by applying to that student the same tern that are applied to all students.

It is equally unsatisfactory to say that the purpose of the restriction, imposed on this private student and on Government-sponsored students, is to protect these students from being "used" by New Zealand groups or individuals for their own political or social ends. The students are adults, and are likely to find such condescension galling rather than comforting. New Zealand should not take it on itself to protect overseas students; by such a restriction from incurring the attention or even wrath of their home country if they speak out politically while they are in New Zealand. New Zealand should not be party to any attempt at intimidation to curb free discussion or expression of opinion. It should strongly discourage any attempt to put pressure, officially or informally, on any overseas students to remain politically passive or quiescent if they want to speak.

While overseas students benefit from the opportunity to learn in New Zealand, New Zealand itself benefits from their coming. New Zealand's comparative isolation should persuade it to welcome people from different societies or cultures, and to encourage, not inhibit, their full participation in social and political life. A few of them may be propagandists, but it should be a source of pride for New Zealand that conflicting points of view can compete in a free exchange of opinions, or prejudices. The public itself should be able to sift the wheat from the chaff and not to be denied any source of information which better equips it to be able to do so.