Temaru and East-West Center conference

Following up on an earlier post where this was mentioned in the comments, here's the Honolulu Weekly article about the conference of Pacific Island leaders at the East-West Center attended by Tahitian president and independence leader Oscar Temaru, but not attended by Native Hawaiian leaders or the press.

[I have posted the entire article in the extended entry since the URL will change when they archive it.]

Honolulu Weekly
June 8 - 14, 2005

Where are the Hawaiians?

The East-West Center didn’t invite native Hawaiians to its conference of Pacific island leaders

Gretchen Currie Kelly

On May 18 and 19, the East-West Center hosted an event that, had it taken place in any number of places around the Pacific, would have attracted a beehive of media activity.

But the eerie quiet—with no photographers or reporters in sight—belied the significance of this annual gathering of indigenous leaders for the 29th meeting of the standing committee of the Pacific Islands Conference of Leaders.

In attendance for the first time was Oscar Temaru, the new president of Tahiti. The veteran independence activist has been at the center of drama and turmoil in a cliff-hanging 10-month sequence of events that saw him elected, only to lose his office and then regain it in a new election. For almost a year, Papeete erupted with protest marches and charges of French intrigue and interference in the affairs of the territory.

Temaru joined other dignitaries of the region, including chairman HRH Prince ‘Ulukalala Lavaka Ata, prime minister of Tonga; the Honorable Jim Marurai, prime minister of the Cook Islands; His Excellency Kessai H. Note, president of the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Honorable Sir Allan Kemakeza, prime minister of the Solomon Islands.

The Pacific Island Conference of Leaders is part of the East-West Center’s Pacific Islands Development Program (PIDP), created in 1980 to “assist Pacific islands leaders in advancing their collective efforts to achieve and sustain equitable social and economic development consistent with the goals of the Pacific islands region’s people.” PIDP began as a forum through which island leaders could discuss critical issues of development with a wide spectrum of interested countries, donors, non-governmental organizations and the private sector.

In the past few years, the region that comprises the Pacific’s ocean of islands—indigenously referred to as Pasifika—has seen its political temperature heat to boiling at a number of pulse points. Tahiti’s election fiasco was only one of many regional situations that reflect a growing grassroots political awareness and populist efforts to wean away from colonial governments and elitist bodies.

Tonga is another high-profile hot spot. The royal family’s unabashed grasping for wealth at the expense of the increasingly struggling populace has sparked clashes. People marched in protest of the government’s attempt to muzzle the press that dared to ask for accountability from the monarchy.

In striking juxtaposition to the rising temperatures and headline events around the region, the quiet mood of the conference had a somewhat forced note, with East-West Center officials balking at releasing information about the gathering, its attendees and its agenda.

The center’s post-conference report indicated that topics discussed at the meeting included economic capacity building, policy dialogue on political transformation, diplomatic training, the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the region, resource and land ownership issues and disaster preparedness.

Before the conference, the dignitaries flew to Maui to tour the Pacific Disaster Center. Prince ‘Ulukalala Levaka Ata explained that all the leaders in attendance were concerned, in the wake of the recent Indonesia tsunami, about creating new capabilities for dealing with natural disasters.

“In Tonga, we had the Disaster Center people come and do studies about the technology gap, to enable our scientists and people to talk through IT means to the Disaster Center,” he said.

Significantly, the leaders concurred on a need for more research into development and institutional models that incorporate the traditions and cultures of the region, reflecting the emerging cultural positivism of Pasifika that seeks self-determined economic, cultural, social and political development, rather than institution based on colonial models that do not reflect “the Pasifik way.”

The PIDP’s dynamic director, Dr, Sitiveni Halapua, gave a keynote report that stressed the importance of broadly participatory, holistic development approaches that “care and provide for the material, cultural and spiritual needs of the people.”

One observer noted that several of the visiting leaders expressed surprise at the fact that no indigenous Hawaiians—with the exception of Kumu Keola Lake who welcomed the leaders with a chant—had been invited to be part of the proceedings.

Rapa Nui representative Mahina Rapu declined to enter the conference chamber when she learned that no Hawaiians had been invited to participate. She spent the two days of the meeting outside the building.

“Linda Lingle is not an indigenous leader,” Rapu said. “Where are the Hawaiians?”

Lingle is the designated representative from Hawai‘i to the Conference of Leaders.

When questioned about how the East-West Center, which gets half its funding from the U.S. State Department, sees Hawai‘i’s role, director Charles Morrison made it clear that Hawai‘i was not considered an indigenous entity in and of itself but rather as a conduit for information about the Pacific to the U.S. government.

“Hawai‘i, by nature of its geography, is a very natural place for providing knowledge about the Pacific islands to the United States” he said.

He went on to speak about Hawai‘i’s strategic value to the Pacific region by virtue of the PIDP programs, the scholarships offered to Pacific students and the University of Hawai‘i’s activities available to Pacific islanders.

But to many of the leaders in attendance, Hawai‘i has always been an integral part of the region, sharing geographic, common language and cultural ties with other Pasifika nations.

“We all belong to the Pacific,” says Temaru, who sees the potential for Hawai‘i’s role as a Pacific island nation as a significant one. “We have to work on our relations with our brothers all over the Pacific, including Hawai‘i. They are our closest cousins —brothers and sisters.”

Posted: Mon - June 13, 2005 at 10:12 AM

getBlogName(); > getCategoryName("C1126750129"); >

Temaru and East-West Center conference

> >