TOKELAU (1 Aug 2005) -- Tokelau, a group of microdot coral islets in the middle of the South Pacific that calls itself the last paradise on earth, is poised to cast off historic, colonial shackles and become the world's newest country. Set halfway between New Zealand and Hawaii, with no airport, a 28-hour boat trip away from its nearest neighbour and most of its people living overseas, it is the ultimate away-from-it-all mini-state. Tokelau's three main coral atolls cover only 12.2 sq km of land spread over 160 km of ocean. None of the 128 islets set in their reef-fringed lagoons is wider than 200 metres or more than five metres above sea level. There are only a handful of vehicles and the population of about 1,600 is outnumbered by the 8,000 or so Tokelauans who live in New Zealand, Australia and Samoa, 500 km to the south. Discovered 260 years ago by a British navy ship looking for mutineers from Captain William Bligh's HMS Bounty, Tokelau is a former British colony that handed over its administration to New Zealand in 1926. It is now in the final stages of completing a long transition to self-government in free association with New Zealand, an act that will see Tokelau removed from the United Nations (UN) list of 16 Non-Self Governing Territories next year. Tokelau is the only dependent territory on the list anywhere near achieving self-government and the UN special committee on the issue has praised New Zealand's "exemplary cooperation" and dubbed it a "case study with wider significance for the UN as it seeks to complete its work in decolonisation". Pio Tuia, the head of Tokelau's ruling council, put the situation in traditional Pacific poetry when he addressed the committee in New York in June: "Behold the seas are shimmering with the dawning of the new day. The big fish is about to surface. The journey's end is near." It has been a long journey since Tuia's Polynesian ancestors first paddled their canoes through the reefs into Tokelau's lagoons more than 1,000 years ago. Tokelau lost half its population to slave traders from Peru in the 1860s before sailing wanderers from Germany, America, Britain, France and Portugal settled there, married locals and revived the community. Britain claimed it in 1889, subsequently passing administration to New Zealand, which has run it for the last 79 years, though the Tokelauans have assumed increasing responsibility for their own affairs. "In practice, they have run themselves for a long time to all intents and purposes," Neil Walter, a New Zealand diplomat who is destined to be his country's last official administrator of Tokelau, told DPA. "It's already operating effectively as a country in its own right." But he said Tokelau, which remains a traditional Polynesian community, could not sensibly be run in the 21st century from a developed nation 3,000 km away, and it was right and proper that it formally manages its own affairs. Walter insisted that neither New Zealand nor the UN, which has sent five missions to Tokelau in the last 30 years, had pressured the Tokelauans into their new status and both had been happy to give them plenty of time to design their own system of government. | | Atafu Atoll, Tokelau That is based on traditional lines, with heads of villages on the three atolls taking turns to be the country's leader annually and a 21-member general fono (parliament) assisted by the Council for the Ongoing Government of Tokelau, which is based in Apia, Samoa, 500 km away, as the country's main link with the outside world. Tokelauans still have to approve the change formally at a referendum to be monitored by the UN later this year following a final round of consultations in the villages and among the 7,000 or so who live in New Zealand. Two-thirds of them were born in New Zealand and most are young, but Walter said they maintained affinity and allegiance with their familial atolls and actively retained the language and culture of their homeland. Keys to acceptance of self-government were assurances that Tokelauans would remain citizens of New Zealand and the latter would keep up the financial aid which accounts for 80 percent of the budget. Self-governance is expected to pave the way for additional aid from other countries and New Zealand has committed an initial 15.5 million New Zealand dollars (about $10.5 million) to an international trust fund to complement earnings from fishing licence fees, copra, handicrafts, stamps and coins. If everything goes according to plan, the new Pacific island state will be born on a yet to be decided Self Government Day after the cyclone season ends next May. That will be a big day, as Pio Tuia said in New York, marking the end of a journey in which his people, New Zealand and the UN had "paddled the Tokelau canoe together shoulder to shoulder and being tossed about like the lone coconut in very rough seas". With the optimism of a fledgling country, he finished his address to the UN special committee: "So now we are ready to cut the sails of the canoe and sail through the channel on the crest of the breaking wave into the Cove of Calmness." SOURCE - IANS |
