KIRIBATI DEMOCRACY
French priests and British Protestant missionaries.
A beneficial community tradition lost The other adverse example brought about after independence was decisions that required voluntary communal work for the good welfare of the community. One such example was case of the school in two villages that required maintenance. The teachers told the school
committee that one classroom needed urgent repair work in order to protect the children from the
elements given the roof was leaking and the walls had fallen apart. The committee asked the Council to attend to the request but it hesitated because due to insufficient funds. So the Committee requested the old men of the two villages to help where they could. The old men met in council under their Maneaba and decided that this problem called for voluntary communal work from everyone in the villages. Everyone agreed to the decision and the schools were repaired, enabling the children to study under better conditions. However one of the parents
refused to work without being paid and so did not contribute to the schools’ repair. Other parents reported this to their village and the old men decided again in council that the child whose parent refused to work voluntarily should be barred from attending classes. The parents of the child complained about this and the Ministry of Education replied that it was against the law to forbid a child from going to school. The committee replied that it had not forbid the child
from going to school; they only agreed that the child should not be schooled in the classroom that the child’s parents refused to help repair. They
“The unfortunate consequence of this is creating a division in the community as people begin to think along party lines and not as one community of a village or of one island.“
were of the view that the child could be schooled anywhere just not in that classroom. The court then came into
dispute and ordered that under the constitution it was wrong to make anyone work without pay. It ended the authority of the old men in making decisions for the good of the community and deciding
punishments to those who refused to obey their decisions. As it stands, people refuse to work
on community projects anymore without being paid. For Kiribati, which has very little revenue, this means that all communal amenities and assets are left to the whims and generosity of aid donors for their maintenance, as the government normally has few financial resources.
Taking matters into their own hands The authority of the old men is still revered by most of the community so the few who dare go against it under the guise of the new system are still punished but in a more discreet way which is near to committing a criminal act. There is now a term called “the six o’clock punishment”. People who refuse to obey the old men’s/village decision are punished by stones being thrown at, or their houses being burned down after six o’clock when it is dark and no one can see or recognize the perpetrators. It is sad but it is one result of the so-called Westminster democracy.
The Parliamentarian | 2013: Issue One | 29
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