When New Zealanders commemorate Anzac Day today on April 25, it’s not only to honour the soldiers who lost their lives in World War I and subsequent conflicts, but also to mark a defining event for national identity.

The battle of Gallipoli against the Ottoman Empire, the story goes, was where the young nation passed its first test of courage and determination.

The question of why New Zealand soldiers ended up on Turkish beaches in April 1915 is typically not part of these commemorations. Rather, our collective memories begin with the moment of the early morning landing.

• READ MORE: New lessons about old wars: keeping the complex story of Anzac Day relevant in the 21st century
• A century on, the Balfour Declaration still shapes Palestinians’ everyday lives
• Less than illustrious: remembering the Anzacs means also not forgetting some committed war crimes
• Other war on Gaza reports

Consider, for example, the timing of the Anzac Day dawn service, or the Museum of New Zealand-Te Papa Tongarewa’s exhibition, Gallipoli: The Scale of Our War, which plunges visitors straight into the action.

This selective retelling of history is necessary for the “coming of age” narrative to work. It helps conceal that Britain was pursuing its own colonial ambitions against the Ottomans, and that New Zealand took part in World War I as “a member of the British club”, as historian Ian McGibbon puts it, loyally devoted to the imperial cause.

Against the background of the recent horrors and escalating tensions in the Middle East, however, it seems more important than ever to make these silences speak in our commemorations of Gallipoli.

Britain’s colonial interests
While the causes of World War I are complex and multifaceted, historians have extensively documented that Britain had long seen parts of the decaying Ottoman Empire as prey for colonial expansion.

Already, in the late 1800s, Britain had taken control of Cyprus and Egypt.

Turkey’s Middle Eastern possessions were of interest to the government in London because they provided not only a land route to the colony in India, but also rich oil reserves.

Hence, when the Ottoman Empire signed an alliance with Germany — mainly to guard against Russian territorial aspirations – and somewhat reluctantly entered World War I, the British did not lament this as a diplomatic defeat.

“The decrepit Ottoman Empire was more useful to them as a victim than as a dependent ally,” as the late historian Michael Howard explained.

The day after Britain declared war on the Ottomans on November 5, 1914, British troops attacked Basra (in today’s southern Iraq) to secure nearby oil facilities.

In the following months, the Triple Entente of Britain, France and Russia won a number of easy victories, which fuelled the belief the Turkish military was weak. This in turn led Britain to devise a plan to launch a direct strike on Constantinople, the Ottoman capital.

First, however, they had to clear the Gallipoli peninsula of enemy defences. And who better suited to this task than the first convoy of Anzac troops, just a short distance away in Egypt after passing through the Suez Canal?

Palestine: a complex tangle of pledges
As is well known, war planners in London had underestimated the enemy’s military strength. The battle of Gallipoli ended in a Turkish victory over Britain and its allies.

Nevertheless, fortunes eventually turned against the Ottoman Empire.

Although a whole century has gone by, British diplomatic efforts and secret agreements that were meant to accelerate the collapse of the Ottoman Empire still shape the Middle East today.

Most significantly, it is the violent conflict over Palestine that can be traced back to colonial power dealings during World War I. The crux of the problem is that Britain affirmed three irreconcilable wartime commitments in relation to Palestine.

First, in the hope of initiating an Arab revolt against Ottoman rule, the British made promises to Sharif Husayn, the emir of Mecca, about the creation of an independent Arab kingdom.

Second, in the Sykes-Picot Agreement, which divided the Ottomans’ Arab lands into British and French spheres of interest, Palestine was designated for international administration.

Third, in the Balfour Declaration of November 1917, the British government pledged support for a “Jewish national home” in Palestine — a move motivated by a mixture of realpolitik and Biblical romanticism.

In the end, it was the third commitment that turned out to be the most enduring.

How should we remember Gallipoli?
Amid this complex history, we must not forget the thousands of New Zealand soldiers who died in World War I — men who had either volunteered, expecting a quick and heroic war, or served as draftees.

However, we need to have a public discussion about whether it is still appropriate for our commemorations to skip over the question of why these men fought in Europe and the Mediterranean.

Facing up to this question not only makes us aware of our responsibilities towards the Middle East problem, but it can also serve as a lesson for the future — not to blindly follow great powers into their military adventures.

Olli Hellmann, Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Waikato. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

Some described it as a case of looking back to go forward.

This past week in Fiji — a place where politics, race, the army and tradition mix together in an often potent stew — the Great Council of Chiefs, a organisation banished for almost two decades, came together to re-establish its place in modern Fiji.

It came on the same week a regional body of traditional leaders, including a Māori king and princess, Samoan king and Fiji’s chiefs, met on Fiji’s sacred island of Bau to discuss ways of becoming more entrenched in politics and the big decisions affecting the region.

• READ MORE: Other Great Council of Chiefs reports
• Other Lice Movono reports

This new push comes at a time when governments in countries such as New Zealand are pushing back against traditional influence, with Māori language and specific social services being abolished.

For some commentators, it reflects a new Fiji and a more mature Pacific region: something that should be encouraged to meld together aspects of traditional life into modern society.

Yet for others, it brings back memories of a time of fear and division.

“The Great Council of Chiefs has committed a lot of mistakes in the past, including being used by some as a leverage for ethnonationalism and racial hatred,” political sociologist Professor Steven Ratuva told the ABC.

“It needs to rise above that and must function and be seen as a unifying, reconciliatory and peace-building body.”

Fiji’s highest chiefly political body, the Great Council of Chiefs has reconvened for the first time in 16 years.

ABC Pacific’s Lice Movono reports from Bau Island in Tailevu, Fiji. pic.twitter.com/6gfbDNcpMa

— ABC Pacific (@ABCPacific) May 25, 2023

‘Times have changed’
The Great Council of Chiefs (GCC), known as Bose Levu Vakaturaga in Fijian, dates back to colonial times. Established in 1876, the council was used as an advisory body for the British colonial rulers.

After Fiji’s independence in 1970, the GCC became entrenched in the constitution, with chiefs acting as a significant part of Fiji’s Senate. During the next three decades it had periods of waxing and waning influence, with its independence and political interference often under the spotlight.

Most notably, as an organisation to promote and represent indigenous Fijians (the iTaukei), it was accused by some of sidelining Fiji’s substantial Indo-Fijian population — which makes up about 35 per cent of Fiji — and in turn stoking racial tension.

In his 2006 coup, military strongman Voreqe Baninimarama took over the country and eventually abolished the GCC, which he considered a threat to his autocracy, famously telling chiefs to “go drink homebrew under a mango tree”.

But after winning the December 2022 election, and in turn removing Bainimarama’s 16-year grip on power, Fiji’s new prime minster Sitiveni Rabuka, himself a former coup leader, re-established the GCC.

Rabuka last week told the 54 chiefs of the GCC — of which only three are women — that “peace must be its cornerstone”.

“While the body is intrinsically linked to the governance and well-being of the iTaukei [traditional Fijians], it carries a profound obligation to embrace and advocate for every member of our diverse society,” Rabuka said.

Ratu Viliame Seruvakula, a military commander under the former Fijian government who worked with the United Nations for almost two decades, was last week elected as the GCC’s new chairperson.

“Times have changed,” Seruvakula said.

“It’s quite obvious that for the last 15 years, people have become more aware in looking [for] something to help guide them forward.”

And in a move that has drawn parallels to Australia’s failed Indigenous Voice to Parliament, he wants the GCC to be a “statutory body with its own machinery and own mechanism.”

“I think this is heading in the right direction [to] really go forward and move iTaukei forward.” he said.

The ‘politics of prestige’
About 60 percent of Fiji is indigenous, with the  iTaukei population, particularly in regional areas of Fiji, dealing with emended issues of systemic poverty, drugs, crime, unemployment and domestic violence.

Some in Fiji think the re-establishment of the GCC will help address these issues.

Yet, for Professor Steven Ratuva, political sociologist and director of the Macmillan Brown Centre for Pacific Studies at the University of Canterbury, it is not an easy fix.

“The question of how the GCC will serve the interests of the iTaukei needs serious discussion,” he said.

“Simply using the old style of chiefly protocol, politics of prestige and struggle for power have not worked in addressing the worsening situation — in fact, these contributed to some of the problems youths today are now facing.”

And, he said, the racial issue must be addressed.

“How will it protect other ethnic groups? This has to be made very clear to ensure that the anxiety and worries are addressed amicably and trans-ethnic trust is established.”

The professor in comparative politics at Victoria University of Wellington, Jon Fraenkel, agreed.

“It has played a questionable role [in Fiji] in the past,” he said. “But I think [overall] that the restoration of the GCC is a positive move.”

The GCC will meet later this year to establish its goals and timeline.

GCC leaders will also be part of a Pacific Traditional Leaders Forum to be held in Hawai’i in June, a new body established last week on Bau Island — which met before the GCC meeting — to promote the input of traditional leaders in decision-making.

Professor Fraenkel said that at this early stage it was difficult to know whether it was part of a concerted trend across the region for traditional leaders to have more say.

“Again, to have greater links between government and community leadership is a positive thing,” he said.

“It’s the case in many countries in the Pacific that the village level or the local level, chiefs can still be extremely important.

“But I don’t think that linking traditional leaders up with their people is going to be done in Hawai’i, it’s going to be done back home, in the community.”

Republished with permission from ABC Pacific News.

When it comes to grappling with the Treaty of Waitangi/Te Tiriti o Waitangi, one of the commonest responses is that it is a matter of interpretation. It seems to be a perfectly fair reaction, except that historical interpretation generally requires adherence to rules of evidence.

It is not a licence to make any claims whatsoever about the Treaty, and then to assert their truth by appealing to the authority of personal interpretation.

Yet since the 1970s New Zealanders have been faced with the paradoxical situation of a growing body of Treaty scholarship that has led to less consensus about its meaning and purpose.

• READ MORE: History and myth: why the Treaty of Waitangi remains such a ‘bloody difficult subject’
• Learning to live with the ‘messy, complicated history’ of how Aotearoa New Zealand was colonised
• Explainer: the significance of the Treaty of Waitangi

It is therefore worthwhile to investigate some of the more common misconceptions about the Treaty that have accrued over recent decades.

This will not lead to a definitive interpretation of the Treaty. But it might remove a few obstacles currently in the way of understanding it better.

The government has been warned to “be careful” with its policies affecting Māori at the National Iwi Chairs Forum (NICF) on Friday.https://t.co/8SskRWTxGo

— RNZ Te Ao Māori (@RNZTeAoMaori) February 2, 2024

1. The Treaty or Te Tiriti?
A common view persists that the English and Māori versions of the Treaty are fundamentally at odds with each other, especially over the central issue of sovereignty.

But research over the past two decades on British colonial policy prior to 1840 has revealed that Britain wanted a treaty to enable it to extend its jurisdiction to its subjects living in New Zealand.

It had no intention to govern Māori or usurp Māori sovereignty. On this critical point, the two versions are essentially in agreement.

2. The Treaty is not a contract
The principle of contra proferentem — appropriated from contract law — refers to ambiguous provisions that can be interpreted in a way that works against the drafter of the contract.

However, there are several problems in applying this principle to the Treaty. Firstly, treaties are different legal instruments from contracts. This explains why there are correspondingly few examples of this principle being used in international law for interpreting treaties.

Secondly, as there are no major material differences between the English and Māori versions of the Treaty when it comes to Māori retaining sovereignty, there is no need to apply such a principle.

And thirdly, under international law, treaties are not to be interpreted in an adversarial manner, but in good faith (the principle of pacta sunt servanda). Thus, rather than the parties fighting over the Treaty’s meaning, the requirement is for them to work with rather than against each other.

Nearly 400 people have marched down the main street of Kaitāia in a show of support for Te Tiriti o Waitangi.https://t.co/3BGtm8BMbw

— RNZ Te Ao Māori (@RNZTeAoMaori) February 2, 2024

3. Relationships evolve over time
No rangatira (chief) ceded sovereignty over their own people through the Treaty. Nor was that Britain’s intention — hence Britain’s recognition in August 1839 of hapū (kinship group) sovereignty and the guarantee in the Treaty that rangatiratanga (the powers of the chiefs) would be protected.

Britain simply wanted jurisdiction over its own subjects in the colony. This is what is known as an “originalist” interpretation — one that follows the Treaty’s meaning as it was understood in 1840.

This has several limitations: it precludes the emergence of Treaty principles; it wrongly presumes that all involved at the time of the Treaty’s signing had an identical view on its meaning; and, crucially, it ignores all subsequent historical developments.

Treaty relationships evolve over time in numerous ways. Originalist interpretations fail to take that into account.

4. Questions of motive
British motives for the Treaty were made explicit in 1839, yet in the following 185 years false motives have entered into the historical bloodstream, where they have continued circulating.

What Britain wanted was the right to apply its laws to its people living in New Zealand. It also intended to “civilise” Māori (through creating the short-lived Office of Protector of Aborigines) and protect Māori land from unethical purchases (the pre-emption provision in Article Two of the Treaty).

And Britain wanted to afford Māori the same rights as British subjects in cases where one group’s actions impinged on the other’s (as in the 1842 Maketū case, involving the conviction for murder and execution of a young Māori man).

The Treaty was not a response to a French threat to New Zealand. And it was not an attempt to conquer Māori, nor to deceive them through subterfuge.

5. Myths of a ‘real’ Treaty and 4th article
Over the past two decades, some have alleged there is a “real” Treaty — the so-called “Littlewood Treaty” – that has been concealed because it contains a different set of provisions. Such conspiratorial claims are easily dispelled.

The text of the Littlewood Treaty is known and it is merely a handwritten copy of the actual Treaty. And, most obviously, it cannot be regarded as a treaty on the basis that no one signed it.

Another popular myth is that there is a fourth article of the Treaty, which purportedly guarantees religious freedom. This article does not appear in either the Māori or English texts of the Treaty, and there is no evidence the signatories regarded it as a provision of the agreement.

It is a suggestion that emerged in the 1990s, but lacks any evidential or legal basis.

Finally, there is the argument that the Treaty supports the democratic process. In fact, the Treaty ushered in a non-representative regime in the colony. It was the 1852 New Zealand Constitution Act that gave the country a democratic government – a statute that incidentally made no reference to the Treaty’s provisions.

This list is not exhaustive. But in dispensing with areas of poor interpretation, we can improve the chances of a more informed and productive discussion about the Treaty.

Dr Paul Moon is professor of history, Auckland University of Technology. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

In a significant step toward preserving and commemorating Fiji’s rich history, efforts are underway to establish the country’s first living museum.

This unique institution will focus on capturing the era of the British colonial government’s indentured system in Fiji, shedding light on the arrival of Fijians of Indian descent to the Pacific Ocean.

The initiative aims to honour the contributions and struggles of the indentured labourers, known as Girmitiyas, who played a pivotal role in shaping Fiji’s economy.

• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: The Girmitiya museum
• READ MORE: Other Girmitiya reports

Behind the vision is the Global Girmit Institute, whose board of trustees chair Dr Ganesh Chand told RNZ Pacific the museum had great significance for Fiji.

Dr Chand said that many Fijians were unaware of their country’s history and the way of life under British rule in Fiji, noting that Fiji-Indians were even unaware of their origins — the Girmitiyas.

Fijian-Indians make up about 37 percent of the country’s population.

“For Girmitiyas, there has been a total silence of material in our curriculum all the way up to now,” Dr Chand lamented.

“There is nothing in the texts, and students don’t learn their history.”

He said that if schools fail to teach local history, it could be detrimental to that nation as a whole.

“If they don’t learn in these in schools, then they grow up thinking that their house and day-to-day life is their entirety in the country.

“But that is not a very good state for nation-building. For nation-building, people need to know the history,” Dr Chand said.

The museum aims to rectify this by providing a “comprehensive and immersive experience” that educates visitors about the Girmit era.

The Global Girmit Institute living museum will be co-located within the GGI Library at its headquarters in Saweni, Lautoka, on the country’s main island.

Work has already begun, with the collection of artefacts intensifying in preparation for the anticipated opening of phase one next year.

Travellers who crossed two oceans
The gallery will feature a range of artefacts and recordings of the oral history of people from different linguistic backgrounds and cultures.

Objects relating to farming and the sugar industry, lifestyle, music, food, clothing and religious events will also be displayed, along with objects that record the impact of colonialism on the islands.

Dr Chand said visitors will have the opportunity to witness and understand first hand the living conditions and lifestyle of the Girmitiyas.

“The living museum will feature a fully furnished residence from the era, and our workers will live there and depict how life was in those days under British rule,” he said.

So, how did a group of South Asian people — the Girmitiyas — arrive in the Pacific Ocean?

It was the abolition of slave labour in the early 19th century that gave rise to the Indian indenture system.

This saw an influx of labourers transported from India to various European colonies, including Fiji, to work in plantations.

The system was established to address the labour shortage that followed, explained academic and linguist Dr Farzana Gounder, a direct Girmitiya descendant and a representative of Fiji on the UNESCO International Indentured Labour Route Project.

“The term ‘Girmit’ is derived from the word ‘agreement’ and was used to refer to the system of indentured labour that brought Indians to Fiji between 1879 and 1916,” she said.

“Under this system, Indian labourers were recruited from British India to work on sugar plantations in Fiji, which was then a British colony. During this period, more than 60,000 Indians were brought to Fiji under indenture and became known as Girmitiyas.”

The indenture was seen as an agreement between the workers and the British government, and over the next three decades Girmitiyas were shipped across two oceans to work the lands in Fiji, where a jarring reality awaited them, explained Dr Gounder.

“The Girmitiyas faced many challenges when they arrived in Fiji, including harsh working conditions, cultural and linguistic barriers, and discrimination from both European and indigenous Fijian populations.

“They worked long hours in difficult and often dangerous conditions on the sugar plantations and were paid very low wages.”

The Girmitiyas were instrumental in the development of Fiji’s sugar industry, and this museum aims to tell these stories.

Fiji’s Peace Village to host historical stories
The government of Fiji is also commissioning a living museum in the central province of Navilaca village in Rewa.

Assistant Women’s Minister Sashi Kiran announced that this gallery would pay homage to the relationship between the Girmitiyas and iTaukei people.

“Navilaca village is significant to the history of both the indigenous people and the Indo-Fijians,” she said.

Kiran recounts the heroic efforts of the indigenous people in 1884 who, in the absence of immediate assistance from the colonial authorities, led the rescue operations, saving many lives when a ship named Syria, carrying around 500 Girmitiyas, became wrecked on the Nasilai Reef.

This village thus served as an apt location for the museum, paying homage to the resilience and humanity displayed during that challenging time, she said.

“The village of Navilaca had done the rescue when the Syria was wrecked, and villages there had not only rescued the people but buried the dead in their chiefly ground. They had also looked after all the injured until they healed.

“The fisherfolk had been rescuing people, and the archives also say that there were only about 100 out of almost 500 passengers left by the time the colonials came, so most of the rescue was actually done by the indigenous people.”

The village has since been declared a place of peace with an offer extended to host teaching of each other’s rituals, ceremonies, and customs.

“It will be a space where both cultures can be taught through artefacts and storytelling,” she added.

It will also be open to tourists and the diaspora.

Both living museums promise to be vital cultural institutions, providing a platform to remember and honour Fiji’s history.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Methodist Church of Fiji is seeking forgiveness from the descendants of Indian indentured labourers, or Girmitiyas, for the transgressions of the last 36 years.

The racially motivated violent coups of 1987 and 2000 and the military coup d’état of December 2006 have left a permanent scar on race relations within the country.

The 1987 and 2000 coups were supported by the church’s then-leadership.

• LISTEN TO RNZ PACIFIC WAVES: Methodist Church delivers an official apology 
• READ MORE: Other Fiji race relations reports

But in a historic move, the church is launching a 10-year campaign to heal the wounds of the past — starting with an apology to coincide with the inaugural Girmit Day celebrations next Sunday.

Reverend Ili Vunisuwai is leading the official apology at the national reconciliation service on May 14 as the head of the largest Christian denomination in Fiji.

“The time is right to launch a campaign for national reconciliation and give the people of all races a chance to confess their weaknesses,” Reverend Vunisuwai said.

“Let’s seek forgiveness from those they regard as their enemies. We strongly believe that by confession with pure hearts and humility, our transgression can be forgiven,” he said.

“As we look back, the dark days of social upheavals of coups of 1987, 2000 as well as 2006, and then, unfolding events of hatred and discrimination, which resulted in fear and uncertainties, I think there’s a lot to be done by the church to bring the two races together.”

The timing of the event has much significance as the country of under a million people marks 144 years since the arrival of the first of more than 60,000 indentured labourers or Girmitiyas as they later came to be known.

Girmitiyas were brought to Fiji between 1879 to 1916 by British colonial rulers to work in plantations across the island.

As a result of the indentured labour system, Fijians of Indian descent make up the second largest ethnic population in Fiji today — slightly over 34 percent, while the iTaukei or indigenous people comprise 62 percent.

Chair to the Girmit Celebrations, Assistant Minister for Women Sashi Kiran, is calling the apology efforts a start of a peaceful future for the nation.

‘We acknowledge the pain’
‘I’m very humbled, and I’m very, very touched at the strength of the Committee and of the leadership of the Methodist Church,” Kiran told RNZ Pacific.

“They’re willing to look at the problem in the eye and say, ‘Well, let’s talk about it. We apologise, we can’t change the past, but we are sorry for the hurt that we have caused’.”

But while Kiran accepts the apology from the church, she acknowledges that many in the Indo-Fijian community may not be ready.

“Any pain cannot be underrated,” she said. “What people went through was their pain, and it’s their journey so by no means can we judge what people are feeling or going through”

“We acknowledge the pain. We acknowledge the pain of the past,” she added.

However, she admits that events of the past cannot be undone, and the way forward is through healing.

“In the interest of healing the nation, in the interest of future generations that they born into a healed nation…we ask you to please open your hearts and open your inner feelings,” she appealed to Fijians.

“Let’s talk about it [past atrocities], and let’s work on healing and come into that space.”

She said it was also “okay” for those people who still “need time” to heal from the racial troubles, adding “at least we begin to talk about this.”

Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka, who has publicly apologised for his actions in 1987 repeatedly, accepts that many will still remember the dark past that made him notorious worldwide.

“The man that we did not want to know about, we shied away from his name, addressed us…and he does not bite, he’s not an angry young man,” Rabuka told the 12th World Hindi Conference in Nadi in February.

“He is just an old man who understands the feelings of the descendants of the Girmitiyas who are now his age, looking at their grandchildren and children growing up in the land they now call home.”

RNZ Pacific asked Reverend Vunisuwai why it has taken the Methodist Church of Fiji 35 years to apologise to the Indo-Fijian community?

“The current government has allowed the celebration of the Girmitiyas, and that’s probably a good time for national reconciliation regarding all the upheavals of the past 30 years or so.”

• The official Girmit week celebrations kicks off on Wednesday.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.