Dreamy tropical islands hotbed of political intrigue. March 4, 1996
By Michael Field
A power struggle that has broken out in the scattered Cook Islands is just the latest drama in a Pacific state given to providing a rich mixture of intrigue and drama.
Prime Minister Sir Geoffrey Henry is fending off challengers against a fiasco created by shadowy tax haven operations, an Italian funded 80 million NZ dollars (53 million US dollars) that's never had a paying guest, a budget blow-out and a suicide of an ex-official who blew the whistle on alleged frauds.
The Cooks, 3,000 kilometres (1,860 miles) north-east of here, is home to 18,500 people. Its 15 atolls and high islands have a combined land area half the size of that of Singapore, spread over an ocean greater in area than the Indian land mass.
Last week the Cooks defaulted on some of its debt and as the Asian Development Bank moved in to demand substantial public service restructuring, Henry axed government pay packets by 15 percent.
Now 11 of the 20 ruling Cook Islands Party members of the 25 seat Parliament have signed a resolution calling on Henry to take "early retirement".
"I am disappointed with Henry's attitude, he couldn't put his priorities right," Works Minister Tom Marsters who is behind the plot said.
His name is part of the Cook's engaging history. In 1862 seaman William Marsters arrived on Palmerston Atoll with three wives -- all sisters from a nearby atoll. Today many of the male descendants of the three clans wear distinctive beards and speak in the Gloucestershire accent of their fruitful forefather.
Henry has colourful connections. His late uncle Albert Henry became the first Commonwealth leader to be tossed out of office by court order and the only one to have his knighthood stripped from him. His sin was in 1978 to use money from stamp selling operation to charter planes to fly in supporters from New Zealand to vote for him.
Geoffrey Henry, 55, became prime minister in 1989. He is dismissive of foreigners.
"I want people to understand how precious this little territory is to us because you see this is all that a Cook Islander has," he said once.
Last year he said the US Central Intelligence Agency was masterminding a plot to overthrow his government.
Mostly people make a subsistence living on the land, or from fishing and on one atoll from black pearls. Many families rely on money from families in New Zealand.
The Cooks also makes money in an off-shore banking operation that was used for a time by leading New Zealand, Australian, Japanese and Hong Kong companies. A New Zealand commission of inquiry chaired by a former chief justice is examining its operation sending publicity shy investors fleeing.
New Zealand Foreign Minister Don McKinnon then said only a dose of "tough love" and no aid would help the Cooks.
"We've tried other ways of convincing the Cook Islands Government to put its house in order but, sadly, there is only evidence of continued profligate spending," McKinnon said.
Yet another twist came last week with the revelation that Cooks auditor Richard McDonald had been found dead in unexplained circumstances in Queensland. He had been one of the original whistle-blowers and had last year gone into exile after giving evidence to the New Zealand inquiry, despite threats of immediate arrest should he return.
An official verdict on his death has yet to be released.
Henry's government has made friends with next door French Polynesia, allowing in French television broadcasts and French lessons in classes. But its partly thanks to the French he is in trouble; tourism, an economic mainstay, has suffered a 15 percent drop in revenue due to French nuclear testing at Mururoa, east of the Cooks.
The country's biggest hotel, the 200 room Sheraton, has never opened and is mired in Mafia trials involving its Italian backers. It stands now like an ancient Inca temple, being swallowed up by the rainforest.
Copyright: Michael Field
