Political Reviews Micronesia in Review: Issues and Events, 1 July 2016 to 30 June 2017 michael lujan bevacqua, elizabeth ua ceallaigh bowman, monica c labriola, clement yow mulalap Polynesia in Review: Issues and Events, 1 July 2016 to 30 June 2017 peter clegg, lorenz gonschor, margaret mutu, chris nobbs, ‘umi perkins, steven ratuva, forrest wade young The Contemporary Pacic, Volume 30, Number 1, 125–213 © 2018 by University of Hawai‘i Press 125 political reviews • polynesia 165 member (TI, 26 Aug 2016); Joseph news. Honolulu. http://pidp.eastwestcenter Ah-Scha, assembly member from the .org/pireport Marquesas Islands (TI, 25 Jan 2017); Polynésie Première (French Polynesia and Pori Chan, delegate mayor of program of Outre-mer Première, the Kaukura Atoll in the Tuamotus (TI, French government television network for 1 May 2017). Finally, the country overseas departments and collectivities) also mourned two important cultural http:// http://la1ere.francetvinfo.fr/ figures, local music producer Alphonse polynesie Vanfau (TI, 28 June 2016) and Wilfrid rnz, Radio New Zealand. Wellington. Pinai Lucas, one of the promoters of Daily radio and Internet news. the Tahitian cultural renaissance dur- http://www.radionz.co.nz ing the end of last century (TI, 31 Jan rnzi, Radio New Zealand International. 2017). Daily radio and Internet news. Wellington. lorenz gonschor http://www.rnzi.com TI, Tahiti Infos. Weekday daily newspaper and Internet news. Tahiti. References http://www.tahiti-infos.com DT, La Depêche de Tahiti. Daily. Tahiti. tntv, Tahiti Nui Television (the country http://www.ladepeche.pf government’s television network) Doom, John Taroanui. 2016. A he‘e noa http://tntv.pf i te tau: Mémoires d’une vie partagée. TPM, Tahiti-Pacifique Magazine. Papeete: Editions Haere Po No Tahiti. Fortnightly. Tahiti. Fry, Greg. 2015. Recapturing the Spirit of http://www.tahiti-pacifique.com 1971: Towards a New Regional Political United Nations. 2016. Question of Settlement in the Pacific. ssgm Discussion French Polynesia. Resolution adopted Paper 2015/3. Canberra: State, Society & by the General Assembly on 6 Decem- Governance in Melanesia, The Australian ber. UN General Assembly, 71st ses- National University. http://ssgm.bellschool sion. a/res/71/120. http://www.un.org/ .anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/publications/ en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/ attachments/2015-12/DP-2015-3-Fry RES/71/120 [accessed 12 Aug 2017] -ONLINE_0.pdf [accessed 15 Sept 2017] Gonschor, Lorenz. 2017. Polynesia in Review: Issues and Events, 1 July 2015 to 30 June 2016: French Polynesia. The Con- Hawai‘i temporary Pacific 29 (1): 134–144. The year under review in Hawai‘i saw otr, Overseas Territories Review. Blog. the traditional Hawaiian voyaging http://overseasreview.blogspot.com canoe Hōkūle‘a and its accompanying Pacnews, Pacific Islands News Association. vessel Hikianalia return to O‘ahu on Daily Internet news. Suva. 17 June 2017 after a three-year, forty- http://pina.com.fj thousand-mile, worldwide voyage pif Secretariat. 2017. About Us: Our Staff. dubbed “Mālama Honua” (Care for http://www.forumsec.org/pages.cfm/about the Earth). The voyage circumnavi- -us/executive/ [accessed 17 Aug 2017] gated the Earth using only traditional pir, Pacific Islands Report. Daily Internet Polynesian navigation techniques, 166 the contemporary pacific • 30:1 (2018) reaching 150 ports in twenty-three noted by the New York Times, which countries and territories (pvs 2017). called him an “innovator and a histo- Captain Ka‘iulani Murphy stated, rian on four strings”; “Mr. Kamae was “We really are sailing in their (the one of the most influential Hawaiian ancestors’) wake . we had to relearn musicians of the second half of the what our ancestors had mastered” 20th century, at once an innovator and (Civil Beat 2017). Originally trained a diligent steward of folkloric customs. by Satawal’s Mau Piailug, Polynesian He is best remembered as a founder of Voyaging Society President Nainoa the group the Sons of Hawaii, which Thompson noted that traditional made a handful of widely emulated Pacific Islanders “figured it out—how albums in the 1960s and ’70s that set to live well on these islands . that the terms for the revivalist movement is the challenge of the time for planet known as the Hawaiian renaissance” earth and all of humanity.” Thomp- (Chinen 2017). Cruz was a longtime son used the attention on Hōkūle‘a’s member of the popular music group return to urge Hawai‘i to become a Ka‘au Crater Boys, and his younger leader on sustainability (Caron 2017). brother, Guy Cruz, also a noted singer, Just as Hōkūle‘a was returning died just a few days after him (Kake- from her voyage, Hawai‘i Governor sako and Berger 2016). David Ige affirmed the state’s com- Politically, Hawai‘i was at the mitment to the Paris Climate Accords, forefront of opposition to newly signing two bills aimed at reducing elected US President Donald Trump’s greenhouse gases in a manner consis- Muslim travel ban, which sought to tent with the Paris agreement. This prohibit travel to the United States was one of Hawai‘i’s perceived acts from seven predominantly Muslim of defiance toward President Donald countries. After Hawai‘i Attorney Trump, who pulled the United States General Douglas Chin filed a motion out of the accords. One news outlet challenging the ban, US District Judge reported: “Mr. Ige, a Democrat in his Derrick Kahala Watson ruled on 15 first term as governor, said in remarks March 2017 that “the Government’s before the signing: ‘We are the testing narrowly defined list [of types of fam- grounds—as an island state, we are ily members allowed to travel] finds especially aware of the limits of our no support in the careful language natural environment’” (Bromwich of the Supreme Court or even in the 2017). immigration statutes on which the Hawai‘i lost celebrated musicians Government relies” (State of Hawai‘i Palani Vaughan, Eddie Kamae, and 2017). Trump-appointed Attorney Ernie Cruz Jr during the period under General Jeff Sessions stated publically review. Vaughan was a well-known his disbelief that “a judge sitting on scholar of King David Kalākaua (who an island in the Pacific” could deter a reigned 1874–1891) and in the 1970s decision of the US president (Savage and 1980s he revived interest in the 2017). As a result of his decision, monarch’s period with a four-album Watson received threatening messages series devoted to Kalākaua (khon2 and was put under twenty-four-hour 2016). Kamae’s passing was even protection by the US Marshall Service, political reviews • polynesia 167 which protects federal judicial officials The 2001 case was cited in the (Silva 2017). high-profile pca case Philippines v On 7 July 2017, Judge Watson China regarding the South China ruled against Hawai‘i’s challenge to Sea, and the citing of the 2001 case the revised ban, claiming that only the lends support to the emerging dis- US Supreme Court had the authority course of Hawai‘i as an independent to rule on the case (Somin 2017a), state (Hawaii Kingdom blog 2016). but a week later he issued an injunc- Federico Lenzerini, professor of inter- tion against key parts of the travel national law at the University of Siena, ban executive order (Somin 2017b). Italy, is the counsel for the Hawaiian At issue was the definition of “close Kingdom and Dr David Keanu Sai is relatives,” and whether grandparents the kingdom’s agent. Lance Larsen met the qualification for exemptions is represented by attorney Dexter to the travel ban. In his 14 July ruling, Ka‘iama. Professor Francesco Fran- Watson held that grandparents were cioni of the European University Insti- “the epitome” of close relatives. tute in Florence, Italy, is the appoint- In some quarters, it is thought that ing authority, tasked with forming the the fate of Native Hawaiians’ claims International Commission of Inquiry to political sovereignty lies in the for the case. According to the Hawai- international arena. To this purpose, ian Kingdom blog (2017): “The pca proceedings were initiated in the accepted the case as a dispute between Permanent Court of Arbitration (pca) a state and a private party, and in The Hague, Netherlands, for the acknowledged the Hawaiian Kingdom case Larsen v Hawaiian Kingdom. as a non-Contracting Power under This continuation of the Larsen case Article 47 of the 1907 Hague Con- is in the form of a fact-finding Inter- vention for the Pacific Settlement of national Commission of Inquiry. The International Disputes.” initial case stems from 2001. The In the realm of cultural politics, underlying basis of the case is the advocates and opponents of the continued existence of Hawai‘i as an Thirty Meter Telescope (tmt) on independent state. This is based on Mauna Kea, Hawai‘i Island, experi- the fact that Hawai‘i was annexed enced both victories and setbacks as to the United States in 1898, alleg- the courts stalled construction. As edly, through a Joint Resolution of Hawaii News Now pointed out, the Congress, rather than a treaty. As a Mauna Kea movement “has spread unilateral and domestic action, the far beyond the slopes of Mauna Kea. resolution, it is argued, cannot be used Rallies are now springing up around to acquire foreign territory. The new Hawaii, the mainland and around the International Inquiry lends credence world . from Oregon to Kentucky, to this argument, and the fact-finding New Mexico, North Dakota, Georgia format does not require the partici- and Massachusetts. There are even pation of the United States, a factor pictures and rallies from Korea, New that had led to the inconclusive result Zealand, England and Germany” of the original Larsen case in 2001 (Gutierrez 2015).