Testimony: Clariza Lucas, World Uranium Hearings, 9/17/92, Salzburg

reprinted with permission from
Poison Fire, Sacred Earth,
TESTIMONIES, LECTURES, CONCLUSIONS,
THE WORLD URANIUM HEARING, SALZBURG 1992
pages 212-213
It is well-known that there are three ways to destroy a people's identity: by fighting against them with weapons, substituting their language, and by changing radically their nutritional habits. France has become a real expert in these three methods. . . .
In my native language, the neo-Maohi, they call the earth "fenua". The placenta nourishing the baby in the womb is called "pu-fenua". In fact, for my people, the earth is related to the fertility of the mother, which is the "te pu-fenua", the center of the earth. When a child is born, the placenta is traditionally buried and a tree is planted on that spot so that the cycle of life can be restored.

Clariza Lucas

Clariza Lucas, Maohi Nation, Tahiti, Polynesia. Representative of Tavini Huiraatiraa (Polynesian Liberation Front), works in a social assistance program, representative of 18 Women's Committees.
(This speech was held originally in French)

First of all, I would like to introduce myself: My name is Clariza Lucas and the title of my report is "The Nuclear Colonialism". I'm working in a social assistance program in Tahiti, French Polynesia -- that is the way the French colonialists call our beloved islands. I belong to the Maohi people. Geographically, Polynesia is in the Pactfic Ocean, its area in square meters being as huge as that of Europe.
In 1966, the French first tried their nuclear atmospheric experiment here on Moruroa, the big Southwest atoll of the Tuamotu Islands, 28 kilometers long and 11 kilometers wide and 1,250 kilometers from Tahiti. The number of these experiments increased through the years.
I find myself here today as a representative of 18 Women's Committees spread all over Polynesia. These militant women struggling for the independence of our "fema", which means "land", are members of an independentist party called "The Tavini Huiraatiraa", the "Polynesian Liberation Front". Mr. Oscar Temaru, the leader, wants to join us in order to greet you and thank you for your invitation and the reception we had in your beautiful country of Austria.
We think that our struggle is legitimate and keep referring ourselves to the definition of the word "independence" originally given by that French State that still confines us in a colonial system: "Independence is the first and only fortune of a people." It is well-known that there are three ways to destroy a people's identity: by fighting against them with weapons, substituting their language, and by changing radically their nutritional habits. France has become a real expert in these three methods.
Let's talk about weapons first. In fact, France started colonialism by leading wars. There have been blood-baths on the Marquises, Tahiti and the so-called "Iles-Sous-Le Vent" islands. The arrows and lances of our ancestors, the "Tupuna", could not withstand the French rifles. Another French crime was the substitution of language which, from that moment on, prohibited Maohi language by the legally official French language. The Maohi language has been officially recognized only three years ago, on the condition that the French one still remains the co-official language. Referring themselves to this indisposing law, the French administration, institutions and Catholic or Protestant Churches tried for 150 years to create a new French-speaking race. In fact, private or religious schools are still being raised up "for the peoples' sake". But the Maohi still are and will be marginalized from that society in which everything is French: schools, degrees, jobs -- only unemployed is Polynesian.
Now, I would like to give you some numbers: Polynesia has 200,000 inhabitants, 52 percent being young blacks under the age of 20. Concerning the job market, the creation of the CEP (Experimentation Center of the Pacific) helped to create 16,000 local jobs for an active population of nearly 35,000 people. Only 2,000 of these jobs are still left. The 15,000 urban workers and soldiers have no problems finding lodging and work. But 4,000 Maohi people are still looking for a homeland and for a job. It also has to be mentioned that these urban workers export each month from 55 to 65 percent of the salary they get there, these sums being exempt from any taxes.
Each Maohi who only speaks his own language -- and they are becoming more and more -- is completely cut out of everything. Nowadays, this linguistic discrimination is a real problem and still the whole question of the colonialist system is being contested.
Let's now come to the third point -- the food war. The Maohi live essentially from what they fish or gather. After the atomic experiments, the geographic contaminated fishing zone got much larger near the nuclear experimentation complexes of Hao, Fangataufa and Moruroa. Actually, 90 percent of the food must now be imported.
The number of manifestations to protest against nuclear experiments has increased, but France still answers with the usual impassibility and arrogance. The French dictatorship is still well-established. How can our Maohi people manage against such means as the French ones? My struggle, as a house-wife and mother, also is an act of natural protective instinct towards my children. There are my children and my grand-children. There are the children and the grand-children of other people, and there also are those children in other countries being victims of nuclear experiments.
In my native language, the neo-Maohi, they call the earth "fenua". The placenta nourishing the baby in the womb is called "pu-fenua". In fact, for my people, the earth is related to the fertility of the mother, which is the "te pu-fenua", the center of the earth. When a child is born, the placenta is traditionally buried and a tree is planted on that spot so that the cycle of life can be restored.
That's the reason why I am a militant of the "Tavini Huiraatiraa", the Polynesian Liberation Front. I want the independence of my country and the French nuclear experiments to stop. That's also why I believe in and I struggle for the creation of a new state with national sovereignty on the chess-board of the United Nations.
I thank you for your attention.