Mr. Viliami Tiseli's rebuttal supports the Tongan Legislative Assembly's rejection of the UN's CEDAW treaty (Thank you...31 Oct 2009), and it can be evaluated in three ways:
1. He fails to evaluate the action of the House in a logical and critical manner.
Logically shouldn't we ask: How many of the Tongan Legislative Assembly members, who debated and voted on this issue concerning women, were women? Here's why the question is relevant:
Example (a). The Founding Fathers of the United States were all white men. In white male-dominated America in the 1700s-1900s only white men made decisions, females were not allowed to vote until 1920. Colored people (Blacks and American Indians) were not citizens until after the American Civil War ended in 1870.
Interpretation: The all-white male Founding Fathers were beneficiaries of a system they designed for themselves, white men.
Example (b). The late Queen Salote Tupou III, the only female Monarch in the modern Tongan era, promoted the education of young Tongan girls in education, the nursing profession and teaching. Women's suffrage was won in the Kingdom during her reign,1960.
Interpretation: Advancement of Tongan women was most pronounced during the reign of a female leader.
Critical Evaluation
Critically, we must evaluate our own biases. Shouldn't we ask: Aren't there conflicts of interest and biases involved with an all-male Legislative Assembly, who are beneficiaries of Tongan society's discrimination against women (hereditary tax allotment law), to improve the safety and economic status of all women in Tonga?
2. Mr. Tiseli supports the discriminatory law against Tongan women in the current Constitution because he is a beneficiary like the "Good Old Boys Club" in the House. They play lip service to Tongan unwritten customs, but refuse to commit them to written form and share their land-ownership rights with women.
Fact: Mr. Tiseli can rationalize all he wants, but the land tenure law (hereditary tax allotment) favors men over women, thus creating an underprivileged class: Tongan women.
Fact: The Constitution declares in Clause 4 that no law shall protect one class of people and discriminates against another class:
Clause 4. There shall be but one law in Tonga for chiefs and commoners for non-Tongans and Tongans. No laws shall be enacted for one class and not for another class but the law shall be the same for all the people of this land. (Amended by Act 3 of 1976.)
Fact: Tonga's Polynesian culture is a male-dominated tradition where women are subservient to men. Ask a young unmarried pregnant girl or woman in Tonga. While she is shunned in the community, the father of her child is hailed as a real "man." PM Dr. Sevele's Biblical quote "the man is the head of the family" is misplaced logic from a hunter-gatherer society. Women are equal partners to men today; some women are more capable and smarter in business than most men.
Fact: Our respects for sisters, the fahu system, etc., are just traditions. They're not written law. They should be the very proud reasons for Tonga to ratify CEDAW, not the alternative excuses. Unwritten traditions are subjected to the whims of Tongan men who consider women their properties.
Who has ratified CEDAW?
Fact: Mr. Tiseli and his family live and enjoy all the rights under New Zealand law which protects and promotes the rights of women. New Zealand ratified CEDAW in 1985. New Zealand feels it is the government's obligations to promote and protect its female citizenry, especially the plight of Maori, and Pacific Islanders living there. NZ is also one of the largest Foreign Aids donors to Tonga.
Fact: Australia, home to thousands of Tongan immigrants, and one of the largest Foreign Aids donors to Tonga, ratified CEDAW August 17, 1983. Over 90% of all UN member nations (185) have ratified CEDAW.
Fact: There are only three island states in the Pacific who have not ratified CEDAW. They are all among the poorest island states in the Pacific: Tonga, Palau, and Nauru . . . "Birds of similar feathers flock together."
3. I find Prime Minister Dr. Feleti Sevele's persuasive, and fear-mongering Biblical references in the House intellectually dishonest. He has no proof to backup his cultural-decay claims such as: "We also have to allow same-sex marriage." While he is proud of the US refusal to ratify the CEDAW, same-sex-marriage has become law in some American states that have approved it.
Example: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, and Vermont have legalized it. Maine will begin January 01, 2010. California recognized marriages between June 16 and November 4, 2008. Proposition 8 failed to pass November 4, 2008 voters' approval, thus prohibiting the practice since.
PM Promotes Feudal System
Dr. Sevele has no proof that the CEDAW will "tarnish our hereditary custom and our laws." Therefore, his premise is flawed. What at stake here is a "land ownership" issue, the base of economic survival and success in Tonga as an agricultural economy. Like in a feudal system, Tongan men are entitled to be the masters, while women can only "rent land for long term" as serfs, and in the mercy of a benevolent benefactor.
"The government believes that Tonga is unique for maintaining women's dignity and their status in society. We are also used to women holding high ceremonial figure in Tonga," Prime Minister Dr Feleti Sevele said on a national TV programm.
This is the biggest con job talk I've heard from from a Tongan PM. Tongan women ought to be insulted. Holding out a carrot for "women holding high ceremonial figure in Tonga" is just that...for ceremonial purposes. It does not create wealth in a democratic society, Mr. PM.
Only one brave and "fakapotopoto" MP (PR Sunia Fili) stood up against 23 anachronistic MPs and voted for the CEDAW. PR Fili is the only one worthy of representing all people of Tonga, both men and women. It is noted that three gutless People's Representatives ran and hid themselves behind their wives' skirts, and not be accountable: 'Akilisi Pohiva, 'Isileli Pulu, and Teisina Fuko.
Discriminating against women keeps the egregious breach of the Constitution Clause 4 alive, and maintains Tongan men's advantage in a traditional feudal system. It is time for Tonga's land distribution law to be brought up-to-date to the 21st Century.
Is there a relationship between the increasing domestic crimes against women in Tonga, and how women are treated as second class citizens under the law, and our unwritten traditions?
