Maasina Ruru was an

emancipation Emancipation generally means to free a person from a previous restraint or legal disability. More broadly, it is also used for efforts to procure economic and social rights, political rights or equality, often for a specifically disenfranchis ...

movement for

self-government __NOTOC__ Self-governance, self-government, or self-rule is the ability of a person or group to exercise all necessary functions of regulation without intervention from an external authority. It may refer to personal conduct or to any form of ...

and

self-determination The right of a people to self-determination is a cardinal principle in modern international law (commonly regarded as a ''jus cogens'' rule), binding, as such, on the United Nations as authoritative interpretation of the Charter's norms. It stat ...

in the

British Solomon Islands The British Solomon Islands Protectorate was first declared over the southern Solomons in 1893, when Captain Gibson, R.N., of , declared the southern islands a British protectorate. Other islands were subsequently declared to form part o ...

during and after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, 1945–1950, credited with creating the movement towards independence for the

Solomon Islands Solomon Islands is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 900 smaller islands in Oceania, to the east of Papua New Guinea and north-west of Vanuatu. It has a land area of , and a population of approx. 700,000. Its capita ...

. The name is from the 'Are'are language meaning the Rule of "relationship of siblings together" and is often corrupted to "Marching Rule", "Marxist Rule", or "Rule of Brotherhood".

Foundation and influences

The movement was created after Nori, Aliki Nono'oohimae,

Jonathan Fiifii'i Jonathan Fiifii'i MBE (1921 – October 1989) was a Kwaio from Ane'emae near Oloburi, Malaita, Solomon Islands. His father was Buumae and mother Dafua. Biography Fiifii'i was a founding member of Maasina Ruru, the independence movement that he s ...

, and a host of others from Malaita who worked together in the Solomon Islands Labour Corps during World War II. One of the influences is said to have been the African-American soldiers whose humane treatment of the fellow workers was markedly different from the

plantation A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...

owners. They spread a message of independence amongst the Malaitan soldiers who began a campaign of non-compliance and

civil disobedience Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government (or any other authority). By some definitions, civil disobedience has to be nonviolent to be called "civil". Hen ...

. They were also influenced by other revolutionary or anti-government movements, progressive missionaries such as Rev. Richard Fallowes and apocalyptic movements such as that of the priest Noto'i. During 1939 in Uogwari and Atobala he had been a

prophet In religion, a prophet or prophetess is an individual who is regarded as being in contact with a divine being and is said to speak on behalf of that being, serving as an intermediary with humanity by delivering messages or teachings from the s ...

of the ancestor

La'aka La'aka is a powerful ancestress and one of the most widely propitiated of spirits among the eastern Kwaio on Malaita, Solomon Islands. She is seen as both a protective figure who exemplifies maternal virtues and the productive powers of women and a ...

and channelled that

Tulagi Tulagi, less commonly known as Tulaghi, is a small island——in Solomon Islands, just off the south coast of Ngella Sule. The town of the same name on the island (pop. 1,750) was the capital of the British Solomon Islands Protectorate from 18 ...

would be destroyed and the government would be thrown into the sea. His followers were arrested by the government but in 1946, the capital moved from

Honiara Honiara () is the capital and largest city of Solomon Islands, situated on the northwestern coast of Guadalcanal. , it had a population of 92,344 people. The city is served by Honiara International Airport and the seaport of Point Cruz, and lie ...

. Noto'i joined the Maasina Ruru movement as did people from all over the islands.

Operation DeLouse and Operation Jericho

In 1947, the British government launched Operation De-Louse to arrest the leaders of the movement. The nine main chiefs or Alaha were also arrested and charged under the '' Sedition Act'' for organising secret meetings. This despite the fact that Maasina Ruru meetings were mass meetings of thousands of people at a time. They were mostly sentenced, including Fifi'i, Nonoohimae and Aliki, to six and a half years hard labour. While the leaders were in jail the campaign of civil disobedience continued with villages refusing to pay taxes ''en masse''. While many villages were also barricaded against the British, the government launched Operation Jericho. Two thousand arrests were made in Malaita alone, and yet the resistance continued. In 1951 the British government held meetings with the imprisoned leadership and brokered a deal for self-government in the form of the Malaitan Congress. The prisoners were released and demands were met towards the end of 1951.

Foundation and influences

Operation DeLouse and Operation Jericho

References

Further reading