When he sat in the uproar of the National Assembly in Paris, Pouvanaa Oopa, sole representative of Tahiti and its sister Pacific islands of French Polynesia, was the mildest of men. But back home in peaceful Tahiti, Pouvanaa Oopa became a terror in paradise.
There beside the whisper of the surf, Oopa, who was once a fried-potato vendor and then a carpenter, roared like a Paris Assemblyman. Under the slogan, "Tahiti for the Tahitians; Frenchmen into the sea!", Oopa's Democratic Rally of the Tahitian People swept last year's elections, and Oopa, 63, became Premier of Polynesia. Oopa accused the French of allowing...
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