New Guinea
pp. 39-42 · Read in the full issue
Salamaua To Be Capital Of
£500,000 Expenditure On Town And Wau-Salomaua Road
IN the Commonwealth Parliament on Thursday, June 23, the Minister in Charge of Territories (Mr.
Hughes) announced:— I.—That he had selected Sala maua as the future capital of New Guinea, and that the trans fer would be effected in two years at a cost of £350,000 (including
harbour improvement).
2.—That a road would be built directly over the mountains to Wau, at an estimated cost of £150,000. 3.—That the plan of the Griffiths committee to build the capital on the Markham table lands near Lae, and link it up with a system of developmental roads, had been rejected.
The following is an official copy of Mr. Hughes’ statement.
Mr. Hughes described the volcanic dis turbances at Rabaul in May, 1937, and the investigation which made it neces sary to remove the administrative head quarters. He proceeded:— In order to assist the Commonwealth Government in the selection of suit able site, a committee was appointed to visit the Territory and to report as to the most suitable locality for the purpose, having in mind the need for any early transfer from Rabaul and the future development of the Territory. The com mittee, in a report dated April 27, 1938, submitted the following proposals:— 1, —Lae. an the coast in the Morobe district of the mainland of New Guinea, to be the site of the administrative headquarters. 2.—Salamaua, also on the coast about 20 miles from Lae, to be the port for the administrative headquarters, and to be developed as the chief port of the Territory. 3.—A road to connect Lae and Sala maua.
The estimated expenditure under these proposals is as follows; — Transfer of administrative headquart ers from Rabaul to Lae —£248,000 (in cludes provision for houses to be built and other public works and the actual transfer of the personnel).
Lae/Salamaua road—£lso,ooo.
Rabaul district services—provision for a district staff for the New Britain dis
trict to be in a safe place near to Ra baul —£45,000.
Making a total of —£443,000.
The committee also pointed out that cer tain works are necessary to assist the development of the Territory. As, how ever, the committee was of the opinion that these works must proceed irrespec tive of the location of the administrative headquarters, they were not taken into account by it in estimating the cost of removal of the administrative headquart ers. The works referred to are the devel opment of Salamaua as a port, and the construction of a road from the coast to the goldfields in th 6 Morobe district.
In view of the expenditure involved and the far-reaching effects of the de cision to be made, the Cabinet arranged that I should visit New Guinea to ob tain first hand knowledge of the Terri tory, so as to assist the Government in coming to a decision in the matter. By the use of aeroplanes, I was able, during a brief visit to the Territory, to inspect a large area of New Guinea, and to see a number of the sites that might be considered suitable for the new adminis trative headquarters. I visited Rabaul, Bitapaka, Salamaua. Wau, Edie Creek, Bulolo, Upper Watut, Lae, Ramu and Madang. The report of the committee, and the information I have been able to furnish to my colleagues, have been con sidered by the Government, which has reached the following decision: — 1. —Salamaua to be the site of the ad ministrative headquarters. 2. —A road to be constructed from Salamaua to Wau, the centre of the rich gold-mining area of the Territory. Roads already connect Wau and Edie Creek, and Wau and Bulolo and other places, but there is no road built from the min ing fields to the coast. 3. —A long-range policy to be formula ted that will in time permit of the road suggested from the coast to the goldfields being extended to the Markham Valley and eventually to Ramu and further in land; this road to be the backbone of a system for the hinterland Of the New Guinea mainland, which can in time be linked with Madang on the north coast of New Guinea.
It is proposed that the necessary finance for the foregoing projects should be provided in the following manner:— I. —The cost of the preparation of the new site for the administrative head quarters at Salamaua. the transfer thereto and harbour improvements and
other works incidental to the establish ment of the administrative headquarters at Salamaua (estimated at £350,000) to be the subject of equable arrangement between the Commonwealth Government and the New Guinea Administration.
2. Provision for a district staff near Rabaul (approximate cost £45,000) to be a matter for the New Guinea Adminis tration from Territorial funds. 3. —The estimated amount necessary to provide a road from Salamaua to Wau (£150,000) to me secured by a loan to be raised in New Guinea. Such loan to be guaranteed by the Commonwealth Gov ernment and to be amortised over a per iod. A toll to be charged to users of
the road and payment of interest on the loan and provision for redemption to be a first charge on the revenue obtained from the toll. The maintenance of the road to be a matter for the New Guinea Administration as an ordinary adminis trative function.
It is difficult to estimate the time that will be necessary to prepare Salamaua for the administrative headquarters, and to build the road from Salamaua to
Wau, but both projects will be placed in hand immediately. No legal enact ment. either by this Parliament or by ordinance of the Territory, is necessary to effect the transfer of the administrative headquarters, and there is, therefore, no obstacle to the necessary technical pre parations proceeding forthwith.
“Definitely And Continually
Malarious”
The report of the Griffiths Committee (which was ignored by Mr. Hughes) was released in the Commonwealth Parlia ment on June 29. It said, in relation to Salamaua (selected by Mr. Hughes): “Salamaua is built on a low-lying isth mus. Because of its susceptibility to tidal waves, it would be unwise to use the flat land for town purposes. The elevated land available at the site would be insufficient for the present adminis trative needs, let alone for expansion, and is sufficient only for the require ments of the port. The aerodrome area, and to a less extent the Kila area, is still definitely and continually malarious, and in spite of anti-malarial measures, the type of malaria is a malignant sub tertian with a tendency to development of blackwater fever”.
Failure Of Opposition
rjiHE apparently hasty and impulsive action of the Minister caused dis may among those Australian people who had hoped for a new policy in New Guinea, based on the report of the Griffiths Committee. Strong re presentations, in opposition to the Minister’s plan, were made by prac tically everyone of any prominence, who knows New Guinea, but they were all ignored. The newspapers and politicians, who might have forced the Czar-like Mr. Hughes to hold his hand, displayed complete ignorance of New Guinea conditions and of the issues at stake; and nothing was done.
Mr. Hughes’ enabling legislation went through Parliament in an all night sitting on June 29, while most members slept in their seats.
New Guinea now is committed to an expenditure of about £soo.ooo—for what? To build an administrative establishment at Salamaua for the comfort of General McNicoll and his clerks, and to construct a road over barren and useless mountains to a goldfield that will be dead and buried in twenty years’ time.
That £500,000. spent wisely, would have lent stimulus to the development of New Guinea, and given Australia title for all time to the possession of the great territory. As it is, we are just where we were a year ago.
Never mind! There is going to be a lot of easy money available in New Guinea soon, and road and building contractors are going to be very happy. And—silver lining to the cloud!—Wau. at least, is going to get its long-awaited road to the coast.
New Guinea interests should “hop in early”, for as much of that £500.000 as they can get. They will need it all, about 1940, when the Territory begins to nay for the spending orgy on which it now is launched.
Criticism Of The Hughes’ Plan
The following statement was pub
lished in Sydney by the editor of the “P.1.M.”, as soon as Mr. Hughes made his announcement:— MOST people who know New Guinea— and especially those who have been critical of the policy of laissez faire. which has been followed there for so many years—will give approval to the announcement that the removal of the capital to the mainland (at Salamaua) is to form part of a far-reaching plan for reading and developing the great, fer tile interior plateaus of the mainland But a comparison of the plan which has been so hastily adopted by the re sponsible Minister (Mr. Hughes), with the plan put forward after a lengthy in vestigation by an expert committee, dis closes features which must give rise to some uneasiness. Mr. Hughes, in his statement to the House of Representa tives, was also vague on the subject of finance, and he has left all New Guinea interests with a strong suspicion that they are due for a period of murderous tax ation.
The Griffiths committee recommended that the site for the capital be the fer tile plateau behind Lae, near the mouth of the Markham River. This place would have been cool and healthy; it would have been easily accessible for a supply of water and hydro-electric power; the establishment of the town there would have encouraged the settlement of the large fertile areas in the vicinity, and especially up the Markham Valley; and a developmental road (already surveyed and partly constructed) would have taken the easy grade from the new capital, up the Markham Valley onto the Ramu- Purari tablelands, with a side-road from the Markham over into the Bulolo Val ley. thus giving the Wau-Bulolo gold in dustry its long-awaited access to the coast. The one disadvantage of the Lae site was that Lae is not a good port; but it was proposed to overcome this by building 25 miles of road along the coast, from Lae to Salamaua, at an estimated cost of £150,000.
Mr. Hughes simply swept that plan aside, and decided that the new capital shall be at Salamaua, that there shall be a new road straight over the mountains from Salamaua to Wau at an estimated cost of £150,000, and that road communi cation between Salamaua and the Ramu- Purari tablelands shall be via Wau and Bulolo, in some manner that is quite vaguely indicated—presumably through the Watut or Wampit Valleys. The com mittee’s plan was prepared by experts and, on the face of it, appears practic able, to those who know the country.
Mr. Hughes’s plan, as so far disclosed, can be objected to on the following grounds: There is not room on the Salamaua isthmus for any more building, so the new administrative quarters must be built on Kila Point, on the mainland, on the opposite side of Salamaua har bour. This area is low-lying, with its back against the foot of the mountain range, and it has no special residential qualification. At the head of the har bour, between the present Salamaua town and the Kila area, there is a vast swamp, partly under water in the rainy season.
Somewhere in the mountains nearby, pre sumably, there is a source of water and hydro-electric supply. A suitable town can be built there in time, no doubt; but why it should be placed in such a low lying, hot, malarial and strategically vul nerable position, when much cooler and more attractive sites are available, is something I cannot understand. This is
to be a permanent town —not a mining camp.
But the chief objection is that road over the mountains from Salamaua to Wau. I am assured by those who know the country that the estimated cost of £150,000 is ridiculous; that the annual cost of maintenance will be enormous; that it will open up no agricultural coun try whatever; and that, when completed, it will be so beset by steep grades and curves that it will have little value as the first stage of an arterial road for the development of the interior tablelands.
The alternative, longer road, from Sala maua via Lae and the Markham, with a side-road over to the Bulolo, would have had few engineering difficulties (apart from the crossing of the Markham River) and would have opened up good country along most of the route. The road via the Markham would have per manent value, while the road over the mountains from Salamaua will be of use only so long as the goldfield holds out —a matter of from 15 to 25 years.
The big companies operating in New Guinea have been given to understand, in no uncertain fashion, that they will be expected to subscribe liberally to the loan, whereby the £150,000 road is to be financed; and they have been assured that a road-toll will provide for interest and redemption. The companies have no faith in the plan. They know that no road worthy of the name can be built for £150,000; that if the toll is high enough to provide interest and redemption on the ultimate cost, it will put such a burden on road-users that the road will be al most valueless; and that the New Guinea
administration will not be able to take care of maintenance “as an ordinary ad ministrative function”, as so vaguely sug gested by Mr. Hughes. They therefore expect that the proposed road will have little real economic value, while this vis ionary plan typical of some Parliamen tarians will throw upon them and upon the New Guinea community a heavy burden of taxation.
There is the same vagueness about the method of providing for the cost of trans fer from Rabaul to Salamaua—estimated at £350,000. Mr. Hughes simply says “this will be the subject of equable ar rangement between the Commonwealth Government and the New Guinea admin istration”. I am sure that taxpayers in both Australia and New Guinea would like something more concrete than that.
That huge sum has to be found in some way. It is much more likely to come out of the Dockets of taxnayers than out of the pockets of the Minister and Ad ministrator. who make these far-reaching plans, and refuse to give any informa tion. It is certain that the revenues and accumulated surnlus (about £80,000) can not nrovide so large an amount.
None of the big comnanies, even those engaged in aerial transport, is now op posing a reading plan—especially if the goldfield'? road is to form part of a gen eral reading scheme for the development of the mainland. Everyone now recog nises that, if Australia is to keen New Guinea, the country must be opened ud and developed. The well-balanced plan of the expert committee seems to have been formulated with that policy in view.
The necessity for moving the capital created a remarkable opportunity for initiating a worth-while policy of public works, in which the large revenues de rived from gold rovaltv have been nrofitablv employed. Mr. Hughes, by his apparently impulsive interference, has thrown that plan completely out of gear.
Tt is to be hoped that the Federal Par liament, before it passes the legislation necessarv to implement Mr. Hughes’s plan, will insist the report of the Griffiths committee being tabled, and will compare it with the proposals of Mr.
Hughes.
Mr. A. Robson, electrical engineer of Australian General Electric, Ltd., who recently installed power houses, etc., in connection with direction finding equip ment on Salamaua and Port Moresby aerodromes, arrived in Sydney by the “Macdhui” on May 26.
A CONTRAST IN COSTUME—Snapshot at Bulolo, New Guinea.