Military Call-Up

In Papua and New Guinea

ALL men between the ages of 18 and 45, whether married or single, resident in New Guinea and Papua, were called up for military service by the Australian Government in a proclamation issued on February 4. An Army Labour Corps was at the same time created, as a branch of the Australian Militia Forces.

Not much additional information is available in Australia, but it is definitelv known that all men of the ages stated, capable of giving service, are being re tained by the authorities in Papua and in the mainland section of New Guinea that has not been occupied by the enemy.

Much of the administrative and prac tically all industrial organisation had ceased to function in New Guinea, and the call-up was philosophically accepted; but in Papua, where the Territorv or ganisation generally is still in being and where the enemy has not penetrated, the call-up caused consternation.

It would have meant that industries, in cluding the important rubber industrv. would have closed down, the banks arid radio stations could not function, and the Papuan Administration could not have carried out its duties. The Administrator of Papua (Hon. Leonard Murray) made the most urgent representations ‘to Can berra with the result that practically all public servants were released from riiili tary obligations, and provision was made to allow industries to carry on.

Indentured Labour “Goes Bush”

EVEN without the call-up, industrial conditions throughout Papua were becoming very difficult. Indentured labourers have been deserting in large numbers.

Like the thousands of indentured native labourers on the Morobe goldfields—who vanished into the bush within a few days of the arrival of Japanese air raiders— the Papuan labourers evidentlv decided that the time had come to seek the safety of their villages, irrespective of all in denture obligations.

“They are now deserting in hundreds”, wrote a Port Moresby man on January 30, “and nothing can be done towards bring ing them back. The latter is the dutv of magistrates and patrol officers, and they are now few in number and very fully occupied with various unusual mat ters. These primitive people, faced with conditions ouite strange to them, have simply surrendered to fear and mob hysteria.”