Month In Papua-N. Guinea

Prom Our Own Correspondent

Port Moresby, June 30.

Headquarters To Replace

Higaturu

POPENDETTA is to be the new head quarters of the Northern Division of Papua, replacing the ill-fated station at Higaturu.

It has none of the scenic advantages of Higaturu, nor does it enjoy the fine high land climate which attracted so many people to the forest-covered ridge below Mount Lamington. But it is probably the only reasonable alternative as a head quarters.

Kokoda would be an expensive centre as the land route would be even longer than that to Higaturu. Moreover, it is not central for the division, and is ill located as regards the density of popu lation.

Popendetta, before the eruption, was a miniature hamlet with an agricultural officer and District Services Co-operatives official. This, with a trade store run by Buntings, comprised the sum total of the settlement.

Climate is often humid, it has a good crop of mosquitoes, and it is located on flat land.

But it still has some pleasant' features with some good timber stands, a pleasant little stream, and rich soil. Moreover, it is linked with Cape Killerton on the north coast by a reasonably good wartime army road, and freight charges to the new station will be quite a bit less than to Higaturu.

It is probable that the Popendetta air strip will be brought up to Douglas standard since it took plenty of these planes in the emergency weeks after the eruption.

Popendetta is about eight miles in a direct line from Mount Lamington and beyond what is considered to be the limit of blast danger.

It is unlikely, however, that there will be any elbowing among Government officials for appointment to Popendetta as there was in the case of Higaturu. But at least it is safe, and after Lamington that is an important consideration.

Red Cross Centre

AFTER interminable building delays, the new Red Cross headquarters structure has been completed and officially opened at Port Moresby.

On June 22, the hall was officially opened by the Deputy Administrator, Mr.

Justice Phillips, at a Red Cross ball. The great event was marked by a special visit to the Territory of the Australian Red Cross Chairman, Sir John Newman- Morris, and the Secretary-General, Capt.

A. Brown.

There is only one thing wrong about this very handsome building, and that is that it blocks yet another strip of rapidly diminishing sea frontage to Ela Beach.

With another slice being taken up shortly by a Bowling Club building, Port Moresby folk will soon have to crawl under the foundations of public and semi-public edifices to get a glimpse of the open sea.

However, the Red Cross building is now an accomplished fact, and is quite attrac tive. It will also be useful, as the town badly needs a public hall for social func tions. Until now the only hall has been the RSL Clubroom, and with the town’s increasing growth another hall was essen tial.

The Arts Council is tagging along, too, reconstructing and redecorating the Library Institute building, but the in evitable timber supply problem is retard ing completion of the job.

The new Red Cross building has a central hall capable of seating three or four hundred people, a stage, wide verandas, and offices and workrooms for the Red Cross organisation.

Already the Pre-School organisation has transferred from the RSL quarters, and the youngsters have an ideal place in

which to make their first acquaintance with future schoolmates.

Kelanoa Still Stuck Fast

11HE Production Control Board’s 300-ton ship, Kelanoa, is still hard on coral off a New Ireland beach, with the sea washing through the engine room and pessimists forecasting that she will break up in the first storm.

Meanwhile, the experts are arguing as to whether salvage of the ship should be attempted, or if it would be wiser to make

the best of a bad job and offer the im paled craft where she lies.

Afloat she is worth about £25,000; on the rocks around the same number of pennies since the sea can strip it down to matchwood any time it decides to turn up rough.

Not very much has been heard about the preliminary inquiry into the strand ing, but probably something will be made public eventually.

Many would like to know how a ship

went head on to a beach and got herself perched on a couple of niggerheads.

Duty On Disposals Goods

DISPOSALS goods from the Islands are going to cost buyers more after the end of this year, for the Common wealth Government is terminating the duty-free concession on Decomber 31, 1951.

Materials going from the Territory to Australia will then be assessed at the standard tariff rates.

There may be quite a bit of revenue in this for the Commonwealth.

Most of the cream has long since been skimmed off the disposals business, but there is some solid money in it yet for anyone with persistence and resourceful ness in salvaging stuff which at first glance may not seem marketable.

Then, too, private individuals working for themselves and not to a time sheet can afford to put labour into salvaging.

A lot of useful stuff may yet come out of the Islands.

Kukukuku Patrol

MORE uncontrolled tribes have been contacted in the general region of the Kukukuku country by a patrol which started from Mumeng, moved up the Banir River and across to the new District Services outpost at Menyama.

Patrol Officer J. P. Sinclair had a few anxious moments among suspicious and well-armed natives, but got through with out actual trouble. He found that many of the tribes are antagonistic to one another, and a lot of uneasy truces exist among them.

These people fight with bows and arrows and stone clubs, and, in appear ance, are short, stocky and not at all handsome. They wear grass skirts tapered to a point just above their knees, and

this is common to both men and women.

Despite the generally unfriendly atti tude to the patrol, several natives assisted the party by acting as guides, and several volunteered to return to the sta tion with the patrol.

They are now at Mumeng and will be very useful ambassadors on the next trip.

Pir Recruits

CIMALL groups of recruits from all over 3 the Territory are now in training at the Pacific Islands Regiment 3amp near Port Moresby.

The OC of the unit, Major W. R.

Shields, considers that he will have a full company of 120 native troops. Recruiting, which at first was very slow, has im aroved, and batches of volunteers are doming in from points as widely scattered is Wewak and Kerema.

The P.I.R. is a full time Regular Army mit which eventually will have detach nents stationed at several centres in the Ferritory.

Vew Public Servants For P-Ng

a NOTHER crop of optimists will be /V arriving in the Territory within the next few weeks as members of the Papua and New Guinea Public Service.

Mr. E. A. F. Head, the Public Service Commissioner, has just had a spell in Australia picking the winners in Govern nent offices by interviewing applicants or Territory jobs.

This caused the Public Service Associa tion to prick up its ears and ask where he newcomers were going to live, and vhat about the public servants already >n the waiting list for houses.

But Mr. Head reassured the Associa ,ion that no married quarters would be illocated to the newly recruited staff who vould have to accept mess accommoda ,ion, at least in the first instance.

At this rate it will need half a dozen hiploads of imported prefabricated louses to whittle down the waiting list or married quarters.

Hanuabadans Tax Themselves

rHE “Civic Fathers” of Hanuabada Village, elected late last year under the 1949 Village Councils Ordinance, lave imposed a local tax.

Every man in the village over 17 years »ld must now pay £2 a year, unless he can >rove unavoidable hardship or impecuni >us old age. The women, however, have he option of paying a 10/- tax, and thus icquiring the right to vote at village ;ouncil elections.

There is a very interesting angle on his women’s tax roll for all those with hree or more children, their own or idopted youngsters, are automatically exempt from tax but are eligible to vote.

The £1,400 revenue from taxes, plus mall amounts from cemetery fees and a ax for registration of village dogs, will >e spent on road and hygiene mainten mce, wages for village constables, pay nent of a librarian at the Hanuabada Social Club, and capital expenditure on i workshop where the men can make heir own furniture.

At their meetings the Council members how quite a good knowledge of proced ure, and apparently they have accepted he principle of municipal taxes for the naintenance of essential services.

This is a very healthy move, for the lanuabada people have previously shown i persistent and highly successful faculty or getting everything for nothing,, and hey have rarely missed a hand-out for ack of asking.

Over at Rabaul the Reimber Council las done much the same thing on vil

lage taxes, except that they have set the rates just about double those of Hanuabada. Their budget includes provision for payment of a native teacher’s salary, expenditure on the digging of new wells for the village water supply, and salaries for two cocoa inspectors and two forrestry assistants as well as other Council employees.

More Prefabs

A SECOND shipment of Hawkesley prefabricated aluminium houses arrived at Port Moresby early in June, making a total of 120 now in the Territory.

This completes the Hawkesley orders but

the Administration will call tenders for another lot of 200 prefabricated homes, It is expected that several overseas firms will be interested in quoting on this lot.

The Boroko Extension has already assumed the look of a very new and very raw suburb with 10 Hawkesley houses occupied and about 20 more in the process of completion.

By the time all the building operations are finished it will be quite a good resi dential area, but there are plenty of people in Port Moresby who would much prefer to have seen the town extended

along the coast, east of the business sec- j tion rather than inland.

Anyway, the sea view is nice for the Kila Kila labour compound, the police : barracks and other Government Depart ments straggling over the hills.

Planting Co. Representative

ONE of the largest plantation agency firms in the world, Francis .Peek & Co., has a representative, Mr. J.

Lincoln, visiting the Territory. He arrived early in June, and then spent some time in the Central Highlands before going on to Rabaul.

Towards the end of his six weeks’ stay he will be looking over the rubber areas of Papua.

Mr. Lincoln’s firm has extensive con nections in Indonesia and Malaya. With all the difficulties bedeviling property owners in these two countries, some people are wondering if Mr. Lincolns visit has anything to do with extension of Peek interests to Papua and New Guinea.

Documentaries

A SERIES of documentary films on native welfare and development have just been made in the Territory for the Information Section of the Common wealth Department of the Interior. These have been filmed by Cinesound Newsreel photographer, Mr. R. Horner.

One will show how Native Medical and Hygiene Assistants are trained; another will depict the work of the Anti-Tuber culosis medical team; and a third will feature a District Services patrol in the Goilala District.

These and similar subjects make very good films for overseas audiences, but it might be an idea one day for the Com monwealth to do a really factual docu mentary on the very good job of work being done by Australians in the Terri tory.

There are advantages and disadvan tages about making a career in the Islands, but the men who put in years of service, either on Government staffs or as private individuals, contribute a whole lot to the improvement of conditions and general progress of the native people.

They seldom get much credit, and it is time that their contribution to Territory progress got some recognition.

It is an old saying that coming events caste their shadow before them. Two Native Land Commissioners are to be appointed to the Papua and New Guinea Public Service, and Dame Rumour has it that this is the first step towards owner ship registration of native land. The Chief Native Lands Commissioner is to get £1,744 a year, and the runner-up £1,496.

Public Servants who have had a lot of experience in untangling native land ownership forecast that these two new dignitaries are going to earn their money when they get their wavelengths tuned to the clamour of disputing native land claimants.

Payday For Pngvr

IN July CMP members of the Papua and] New Guinea Volunteer Rifles received! their first half yearly pay, and those; who enlisted at Port Moresby in March] collected about £lO each.

The pay-roll for all CMP members was; nearly £l,OOO. and it will be much bigger* when the next pay parade is held some; time around Christmas.

At the end of June enlistments at Porte Moresby, Rabaul, Lae and Wau totalled] 191, and the CO, Colonel Maddem, is? about to start a new recruiting drive im

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Port Moresby where the organisation is now ready to take on more volunteers.

Mt. Lamington Relief

LATE contributions to the Mt. Laming ton Relief Fund are still coming in although the appeal closed at the end of May.

The total at the end of June stood at £20,298. The Committee in charge of the Fund will be meeting again shortly to draft final plans for its allocation.

The tentative proposal, made when the figure was well below its present total, was £lO,OOO for European relief, and £5,000 for native rehabilitation.

Give Them A Name!

PORT MORESBY is seeking suggestions for renaming its streets and sub urbs. This move is sponsored by the Town Advisory Council which is seeking suggestions from public organisations and private citizens.

The first crop of new names favours those of Territory pioneers, both govern ment and mission people. One submission was that the Rouna Road should be re named the Hubert Murray Highway; the road to Hanuabada, the William McGregor Highway; and the golf course road as Le Hunte Road.

Adoption of the names of the main mountain ranges and river systems was also suggested, likewise native names and some of the main battle areas in the New Guinea campaign.

Natives Keep Island

THE natives who own Local Island, off Port Moresby, have declined to sell or lease it as a European recreation area.

But their refusal was accompanied by a statement that they had no objection to picnic parties visiting the Island.

All proposals for acquisition of Local Island have now been dropped.

Prefab Schools

FIVE Hawkesley aluminium, prefab ricated two-classroom school build ings are on order by the Administra tion, Two will be erected at Lae, two at the new Boroko suburb in Port Moresby, and the fifth will be used to add two new schoolrooms to the Ela Beach European School at Port Moresby.

Each building will have a wide veranda, and it> seems that these will make very good school buildings. The houses at Boroko admittedly are not masterpieces of architectural beauty, but at least they are cool and airy.