Uno Influence in P-NG Affairs

Ditorial Note:

REPORTERS are always being [V accused of “taking words out of context”. Now the boot seems ) be on the other foot.

What PIM said in the August ;sue was; “One way and another, le stars have not been propitious )r the PNG Administration in the ist couple of months: drunken shoolboys sent home from Aus •alia; a surprisingly frank report y the registrar of Co-operatives; nd now the Tapini affair. All of lem may be regarded as legitimate mtingencies in running a large, rimitive country like P-NG. But :» head-line making! No one in NO is going to like it a bit”.

Further, the Tapini Affair had een bumping about making nasty oises since the preceding May hen half the horrible secret was t out of the bag, but the other alf retained. There was going to 3 an inquiry into certain matters b Tapini, announced the Admin trator, but it wasn’t in the public iterest to say what the matters ere.

Immediately, of course, rumours : all sorts, incriminating all sorts : people, were circulating—all of lem quite wide of the mark, as it anspired—and immediately, too, it as being said that the Adminis ation would like to hush it up be mse of fear of offending the United ations.

This journal does not care two Dots whether UNO and its Trustee hp Council are offended by any ling that happens in the Pacific, • not. But if Mr. Townsend believes lat the actions of the Papua-New uinea Administration are NOT ifluenced by UNO opinion, he is l the minority.

We are well aware that Papua not a Trusteeship Territory and lat what Australia does there is sr own business. But we are also vare that officers of the Depart ent of Native Affairs (District srvices) are officers of the Admin tration of the Territory of Papua id New Guinea. That is, an ADO ho is serving at Tapini this week, in well be serving across the Drder in Wewak the week follow-

It is too absurd to suggest that an officer who would tie natives to flag-poles with impunity in Tapini would refrain from doing so

over the border in Wewak, as in the latter place he would be under the eye of UNO.

What an officer does in Tari or Tapini or Telefomin or Talasea re flects on all officers of the service no matter what side of the border they happen currently to be operat ing.

Probably this fact pinpoints better than anything else the complete absurdity of the whole Adminis trative set-up as it exists in P-NG to-day. The United Nations Organ isation may have its uses—par ticularly if you happen to be a Russian, an Egyptian or a Domini can—but no one yet has been able to convince this journal that the

:usteeship Council has been able confer any lasting benefit on ;w Guinea or its natives.

As Mr. Townsend has pointed out Papua belongs to Australia. But ies Australia neglect the Papuans order to do more for the New uinea natives? The answer is, of urse, No.

And while we are on the subject to whom do the New Guinea stives owe allegiance? In the final talysis, the Papuans are subjects the Queen. But the New iiineans, we presume, must cast eir eyes to UNO as the fount of eir being and look forward to the ,y when they will be a free nation, litically cut adrift from their ipuan brethren over the border.

One imagines Patrol Officers and hers, as they shuttle here and ere on their lawful occasions in e combined Territory, mentally justing themselves to this absurd nation everytime they cross the rder.

To make the situation even more mplex, Minister Hasluck, in his sdom, has recently extended the nefits of Australian citizenship to ;w Guinea Chinese.

Phis journal does not see why ;w Guinea’s Chinese should not ve the same rights of citizenship migrant Italians, Poles and others ilways providing that New Guinea an integral part, or Territory, of istralia.

But it is not. Australia holds it n trust”, whatever that may ?an now or in the future.

Phe more one thinks about the ssent administration of Papua and ;w Guinea, the more unrealistic e set-up seems. Either the two rritories should have continued be administered separately, so at each could pursue its own stiny; or the present Trust Terri •y should be annexed to Australia.

But fair is fair. Mr. Townsend is a in for whom we have great respect, fore the Pacific War he was a lior District Officer in the New uinea (then separate from pua) Administration. He gave itinguished service during the war the Army; and after it until, ite recently, he was at United itions headquarters in New York. ! obviously believes in UNO and s Trusteeship Council. [f anyone can convince us of the nefits of the Trusteeship system it applies to New Guinea and ler of the former Mandated Terri 'ies, he is the man. We hope that will hear from him on this sub ;t—a vital one for every resident New Guinea, and Papua, too.

Vlr. Douglas Hall, of Nathan and yeth Pty. Ltd., Sydney wine and irit merchants, and agents for the urn’s lines, visited centres in pua-New Guinea in October.