For Biggest
pp. 14-15 · Read in the full issue
P-NG Is All Set For Biggest Pacific Election
With nominations due to close a January 6, Papua-New Guinea is a set to take part in the most massiv electoral campaign yet seen in tH South Pacific. Candidates, mam hardly out of the Stone Age, will U seeking election for 54 seats i P-NG’s new House of Assembly.
OUT the most significant point o O the elections, which are due ti begin on February 15 and continuj until March, is that voters for tlr first time are on a common roll comprising about 1,000,000 name out of a total Territory population a 2,000,000.
To collect the names, Natiw Affairs officers have carried out the most concentrated programme ce patrols ever conducted in the Terri tory, visiting about 12,000 villages; thousands of hamlets, and coverinr 174,000 miles of country.
They have visited all but 6,00<( square miles of territory still classh fied as “restricted”, where visiton are still likely to get shot at by arrows from the trees. (The same thing can still happen in unrestricted areas too.) Only one-third of P-NG’s voten have had any voting experience (through local councils) and the res mainder include men who have neves heard of a ballot box or a parliaments Terrific Job Electoral officers, under the direcc tion of Mr. Bob Bryant, have been; working frantically to educate then new electors with the aid of tape*recorders, loud-hailers, film pro-c jectors, and various gimmicks to geis their attention. The course of thei unique elections will be followed by'
ibers of interested overseas ob ers. orty-four of the new parliamen ts will be elected from open torates in which anyone may d regardless of race. Ten will dected from special electorates in ;h only Europeans are allowed to d. The rest of the House will be eminent appointed, y the end of December, Euro is who had indicated they would standing for open electorates in ed Mr. Les Farley, Papuan ter and husband of former world ous ballerina Elaine Fifield; Mr. i Wells, a coffee planter from Goroka; and Mr. Jack Roy h, a Finschhafen businessman, se to stand for special electorates ided Major Don Barrett, of aul, a former member of the slative Council; New Ireland ter Mr. W. J. Grose; Rabaul tiessman Bert Price; Port
esby missionary, Rev. Percy
tterton.