New Guinea Abuzz With Ideas

Ideas And Action

From a Port Moresby Correspondent

Papua-New Guinea in May had one of its busiest months, with fascinating facts developing at every turn. The House of Assembly meeting, and the visit of the Minister for Territories, Mr. Bames, were the highlights.

MAIN purpose of Mr. Bames’ visit, according to the official an nouncement, was the opening of Rabaul’s big £330,000 Vudal Agri cultural College, but more important to Mr. Bames was his opportunity of talking to the local people who count, such as New Guinean leaders in the public eye and Popondetta planters who are in serious trouble with cocoa.

Mr. Bames promised the planters he would be happy to get written pro posals from them on their problems, which basically amount to the need of more money to overcome cocoa diseases. He will also look at some development proposals for the area.

Mr. Barnes said his tour also helped him get an idea of how the provisions of the World Bank Report on the Territory could be carried out, fol lowing Cabinet’s decision earlier in the month to accept the report as the basis of future planning. He said a great deal of planning had to be done before the Bank’s proposals could be made to work—no detailed work had been done—and the Government was waiting to hear the views of the House of Assembly.

Bank Debate

The House met the same week but nothing of great importance came from its deliberations on the Bank report, because members felt the whole field was too vast for them to do it justice without a lot of homework.

The elected members suggested an adjournment of the debate until the September sitting, but when the Gov ernment pushed for the debate to be held then and there, members showed little interest in making it strong, and the debate lasted only two hours.

Paliau, of Manus, proposed that the report should be translated into pidgin so that all members would have a chance of getting to the bottom of it, but this was generally described as impracticable.

General tenor of the debate was that the Government proposals so far were too vague.

Mr. Barnes got back to Canberra in time to announce that a top level economic adviser would be appointed to the Territory as soon as the Gov ernment could find a suitable man.

Such a position had been recom mended by the World Bank Mission.

He said this man would have the job of co-ordinating the Territory’s development programme.

The Public Service Association buttonholed the Minister in Port Moresby to find out what had hap pened to its scheme for compensation for public servants who might lose their jobs as a result of political ad vancement in the Territory. The scheme, locally known as the “Golden Handshake”, was submitted some months ago, and no public servant really expects the Government will meet all the association’s generous submissions.

But Mr. Bames gave unexpected encouragement by telling the associa tion that he agreed an announcement on a compensation scheme was “urgently desirable” and that he ex pected a statement would come from Cabinet within a few weeks.

Mr. Barnes also talked with the Parliamentary Under-Secretaries, who have been on the job almost 12 months now, and said he was satisfied the system was generally working well, although the Under-Secretaries had put forward some suggestions for im provement and these were being approved.

The main suggestion by the secre taries was that the Administration should see to it that all secretaries had

some real work to do and some rea decisions to make, instead of mereh being loaded with departmental files.

During his tour Mr. Barnes too] every opportunity to remind whoeve wanted to listen that the Territor shouldn’t allow itself to be affected b] outside political interference. He sai< in opening Vudal that people in futun might try to separate Australia an< New Guinea, but the New Guinean should “think carefully.”

In Port Moresby he said that irre sponsible statements suggesting tha P-NG could become another Cong< were to the Territory’s disadvantage.

Busy Month

In other happenings during th month: • The Administrator, Sir Donal Cleland said that the Returnei Soldiers’ League need not be cor cerned about the Territory’s delay i announcing civil defence plans. Th Civil Defence Controller. Mr. la: Skinner, was at present attending training course in Australia and thing would get moving when he returned. • Sir Donald announced his in tention to declare a number of in dustries which will be entitled to hav a five-year tax holiday as “pionee industries”, once established. Pionee legislation to make this possible wa passed earlier this year and is aimei at attracting more secondary industr to the Territory. The first Industrie will be declared “pioneer” after twi months, and in the meantime objec

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tions may be lodged against them.

The industries are the manufacture of industrial gases, the assembly of metal louvre window frames, the manufac ture and conditioning of steel drums, the extraction of pyrethrum, and the industries of wire fabrication, soap making and flour milling. • The Bougainville District Ad visory Council decided that UN assist an c e in developing the Territory should be considered “interference’', and expressed itself in strong opposi tion to a recent announcement that UN aid for education for the Terri tory be sought. • In Rabaul, a New Guinean, Stanis Boramilat, urged at a meeting of the New Britain District Advisory Council that New Guinea be divided into four States —Papua, New Guinea Islands, New Guinea Highlands and New Guinea Coastal—so that it could be prepared for easier emergence to self-government. Each State would have a government, developed from local councils. Mr. Harry Spanner suggested at the same meeting that when self-government came, P-NG should look after its own internal affairs and Australia should look after its external affairs. • In Lae the national president of the RSL said Indonesia had been guilty of “international hyprocrisy” by denying West New Guineans the right of self-determination while carrying out a campaign against Malaysia, where the popular will of the people had already been expressed. • In the House of Assembly in Port Moresby, Mr. Frank Martin, an elected member from the Sepik, urged the Administration to offer asylum to genuine refugees from West New Guinea who were crossing the border into Papua-New Guinea.

Mr. Martin said he believed reports were true that when refugees were turned back by P-NG officials that some were murdered or maltreated in West New Guinea.

“I would ask this House,” he said, “can we as people, who are noted for some humanity, allow this to con tinue?”

He said there were areas of un used and sparsely popuiated land m the Vanimo district of the Sepik which could be bought for the refugees.