How They Decided The Games Site

1^0 W that Port Moresby is pushing ahead with the organisation of the 1969 South Pacific Games, there are noises off-stage which sound like sour grapes. The Lae New Guinea Times-Courier complains that the selection of Port Moresby, rather than Lae or Rabaul, “seems to have been a foregone conclusion”. Somebody at the Lae Town Advisory Council said much the same thing.

The chairman of the Games Council, Mr. Johnstone, replied that the claims were “quite wrong”. The committee appointed in 1964 by the then Administrator, he said, had looked at Lae and Rabaul; their find ings had been submitted to the Administrator, who had announced in mid-1966 that Port Moresby had been chosen.

What Mr. Johnstone did not say was that the committee of five (himself, H. Niall, D. Barrett, R. Galloway and E. Flower) rejected Lae and were split on whether Port Moresby or Rabaul should have the Games.

Two wanted Rabaul and two Port Moresby—leaving chairman Johnstone in the position of having to make a casting vote. He decided not to make it, and the nasty problem ended in Sir Donald Cleland’s reluctant lap.