Up Front

with the Editor

You can’t win. I decided finally that this column gives overmuch attention to Papua New Guinea affairs, and I planned to talk this month on what I see as the begin nings of a true Islands cultural boom.

But that’s going to have to wait.

As soon as I sat down to write (about cultural developments), Miss Josephine Abaijah and Mr Simon Kaumi announced in Port Moresby that they were forming an indepen dent breakaway republican govern ment of Papua, claiming they had the support of half of Papua. Miss Abaijah said there would not be any political union between Papua and New Guinea. They had talked about “freedom” long enough, and this was the year of action for Papua.

The attractive Miss Abaijah is well known for her leadership of the separatist Papua Besena movement.

The good-looking Simon Kaumi has recently come into prominence out side of PNG for his leadership of something called the Papuan Re publican Fighters, and for having been dismissed from a high public service post because of some of his public utterances. A few years ago he made a fine Chief Electoral Officer. He’s a Papuan too, married to John Kaputin’s sister.

Anyway, with those ringing an nouncements of Miss Abaijah’s the hat was thrown into the ring, and this will be a difficult one for Chief Minister Somare and his cabinet (which includes a goodly number of Papuans).

One of the difficulties is that the Papuans have some sort of a case for wanting to do things their way; they’ve felt cast aside as a result of the decision by the Australian Gov ernment just after World War II to administer New Guinea and Papua together for the sake of administra tive expediency.

Papua had been separate, since Britain proclaimed a protectorate over it in 1884, and Australia made it an Australian territory in 1906.

New Guinea has had a more chequered career, once having been administered by Germany, but its

been a League of Nations or United Nations territory since 1920.

Peopling an Australian territory the Papuans have naturally felt them selves to be a more integral part of Australia than the New Guineans (even though their “citizenship” has never given them the right to auto matically enter Australia). With the move towards independence for a combined Papua New Guinea (ex pected either June or September this year), there has been growing re action by Papuans against the possi bility of domination by the New Guineans. It’s the same feeling the Ellice Islanders have in relation to their more numerous northern brothers, the Gilbertese.

But what to do about it? Chief Minister Michael Somare says that the Papuan independence leaders, in their latest announcement, are simply out of touch with reality, and there has to be a confrontation if they persist.

And what else could he say? The eggs appear to be scrambled, and it’s doubtful if Papua can now be un scrambled from the total dish, even if the majority of the Papuans could agree on it.

There has to be a much broader base of dissent before anybody can declare unilaterally a Papuan re public. Provincial government of some sort could be the answer—the sort that the House of Assembly will be discussing in February, which proposes to create provinces out of the present districts—each with their own legislature, premier, public ser vice and power to raise revenue.

But I like the idea put forward officially by Percy Chatterton a few years ago, where he advocated five provinces for all of PNG (Papua, the Highlands, the Islands, the Mainland and Bougainville). Each province would nominate five mem bers who would comprise a 25 mem ber national assembly to take the place of the present House. At once autonomy, without any area being dominated unfairly by any other.

It it too late to look at it again?

Stuart Inder