Political

Currents

Solomons could

get president

The new coalition government in Solomon Islands has issued a manifesto to formalise its poli cies and to set down what it sees as the needs of the country and the people. One of the most contentious issues in the mani festo is the possibility of a constitutional change under which Queen Elizabeth, titular head of the Commonwealth of Nations would no longer be titular head of state of Solomon Islands. Under the proposal Solomon Islands would retain its present parliamentary struc ture but would recognise a ‘ceremonial president’ of its own as head of state. The president would be elected by parliament, but effective power would remain with the prime minister and his government as at present. The government said that it was not committed to the suggested change, but was putt ing forward the proposal as part of natural constitutional evol ution. The people would be fully consulted before any change was considered. The manifesto does not indicate the method of consultation referendum or electorate inquiries which the government would be likely to employ in seeking public opinion.

The manifesto is divided into matters which the government will examine or review and matters to which it has commit ted itself. Seven policy sections are involved. They are the system of government and ad ministration, the development of human resources, the devel opment of the people them selves as communities and indi viduals, the use of natural resources, commercial and in dustrial development, regional co-operation to develop national unity, and foreign relations.

Matters to which the govern ment has committed itself in clude the encouragement of

trade unionism, the creation of a reserve bank as the central control of money and exchange, the creation of a national invest ment board to encourage and regulate investment from all sources and a revision of land ownership and titles. The government also plans to review its media legislation but on lines which superficially conflict. On the one hand it plans legislation to ensure that the press and radio are unbiased and free, but on the other it plans legislation to censor or ban what it calls ‘undesirable’ publications.

The manifesto indicates that firmer measures will be adopted to ensure that the economy is vested in Solomon Islands citi zens to the greatest possible degree.

In its efforts to formalise land ownership and registration of ownership the government plans to establish a register of tribal groups equated to land ownership and land customs.

The government also plans re views of the police force, the housing authority, the edu cation system, the public trans port system and the lending policies of the development bank.

Fiji ministry is

changed

The Fiji Prime Minister, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, reshuffled his Cabinet in mid-January to make way for a new ministry which will deal with existing and alternative forms of energy.

The Minister for Energy under the new arrangement will be Mr Bill Clark who had held the land and minerals portfolio. He will lead efforts to develop new sources of energy from hydro schemes, ethanol, solar power and sea-wave power.

In the reshuffle, six of Ratu Sir Kamisese’s ministers changed their portfolios. Ratu David Toganivalu left the labour portfolio to become Min ister for Commerce and Indus try, replacing Mr Mohammed Ramzan. Mr Ramzan became Minister for Health.

The Minister who formerly held the health portfolio, Mr Ted Beddoes, became Minister for Tourism, Transport and Civil Aviation. He took over from Mr Tomasi Vakatora who has become the new Minister

for Labour, Industry Relations and Immigration. The Minister for Youth and Sport, Mr Sakiasi Waqanivavalagi, con tinued to hold this portfolio but has taken on the added responsibilities of lands and mineral resources.

Ratu Sir Kamisese said en ergy matters had been pre viously handled by a number of ministries including works, agriculture, transport and tour ism, and the Central Planning Office. A separate ministry would give new impetus to the energy problem and allow bet ter co-ordination of work in such fields as ethanol, hydro electricity and solar and wave energy, he said. He believed it was in Fiji’s long-term interests to concentrate on the develop ment of energy sources.

PNG Australia

links affirmed

Strong links between Papua New Guinea and Australia were re-affirmed in December when the PNG Prime Minister,

Sir Julius Chan, and Foreign Minister, Mr Noel Levi, made official visits. Two major docu ments were signed while the PNG leaders were in Australia one to formalise a further five-year old programme to PNG and the other to regulate a sharing of air routes between the two countries.

Sir Julius also used his visit to honour a senior member of the Australian Cabinet, Mr Andrew Peacock, for what he described as Mr Peacock’s out standing contribution to the smooth introduction of indepen dence in PNG five years pre viously and to the continuing good relations between the two countries. Mr Peacock was a former minister for external territories who established a strong rapport with Mr Michael Somare, the political leader of PNG immediately before and after independence. He played a major part in Australia’s transfer of nationhood to PNG.

Later he became foreign minis ter, maintaining strong links with PNG, relinquishing the position only late last year when

he took up the internal portfolio of industrial relations.

Sir Julius said that Mr Pea cock had been a more than significant figure in the warm relationship which now existed between PNG and Australia.

At a function in Sydney he presented Mr Peacock with a painting of a bird of paradise PNG’s national emblem and a traditional tribal drum. In a light-hearted touch to end his address Sir Julius said ‘Aust ralia has helped us in the past and is still helping, but if there is anything we can do now to help Australia, just beat the drum and we will be there’.

In addition to Mr Peacock, Sir Julius also singled out for thanks two former PNG Ad ministrators Sir David Hay and Mr L. W. Johnson, Sir John Crawford who advised Aust ralia on PNG aid, and Dr Ross Garnaut an Australian econom ist who advised PNG on its economic policies.

Addressing a state dinner at Parliament House in Canberra, Sir Julius emphasised the stab ility of his country and its

commitment to meet its inter national obligations. He said: ‘Whatever changes are made, or have already been made, to our foreign policies, we will always follow the principle of a strict adherence to treaties and agreements. ‘We will never be a party to a treaty whose conditions we do not intend to keep, or which we know we cannot keep. We will always work within the limits of agreements and, in doing so, we follow a policy formulated at the time of our independence in 1975. Certainly, we have no intention of throwing the baby out with the bathwater, by overturning our present ar rangements with other nations.

These arrangements were made bi-laterally nothing was forced on us and they have been endorsed by our national parliament. ‘When arrangements need to be changed, they will be changed, but only after mutual agreement by all parties. Papua New Guinea agrees with, and follows, international law. Our aim is for regional stability,

working within the framework of international law. Our deal ings will only be with legitimate governments, and any agree ment reached will be honoured.’

As leader of the country which received the biggest share of Australian aid, Sir Julius said it would be boorish of him to emphasise the atti tudes towards foreign aid which seemed to be arising in sections of the Australian community.

Nevertheless he believed there was a growing attitude of self interest by ‘a potent group of Australian voters’ and which could create a degree of iso lation in national policy. Sir Julius said: ‘I raise the question only to indicate that the close relationship we have could de pend for its future development on a greater understanding, by both countries, of the forces influencing policies. I am a firm believer in the inter-dependence of nations, and the need for one nation to sometimes put the short-term interests of other nations ahead of its own for the long-term benefit of both.’

Sir Julius also assured Aust ralia that his government was using its aid for development. ‘Ultimately we want to pay our own way we want to substi tute trade for aid’ he said. He appealed, too, for a more bal anced trade relationship be tween the two countries. (At present Australian trade to PNG is three times greater than PNG trade to Australia.) The air service agreement which was signed between the two countries while Sir Julius and Mr Levi were in Australia formalises arrangements which had already existed on an in terim basis. Under the agree ment the designated airlines of Australia and Papua New Guinea, Qantas and Air Niugini, are entitled to share in the provision of air services on a number of routes between the two countries. Air Niugini has access to three Australian ports, Cairns, Brisbane and Sydney.

Australia is given access to Port Moresby and one other desti nation in Papua New Guinea, providing that Papua New Guinea agrees with the lo cation.

The agreement regulates such things as procedures for determining the type of aircraft

each airline may use and the frequency of services.

The new aid agreement was signed by the Australian Deputy Prime Minister, Mr Anthony, and Sir Julius. It will become effective in July this year and will operate until June 1985. Under the agreement Australia will provide direct untied budget funds of $1326 million to PNG over the five year period. On current annual figures this would be nearly one third of PNG’s budget funds, but the annual growth of the budget will mean a gradually declining proportion. Mr Anthony said the arrangement followed PNG’s objective of achieving self-reliance through a gradual decline of Australian aid in real terms.

The fattening

termites

Whoever wins the forthcoming French presidential election, the real rulers of France will remain the same as before: the bureaucrats. For ministers come and go, but the bureau crats remain, and since they have the power and the money, the crisis will forge ahead, and inequities will increase. If the Middle East oil sheikhs wear

out as scapegoats, new scapegoats will be found. The bureaucrats are always the winners.

Nowhere is this more evident than in French Polynesia. In Tahiti, for instance, and now, since the creation of ‘communes’, in most of the islands of French Polynesia, the winners have been, for the past 25 years at least, those favoured by the measures imposed on General de Gaulle by Maurice Thorez, leader of the French Communist Party, in 1946, when the general was ruling France with the help and backing of the FCP help and backing that the general would probably have preferred to do without.

In those black market years, civil servants were the victims of postwar inflation, and the folk we then called ‘the BOF’ (for beurre, oeufs, fromages butter, eggs and cheese), or the grocers, were the beneficiaries.

The ripoffs from black marketeering lasted for a limited time only, but the privileges built into French law through the FCP-inspired Contrat de la Fonction Pubhque for the benefit of the then suffering civil servants have long outlived the short period of postwar imbalance between supply and demand in the matter of food. It seems that only some sort of Chinese-style cultural revolution’ could now deprive the new mandarins of their excessive and unjustified prerogatives.

France has continued to shower its civil servants with

wages and benefits out of all proportion to those received by those doing similar or equivalent work in the ‘non public sector’ three to nine times higher, in fact.

In French Polynesia, France pays about 60% of the ‘splen did’ (Francis Sanford used the word, some PIM issues back) salaries of the local civil ser vants. This has certainly de layed the inevitable upheaval.

But a non-producing group of tropical islands, where Mother Nature had previously filled all elementary needs without de manding sustained and long range efforts from its inhabi tants needed incentives rather than brakes.

But what more efficient brakes could have been applied than having the laws of nature replaced by those of a much bigger and wealthier protector called the ‘Metropole’, or Mother State whose financial help must become more essential year by year to pay for this ever-increasing and unproductive when not counter-productive caste, whose efficiency seems to de crease in proportion to its growth in both costs and num bers, perfectly in line with C. N.

Parkinson’s Law.

Those who declare them selves Socialists forget that this unhealthy situation is the result of the policy of their former colleagues and allies, the FCP.

Most people have very short

memories.

Henri Lombard

in Papeete.

Sir Julius Chan, Prime Minister of PNG, is received by a naval guard of honour outside Parlia ment House, Canberra, during his Australian visit. At rear is Mr Doug Anthony, Australian Deputy Prime Minister. AIS picture.