Press

From the

Islands

The Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, Port Moresby A member of a gang which robbed a liquor shop at Wau in the Morobe Province has been shot dead with an arrow by a security guard. Police said the nine-man gang held up the security guard at gunpoint. They broke in and stole liquor. One of the gang members who was the last to leave was shot with an arrow under his left armpit.

He collapsed and died 25 metres from the shop. His accomplice escaped from the scene. The manager of the Wau Hotel, Mr Kopas Spori, said “The situation in Wau is very frightening. The people here are living in constant fear.”

Part of a letter in The Fiji Times from an Australian resident, Mr John Cougle, who is highly critical of Fiji’s investment incentive climate.

Fiji is attempting to lure Australian businesses and businessmen with descriptions of the “wonderful opportunities” that exist in “parad ise. But the government of “paradise” appears to think that everyone who falls into the trap of opening a business in Fiji does so for one of two reasons; permanent residence with a work permit or citizenship. There is no provision for an investor to come and go as he pleases, to supervise his investment which certainly needs a lot of supervision. And as for “free flow of funds” for investors, forget it.

Once the investment is in the country the onus is on you to prove that it s yours to get out but it can be done sooner or later, provided you are not in a rush. This must be the greatest farce publicised by the Economic Development Board. All one can say to Fiji is: “Don’t clean up your own back yard by throwing muck into your neighbor’s.

Help the investor, and he will help you. Hinder him, and your industrial and rural development programs will be delayed, if not cancelled ’ as they have been in our case.

Broadcast news item from Radio Vanuatu, Port Vila The Vanuatu Women in Business Assocation has decided to change its name. It will now be known as Association Blong ol Woman Efate.

Percy Chatterton, in his weekly column in The Times of Papua New Guinea, criticises official reaction to problems in the Bomana jail near Port Moresby Of all recent news items the one which cries out loudest for comment is that the Bomana Corrective Institution is to be closed to the outside world. All visitors, including relatives, priests and pastors, are to be excluded and Sunday church services are banned, there is obviously a crisis out there; but this way of meeting it is surely a policy of despair and perhaps a prelude to disaster.

Marianas Variety News and Views, Saipan, Mariana Islands We understand that a bunch of folks have been sent from here to Taiwan to study slaughter-house construction. Makes no sense to us since we don’t have Chinese pigs here.

The Flotsam and Jetsam co tmn in The Fiji Times Hundreds of people in the Suva-Nausori area were excited just before Christmans about “a shining UFO” flying slowly across the skies one morning about 1300 metres high. Those who have lived in Nadi at irst laughed it off as a weather balloon. But a spokesman from the

J Laucala Bay weather station reported that it was not a weather I balloon. ‘To us it looks like a parachute with a platform at the bottom ’ and with bright, shining lights all round,” the spokesman said. The “shining UFO” was first sighted over Nausori Airport about 9 a.m., and then it slowly floated over the Suva city. The only plausible explanation was that it was an object put up for Christmas season advertising. But this could not be confirmed.

Uni Tavur, Port Moresby, the newsletter of the University of Papua New guinea Fifteen years it’s a long wait for a pay rise. The two longest serving ancillary cooks at the university mess have been working for 15 years without any pay increase. Thomas Buna and Kawgo Daware said it was about time ancillary cooks had promotions and pay increases.

The Fiji Times, Suva The prime minister, Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, has set up a team to review medical reports on some of his cabinet ministers. The team, made up mainly of suva doctors, decides if ministers are medically fit to continue in their portfolios. The Fiji Times was told. Although two cabinet ministers had been cleared by the colonial War Memorial Hospital, their medical reports were “reviewed” by the team. A member of the team confirmed that not all ministers were medically examined or had their medical histories reviewed.

Maureen Mopio, writing in The Times of Papua New Guinea

Port Moresby

Trendy Papua New Guinean women are now getting their hair cut in the punk style worn by rock stars. In recent months women have been wearing the sort of softer curly type of hair called the “wet perm look” and costing up to 40 kina a time at the hairdressers. But now hair is getting hard again, and some women in Port Moresby with the grace jane” style wear their hair in two-tone colors.

Parts of a letter in The Times of Papua New Guinea, Port Moresby, in which Mr Joe Chan describes the aftermath to a critical speech he gave to a handcraft marketing seminar On arrival at an artifact shop with two friends our reception left a lot to be desired. An item was selected and after carefully inspecting the item and price, a firm decision was made to purchase. The only lady behind the counter commented “That will cost you 40 kina because of the embarrassment you have caused me in Port Moresby.” The item was clearly marked 20 kina, and this clearly reflected a colonialist attitude. This was a flagrant and discriminatory breach of commercial law and consumer protection. It is not felt that the people of this town would normally extend this form of discourtesy to nationals from other provinces.

The Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, Port Moresby A ban on garbage collection imposed on 3000 people in Madang is working wonders, according to the president of the Madang Town Council, Mr Jacob Wama. The ban was imposed on people who had not paid their garbage fees. Mr Wama said people were turning up to pay their debts. Some provincial government leaders and senior public servants still had to pay debts totalling about 100,000 kina, he said. He threatened to make public the names of debtors who did not pay what they owed.

From the government newspaper Tam Tam, Port-Vlla, Vanuatu, and published under the heading “Government officers attacked”.

The Banks and Torres Island government headquarters at Sola in Vanualava has once again this year come under heavy attack from millions of bloodthirsty mosquitoes. Mr George Palmer, the treasurer, is reported as saying: “It is impossible to either work in the offices or sleep at night. Mosquito nets are useless the mosquitoes just drill through them to get to the skin”. Nearby Arep school is also badly affected, Mr Palmer says. He confirms that local authorities are helpless against the mosquitoes. Any help to solve the problem would be much appreciated, he says.