No end to PNG’s problems
p. 47 · Read in the full issue
THE Papua New Guinea foreign
affairs minister made a fast get-to
know-you trip through the Pacific
islands early last month. While in Tonga, Sir Julius Chan asked the Tonga government to provide troops to help in a new peace-keeping initiative in war torn Bougainville. This was revealed in
the Tongan king’s opening address of
the 1994 parliament session. It is understood that PNG had approached Fiji and Vanuatu for the same purpose.
However, no one knows how exactly PNG is planning to deploy the soldiers if they will materialise. Will they be just thrown together as one army? Such an arrangement would be extremely
touchy because the bragging Tongans
will certainly push to lead where they shouldn’t and know not how.
If they are kept separate one of two scenarios is possible either logistics will be too complicated for the Port Moresby administration so things will
soon bog down, or the Pacific Way will become operative which means unfinished or hastily done jobs, disregard for time and deadlines, Tongan incurable self-admiration, Fijian initiative phobia, and Vanuatu’s oversized simplemindedness.
Who in his right mind would believe Port Moresby can handle this weird lot when she can’t govern her own clawing
compatriots herself?
Let’s go to the gist of the matter by peeling off the layers one by one. To start with, Bougainville is symptomatic of a widespread and malignant condition that grips PNG in its entirety. This is the desecration to physical environment and people’s lives with no form of real indemnity to the common people knowingly planned and carried out by hosts of marauding investors and so-called developers. On the other hand, PNG’s slack manner, with her Private Dealings Act which is now abolished and other similarly ill
advisedly formulated and badly-monitored legislations have
only served to inflame the sinister effects of the policies. This in turn is due to a wrong-headed, dangerous development philosophy which, by the way, all Pacific Island Countries have adopted. Created in Europe where the analytical tools for guiding progress have been in place for centuries, it is so ill-suited (actually lethal) for the islands. It is part of the disease of modernism that can have a semblance of success only if a tradition of deep study of the sciences and humanities exists.
PNG’s problems are going to increase in number and intensity and given her present approach it does not seem she is going to be able to solve them. Even now people around the Fly River area are clamouring for compensation from the Ok Tedi group for environmental
profanities which they rightly claim are
destroying their sources of livelihood.
I therefore propose a reversal of
priorities as a general blueprint for
development in the islands. The result ing agenda would look like this put nearly everything into human re sources, some into infrastructure, and only a pittance into natural resources
exploitation misnamed development.
Until such time, that is, when the islanders can foresee and monitor the harmful, hidden effects of foreign invest ment, TNCs, international finance, aid packages, restructuring and the whole
sickening apparatus of global rip-off, so
that they can do their own thing.
Most importantly, development must go together with the capacity to critique the development ethic. Otherwise it can only destroy. It is this capacity that the islands most unequivocally lack. And the key here lies in education, but not the type called “relevant”. Why? Because in addition to transfer of skills, it creates a mentality that is receptive to, nay craves development. The type required then is good old fashioned formal education that develops independent thinking and positive critical standards. This requires time so development must wait.
The dislocation of the various parts of society is most pronounced in PNG because of the enormous cultural and economic gap between the tiny educated elite and the uneducated millions, and the vastness of her natural resources. It is only normal that the symptoms of the developmental disease should surface there first and with such explosive force. But instead of trying to contain it in the least disturbing manner the All Blacks Action Party seems to be making a point now PNG is attempting to export it, beyond Spearhead territory! That is an invitation to mischief.
Fiji might go perhaps as a detour to Canberra, and Vanuatu might feel obligated (for favours received). But Tonga, ever the master of real politik, will strain her eyes to see where the big boys stand on Bougainville. If PNG wants to present a united front to the international community, you can count Tonga out. □