New Bougainville Copper CEO Johnny Auna and team. "A once in a lifetime opportunity," says Johnny.

BUKA - Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) has announced the appointment of Johnny Patterson Auna as chief executive officer.

Mr Auna, from Laguai Village, Buin, in South Bougainville, joined BCL in March last year as chief financial officer and company secretary.

OBITUARY
| Exepreneur Magazine

Sir Charles Lepani - the last of 'The Gang of Four', who significantly influenced PNG's governance before its independence

PORT MORESBY - Sir Charles Watson Lepani, KBE CBE OBE, born on 28 October 1947 in the Trobriand Islands of Papua New Guinea, was a prominent public servant and diplomat whose career spanned several decades.

He passed away on 10 January 2025 after a battle with stage four cancer, leaving behind a legacy of dedication to the development and growth of PNG.

KEITH JACKSON

Graduating from the University of Papua New Guinea, 1 August 1975

NOOSA - Time can play strange tricks. Just past my 80th birthday, I find myself inhabiting two worlds: one where my mind remains as agile and adventurous as ever and another in which my aging body increasingly has difficulty in matching its desires.

Yet this contradiction has given me an unexpected gift - the ability to traverse time effortlessly in my thoughts, particularly back to that sweltering day in August 1975 when, just weeks before Papua New Guinea’s independence, I graduated from the University of Papua New Guinea.

KEITH JACKSON

Tess and her son, now aged 13, after her graduation from the University of PNG

NOOSA – Theresa (Tess) Gizoria, one of Papua New Guinea’s most talented women leaders, died last Saturday, two years after being diagnosed with Stage 3 Lobular Cell Carcinoma - an advanced form of breast cancer.

Her initial treatment in PNG was found to be flawed after she was referred to specialists in Australia but Tess refused to allocate blame and instead used her illness to seek better treatment for all cancer patients in the country.

JAMES KOYAPO *

Colonel (ret) Reginald Renagi (left) receives a copy of Bitcoin Dream from Peter Kinjap

PORT MORESBY - 'Bitcoin Dream: Hope Hype and Chaos' by Peter Solo Kinjap is interesting, catchy and of educational benefit not only to Papua New Guineans readers but to readers everywhere.

Its purpose is to educate people about the facts underpinning society’s attitudes towards money and recent developments in how our conception of money is changing.

BAKA BINA

PORT MORESBY - Happy New Year 2025 to all of you who are deep in literature as writers or readers.

For writers, 2024 wasn’t easy and I’m sorry to say things looks just as bleak going forward.

Elders and keepers of our national repository of traditional stories, songs and dances will die and take with them all of these lovely parts of our Melanesian culture.

MICHAEL KABUNI
| Academia Nomad

PORT MORESBY - After 20 years of operation, Heli Solutions has shut down. The local company couldn’t survive fuel shortages and a lack of foreign currency.

But there was a deeper problem. Poor decisions by politicians—especially by the prime minister.

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

Papua New Guinean authors are giving PNG writing its own unique style derived largely from their own lived grassroots experiences (Image created by Adobe AI)

TUMBY BAY - After reading a review of Marlene Potoura’s new book, Remembering, Father and Me, I was prompted to go back to Leonard Fong Roka’s Brokenville, his memoir of the crisis years in Bougainville.

I was not so much interested in making comparisons with Marlene’s experience but to identify commonalities in their experiences and the way in which they presented them.

KEITH JACKSON

Humanoid AI holds a printed page

NOOSA - Some readers will have noticed that I've been experimenting with Claude, an artificial intelligence assistant, to explore how it might help writers, especially those in Papua New Guinea.

While I've always been a capable and fast writer, my ME/CFS illness has worsened in recent years, impairing my ability to write and edit – and at its worst, even read.

JIM McKAY*
| Pearls & Irritations

PNG rugby league star Justin ('The Human Brick') Olam carries the ball upfield (Melbourne Storm)

BRISBANE - In his acceptance speech after Labor won the 2022 Australian national election, Anthony Albanese promised to look after disadvantaged and vulnerable citizens.

During the cost of living crisis over the past two years he told people he felt their pain and had their backs.