From Sana: An Autobiography by Michael Somare

After the snake ceremony I was taught the timit songs. Only Saub lnew these songs, and he had to repeat them ten times so that I could learn them. When the time for the timit songs had come Saub rose to his feet. There was silence.

Now you have left your mother’s womb
You have come to this place to receive power.
With this power you must go out and lead -
lead in initiation, lead in fight, lead in peacemaking.
The strength now has been given to you.

FICTION BY RAYMOND SIGIMET

I didn’t see my baby after the Caesarian. My sedated state made it impossible to do that.

After the procedure, the baby was taken from the operating theatre and brought to the nursery. I was told I would not see my miracle until I was able to sit up in bed.

I was afraid I might not recognise my baby.

FRICTION BY PHILIP FITZPATRICK

The theory goes that if you elect your leaders democratically you end up with a disorganised rabble of one trick ponies, carpetbaggers and other chancers running the place.

According to proponents of this ‘democracy is a rabble’ theory, a one party system is a lot more efficient and better for the general populace.

KEITH JACKSON

CANBERRA - Australia will send a medical team to Papua New Guinea next week to help manage a serious escalation in Covid-19 cases.

Last week a large cluster of people with Covid-19 emanated from the infectious diseases unit of Port Moresby General Hospital.

CHRIS OVERLAND

ADELAIDE – It is a sad reality that Papua New Guinea's leaders have stolen, mismanaged or squandered much of its wealth, leaving its people vastly under serviced and resourced.

This is consistent with the all too familiar pattern in post-colonial societies.

"The issue of racism in Papua is a serious failure and will end up costing Indonesia the very thing they are trying to hold on to"

YAMIN KOGOYA

CANBERRA - On Tuesday 14 July, Antara News in Jakarta published an article by Jaleswari Pramodhawardani of the Presidential Staff Office on President Joko Widodo’s approach in handling West Papua issues.

According to Pramodhawardani, lack of welfare is to blame for problems in West Papua. She concluded that Jokowi plans to resolve West Papua’s issues through various development programs.

Nigerian scammers hard at work trying to steal your money

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - I received an interesting email this morning. It came from Nigeria telling me I had won US$70 million in a lottery I had never entered.

It wasn’t so much that this was obviously a scam but that it came from Nigeria.

I haven’t had a scam email from the west African country in over two years. Once upon a time they were almost a daily event.

James Tanis - "“My people of Bougainville will get through this pandemic. We are a resilient people who have faced adversity and prevailed time and time again...."

ANTHONY KAYBING

BUKA - Bougainvilleans are being urged to remain vigilant and to comply with state of emergency orders in light of the growing concerns over the Covid-19 pandemic which has already hit Port Moresby.

Former Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) president James Tanis has urged Bougainvilleans throughout PNG to adhere to restrictions to mitigate the spread of the virus.

Ethnic diversity strengthens and enriches societies but can also be a source of conflict

ROBERT FORSTER

NORTHUMBRIA, UK – The continued aggressive suppression of black skinned former slaves in the United States has triggered fierce global outrage.

The wave of anger sparked by the murder of George Floyd implied that racism is directed exclusively against black skinned people and that the only perpetrators are white.

Phil Fitzpatrick: "The K70 million the World Bank gave PNG months ago to prepare for the pandemic has mysteriously disappeared"

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - Covid-19 is having a remarkable impact all over the world as it exposes the ideological and structural shortcomings of government and corporate entities.

In the USA and Britain, the bumbling incompetence of their leaders is shown in the disastrous statistics related to rates of infection and deaths from the virus.

GREGORY BABLIS

Is this the death of progress?
Or the progression of death?
NCO – New Covid Order
A Trojan-horse
For NWO – New World Order
Stuck in purgatory
A perpetual limbo
Is this the new normal?
Niupla Pasin protocol.

SCOTT WAIDE
| My Land, My Country

LAE - Papua New Guinea’s environment minister has tried to ease tensions over the proposal to dump mine waste into Huon Gulf in Morobe Province.

Wera Mori says it has not been decided if tailings from the K17 billion Wafi-Golpu project will be disposed using deep sea tailing. But he also admitted that the construction of a tailings dam is not part of the plan.

James Marape says PNG's health system cannot deal with a widespread outbreak of coronavirus (AAP)

LYANNE TOGIBA & BEN DOHERTY
| Guardian Australia| Judith Nielson Institute

PORT MORESBY - Papua New Guinea’s Covid-19 outbreak could overwhelm its health system within days, the country’s pandemic chief has warned, as masks have been made compulsory in the capital, and the government has called in the World Health OrganiSation and the military for help.

PNG’s pandemic response controller David Manning said a dedicated isolation unit established in Port Moresby to treat Covid-19 could soon be overwhelmed if current infections trends continue.

Nurse sits at a screening station in East New Britain (Kalo Fainu/ The Guardian)

MICHAEL KABUNI
| Asia & Pacific Policy Society | Edited extracts

PORT MORESBY – Papua New Guinea has registered 39 positive Covid-19 cases, most of them in the last week, leading to the reinstatement of a range of measures to limit the spread of the disease as a second lockdown is imposed.

PNG’s reliance on a state of emergency and lockdowns to contain Covid-19 is proving difficult due to years of government negligence that have led to both poor health infrastructure and limited police and military capabilities, including the ability to adequately police unauthorised movements across PNG’s borders.

Smartly dressed aid officials from PNG, Australia and WHO pose with a box symbolising the energy behind the campaign to fight Covid-19 in PNG. But sometimes photos don't tell the real story

KEITH JACKSON

NOOSA – Late last week Papua New Guinea cried out for international emergency medical teams to assist its operations to fight Covid-19.

PNG police commissioner and emergency controller David Manning issued the alert after the number of Covid-19 cases in PNG more than doubled last week to an official figure of 39, with the bulk of those recorded at Port Moresby general hospital and centred on the infectious diseases unit.

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - The United States of America, under its barking mad sociopath president, is in total disarray at possibly the worst historical moment in a hundred years.

Confusion reigns supreme and anything could happen, none of which will be nice for its people or the world at large.

GREGORY BABLIS

The Ben Moide Story: Nameless Warriors by Lahui Ako, University of Papua New Guinea Press, 2012, 246 pages. ISBN      9980869577. Order online or purchase from the UPNG Press & Bookshop, Port Moresby

PORT MORESBY – Ben Moide was one of the youngest members of the Papuan Infantry Battalion (PIB), a unit of the Australian Army formed in 1940, the first 63 recruits being old or volunteer police officers, some with considerable experience patrolling with the kiaps.

However Moide’s picture of the PIB was not one of glorious comradeship, but of tribal enmities, tensions even amongst kinsmen, dissension, desertion and discrimination between mixed race and other troops. The PIB lost 60% of its members due to such issues.

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - Forget about the deaths, suffering, unemployment and massive economic calamity of Covid-19.

Because, if you believe our commercial television stations, the most serious impact of the dreaded ‘rona has been the disruption to the footie season.

Jeremiah Munini

JEREMIAH MUNINI

PORT MORESBY - Kipilan, a leader of the Yanarian people near Wabag in Enga Province, was born in Tambori village, in the 1920s.

Three months before Papua New Guinea’s independence on 16 September 1975, he went to Port Moresby to record the story of his life in the Enga language and anthropologist Philip Nere translated it to English.

CHRIS OVERLAND

“No doc we ain’t got no COVID. Stop trying to squeeze water out of a stone. The models aren’t wrong, you are wrong. The clinical and epidemiological evidence isn’t there!” (Martyn Namorong replies to a newspaper article by asserting there’s no Covid-19 in Papua New Guinea)

ADELAIDE - I struggle to understand why Martyn Namorong, who seems a pretty smart guy, would be saying that Covid-19 is a hoax. I'll do him the courtesy of assuming he was being ironic.

The notion that Covid-19 is a hoax appears to originate, as do so many truly batshit crazy ideas, in the fermentation tank of genius and idiocy that is the United States.

LICEANNE UTAH

PORT MORESBY - Gender based violence is a big problem in Papua New Guinea and this includes what’s going on in the minds of this children when families are in conflict and there is separation or divorce.

For most children, family is all that matters. When families split, all these children want is the happy and normal life they used to have.

MICHAEL DOM

There were coconut trees, I remember,
Four, which would have me at the door
With the sounds of their arrival
I creamed them for us
And we did not want more

There was the wind that night, a sign,
Tempestuous love affair of earth and sea
And we did not know that
That time would soon be at an end
We spoke of the barren grapevine
And listened in silence
To words left unsaid

Public controversialist Martyn Namorong is no stranger to masks. This pic dates from 2017 and, with nose fully exposed, would be useless in fighting off Covid-19

KEITH JACKSON

PORT MORESBY - For month after month this year, Papua New Guinea was said to have had eight cases of Covid-19, all of which had been resolved satisfactorily.

As a lifetime skeptic, I never believed the blithe certainty of that fixed in concrete statistic.

Yesterday, health authorities announced a new Covid-19 tally of 30 cases, most linked to an outbreak at Port Moresby hospital.

ROBERT FORSTER

NORTHUMBRIA, UK - It does no good to pretend that late 19th and early 20th century Papua New Guinea with its stone based technology and scattered and perpetually warring tribes could have lain forever undisturbed by the relentless impetus of the world.

Any discussion of Australia’s presence in PNG should not begin with whether it had any right to be there, but with what might have happened if a potentially harsher Japanese or Indonesian administration had taken over the country before it became independent.

GREGORY BABLIS

Inspired by the leadership and politics of Sir John Guise as revealed in the recently released ‘Palace Letters’

Oh Diprose
For a businessman
You were too verbose
Speaking out of line
When it was not your place
Brought back in line
By a bigman of our times.

Lindsay F Bond featuring an Oro style hairdo

MICHAEL DOM

My moral compass swings
On the freed finger tips
Of the monster I hide

The smiling fiend who haunts my dreams
Whose cold silhouette passes me
By the doorway in the mirror

It swings there just at arm’s length
One step away from horror
One move and I embrace it

I cannot subvert
This weird reflection
To love or hate it

Like a shadow that I cannot outrun
The compass on my own extended arm

Eaglewood collectors. They do not know the true value of this highly sought after wood and are ripped off by unscrupulous traders

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - In 2012 I was trekking through the hills north of Amau in the Central Province carrying out a social mapping study.

I overnighted in several small villages and hamlets staying in local houses and enjoying the hospitality of the owners. Sitting around a fire in the evening is a great way to collect social mapping data.

A popular topic of conversation at the time was garahu or eaglewood. This was something completely new to me and I pricked up my ears.

MICHAEL DOM

Strangers teach you to sing songs and march to a drum that they own
To reject your garamut, your kundu and the stilled speech of wood
Their soporific chorus dulls your mind and cheats your Black soul.
--- Sijo on loss of culture (O Arise, 2015)

LAE - It is recognized that most indigenous, non-literate societies maintained a very strong oral tradition as a means of passing on knowledge and information, albeit much of it wreathed in mysticism, of myths and legends, but also as part of a natural creativity and entertainment.

These “hand-made stories” were sufficient for the needs of the time and became part of the foundations of our cultural expression, olsem tumbuna pasin.

Eddie Tanago says the new ICAC law will bring the anti-corruption commission under the control of politicians

EDDIE TANAGO
| Act Now!

PORT MORESBY – Papua New Guinea’s proposed Independent Commission Against Corruption will not be free from possible political interference under the terms of the draft bill to be debated in the next session of parliament.

The prime minister will chair and the leader of the opposition will be a member of the committee that appoints both ICAC commissioners and the members of the oversight committee that will constantly review the operations, functions and powers of the ICAC.

Prince Charles speaks at PNG's independence day. Sir John Guise (left) and Sir John Kerr (centre) themselves had an interesting private talk the night before

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - There’s an interesting conversation currently taking place in the Australian media following the release of letters exchanged between Queen Elizabeth II and Sir John Kerr, the former Australian governor general who dismissed the Whitlam government in 1975.

The release of the 211 ‘palace letters’ from the Australian Archives follows a protracted effort by historian Jenny Hocking who wanted to know what role the queen might have played in the dismissal of an Australian prime minister.

The Australian colonial Administration's basic position was that PNG people should be brought under the rule of law as humanely and non-violently as possible

CHRIS OVERLAND

ADELAIDE - Phil Fitzpatrick is right to equate racism with economic oppression, as they clearly go hand in hand.

You do not need to be a Marxist to understand that neo-liberal capitalism relies upon the ability to exploit labour in order to flourish.

The basic theory underpinning capitalism as outlined by Adam Smith is that if each person is free to pursue his or her own economic best interests so the total economy must inevitably grow.

GRANT WALTON & HUSNIA HUSHANG
| DevPolicy Blog | Edited

CANBERRA - When it comes to fighting corruption in Papua New Guinea, it seems the more things change the more they stay the same.

In 2019, when James Marape took over as the nation’s leader from Peter O’Neill, he promised to prioritise the fight against corruption.

WARDLEY BARRY

I could almost taste her
melanin,
a powerful blackness oozing
from her neck
and the back
of her ear.
Her lips moved
to emancipate a folktale;
each word carefully chosen,
hastily spoken
between spasms of fear
and anticipation.

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - As an old white man who has worked with and enjoyed long standing friendships with people of colour I’ve been following the development of the Black Lives Matter phenomenon for a while now and wondering what has brought it to what appears to be a crucial point in history.

It cannot be avoided acknowledging that the issue of race is incredibly complicated. Or at least appears to be so.

GREGORY BABLIS

PORT MORESBY - In 1995 when Bernard Narokobi was Papua New Guinea’s minister for agriculture, he, Bart Philemon and Jerry Nalau voted against prime minister Julius Chan’s proposed bill for an organic law on provincial and local level governments.

Given the ongoing conflict in Bougainville in its violent bid for secession, the three ministers feared the bill’s proposed centralisation of power pulling it away from local level government gave more motivation for other regions in PNG to push for autonomy.

Following the vote, prime minister Chan sacked all three ministers from his cabinet.

JUSTIN KUNDALIN

PORT MORESBY - The whole nation has been shocked by the death of Jennelyn Kennedy.

It’s not so much her death that shook the nation but how she died.

This 19 year old with two children had been killed by her husband Bosip Kaiwi, literally tortured and skinned alive and dying a cruel death that no person who heard her story will ever forget.

Gregory Bablis

GREGORY BABLIS

You asked me why, why don’t I leave you?
But in the same breath, you walked over and locked the door
My head spun, as blow after blow
You performed me a special number
My own tune that night after night I fell asleep to.

Neim blo yu em bikpla lo PNG
You told me you had many other names too
Elvis Presley, Mr Universe, Mr PNG
Mr Money Bags, Fast and Furious
The ‘Dark Prince’ himself
Bruce Lee.

Paul Kurai (left) with Daniel Ezikiel at Loniu Evagelical Church in Manus. Daniel served in Enga in the 1970s as a teacher and Paul presented him with K5,000 as a sign of his gratitude

DANIEL KUMBON

WABAG - Paul Kiap Kurai was only 24 when in 1982 he nominated to contest the Wabag Open seat against Sir Tei Abal, a distinguished leader and one of Papua New Guinea’s founding fathers.

He knew he was no match for the experience and status of Sir Tei, who had served four consecutive terms in parliament.

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - Did you know that Donald Trump was created in a top-secret biotech laboratory by the enemies of the USA with the goal of wreaking havoc on the nation?

Theorist Harland Dorrinson has conclusive evidence gleaned through an exhaustive search of secret government documents and is 100% certain that Trump was grown in a recombinant-DNA laboratory.

"Young came to have more profound impact on the Wopkaimin than any previous colonial administrative or army patrol. He made ethnographic observations but more importantly recorded that the streams seemed to contain copper deposits"

COL YOUNG

EX KIAP WEBSITE - I have often meant to write of my 24 day patrol to the Star Mountains (Wopkaimin) in August and September of 1966 and the finding of copper sulphate presence in that remote north western corner of the then Western District.

There has been some confusion as to who first discovered evidence of copper leading to the Ok Tedi venture, hence this article.

Moru in Finschhafen 1884–1885. Sketch by Otto Finsch

ISO YAWI

A SILHOUETTE passed quickly through the tree line beyond the fence at the back of Yamang’s compound.

He could see it clearly. It looked like a woman looking for something, maybe lost children, or a lost animal.

Slowly nature’s clock turned.

CHRIS OVERLAND

ADELAIDE - As regular readers will know, our esteemed guide and editor has until very recently been in a world of pain, having undergone unpleasant surgery in a hopefully successful attempt to treat a debilitating back condition.

Anyone who has undergone major surgery can tell you that the easy bit is the time spent unconscious on the operating room table. What follows is almost invariably unpleasant. It is merely a question of degree really.

NICHOLAS C BROWN

VICTORIA - I had gone to Papua New Guinea in 1971 as a 25-year old seeking adventure.

I’d found life in Britain a little less exciting than I had originally hoped and wanted to do something useful.

But, in those days, I had really no idea as to what that might entail.

I was born in London and left the UK in 1972 and, determined to travel and see the world, lived and worked in Papua New Guinea, after which I took up a similar post with the Commonwealth Secretariat in the British Virgin Islands before eventually continuing my career in Australia in the early 1980’s.

STANLEY PUNDIYE

PORT MORESBY – A month ago, on Wednesday 17 June, the Papua New Guinea parliament passed a mining amendment bill suppressing the participation of landowners in the development of PNG mineral resources projects and promoting the participation of the State.

The bill provides a legal basis for the government and foreign investors to take their cut of the pie but the position of landowners’ equity is not very clear.

Inside PNGDF joint task force Covid-19 headquarters (JTFHQ) in Port Moresby

ALEXANDER NARA

PORT MORESBY – The Covid-19 pandemic has had a serious impact on Papua New Guinea’s national security as the government heightens measures across land, air and sea borders.

There is a new focus on continuous enhancement of PNG Defence Force capabilities especially along the 720 kilometres land border.

Australian prime minister Scott Morrison came naturally to philistinism. It was easier than dealing with real world complexity and reason

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - A philistine is a person of narrow mind, populist morality, materialistic views and lack of interest in art and literature.

The term was coined by the 19th Century British poet, Matthew Arnold, adapting the word from the term ‘philister’ used by German university students to describe people who were unenlightened, uncultured and anti-intellectual.

MAIKEL DOM

Mi tasol mi buai,
Na stik daga
Na sel kambang wantaim:
Mi tasol olsem blut i kapsait

Mi sting long ai bilong yu,
Mekim tit i bilak
Na sigirapim sik tu:
Mi tasol mekim maus i sua

PHILIP FITZPATRICK

TUMBY BAY - If you were born in Papua New Guinea after 1975, especially if it was in Port Moresby or one of the other big towns, you would have grown up in an entirely different country to the one your parents knew.

Even if you were born in a village after 1975, unless it was extremely remote, the same circumstances apply.

CAROLINE EVARI

There are superheroes
Big and small
Young and old
In the real world
In the fantasy world

Not all superheroes have superpowers
Like Superman or Batman
Wonder woman or Cat woman
Although sometimes
I wish it was so

Joseph Nobetau - a large, mixed and colourful field of candidates are offering themselves for election as president of Bougainville -

JOSEPH NOBETAU

BUKA - With 25 candidates set to contest the upcoming election for president of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, the opportunity for renewed leadership in the fledgling autonomous region is greater than ever before.

Coming off the internationally applauded independence referendum at the end of last year, Bougainville is now at a crossroads.