The legacy of nuclear testing in the Pacific is unfinished business. From the 1997 disappearance of journalist Jean-Pascal Couraud to the 2025 return of the Rainbow Warrior, these stories are part of a continuous struggle for justice.

In the Pacific, the “Atomic Age” and the climate crisis are not competing issues, they are the same fight for habitability and truth. To face our future, we must first address the lingering shadows of the past.

In “French” Polynesia, there are concerns about the mysterious fate of former anti-nuclear investigative journalist Jean-Pascal Couraud, known as “JPK” (his byline),  who was editor of the now closed Les Nouvelles de Tahiti newspaper.

Early in 2015, a judge upheld prosecution against three men accused of a kidnapping that led his death in Tahiti in 1997.

More than a decade earlier, JK’s family lodged an allegation of murder with the police following claims that he had been assassinated by a (now disbanded) local presidential militia. An investigating commission had alleged that three men, Rere Puputauki, Tino Mara and Tutu Manate, had abducted JK and dumped his body at sea.

• READ MORE: Other Eyes of Fire reports
• The Rainbow Warrior bombing 40 years on: re-energising for global peace
• Eyes of Fire website (Little Island Press)

Twenty two years later, the family are still waiting for justice, and fed up with France’s “investigation”. When the Rainbow Warrior bombing on 10 July 1985 is set against its broader political context in the Pacific, it can be seen that this event was much more than the dramatic, isolated episode against the Greenpeace flagship as portrayed by most New Zealand media.

An “Eyes of Fire” video project in 2015, which included more than 40 student journalists, also demonstrated the importance of a continuing interpretation of these events for the future of Aotearoa New Zealand and its citizens. The students looked back at the past, but were asking questions relevant to the present and future when they interrogated me and my Greenpeace colleagues involved in the Rongelap voyage.

My own baptism in French nuclear arrogance and perfidy was thanks to the late Swedish activist, researcher, and writer Bengt Danielsson, who was awarded the 1991 Right Livelihood Award for “exposing the tragic results… of French colonialism”. He and his wife Marie-Thérèse Danielsson wrote the classic and chilling books Moruroa, Mon Amour and Poisoned Reign.

In 2021, a French investigation team published a book and website that introduced new revelations about the nuclear testing programme and its health and environmental harm inflicted on Tahitians. The book, Toxique: Enquête sur les essais nucléaires français en Polynésie, by Sébastien Philippe and Tomas Statius, and the associated website Moruroa Files, were a forensic analysis of about 2,000 French government documents declassified in 2013.

Consistently lied about the tests
According to former Auckland University of Technology scholar Ena Manuireva, who was born in Mangareva (an atoll near the French nuclear testing sites of Moruroa and Fangataufa), these publications confirmed what Tahitian people already knew: “That since 1966, the French government has consistently lied about and concealed the deadly consequences of their nuclear tests, which they now seem to acknowledge, to the health of the populations and their environment.”

Following the third test after French nuclear bombs began in the Pacific, on 7 September 1966, local Tahitian lawmaker John Teariki challenged then French president Charles de Gaulle by saying: “No government has ever had the honesty or the cynical frankness to admit that its nuclear tests might be dangerous. No government has ever hesitated to make other peoples — preferably small, defenseless ones — bear the burden.”

“May you, Mr President, take back your troops, your bombs, and your planes.”

De Gaulle ignored the advice. And it took another 30 years and 190 further tests before France stopped its ruthless nuclear pollution in the Pacific.

France’s Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) was reported in early 2025 to have spent 90,000 euros in a big public relations campaign in a vain attempt to discredit the research in Toxique and the Moruroa Files, according to documents obtained by the investigative outlet Disclose.

The CEA published 5000 copies of its booklet, titled ‘Nuclear tests in French Polynesia: why, how and with what consequences’ and distributed them across Oceania.

The Rainbow Warrior bombing, with the death of photographer Fernando Pereira, was a terrible tragedy. But a greater tragedy remains in the horrendous legacy of Pacific nuclear testing for the people of Rongelap, the Marshall Islands and “French” Polynesia; associated military oppression in Kanaky New Caledonia; and lingering secrecy.

New Zealand and the PIF states should now require full investigation of nuclear testing in French Polynesia and seek a more robust compensation programme than currently exists. New Zealand and the PIF states also need to take a less ambiguous position on decolonisation in the Pacific, give greater priority to that issue and seek a “re-energising” of the activities of the UN Special Committee on Decolonisation.

This is especially important in relation to “French” Polynesia, Kanaky New Caledonia and the end of the Bougainville transitional political autonomy period with a unilateral declaration of independence slated for 1 September 2027.

Decolonisation is also a critical issue that has a bearing on New Zealand’s relations with Indonesia, particularly over the six Melanesian provinces that make up the region known in the Pacific as “West Papua” and Indonesia’s growing politically motivated role in the region over climate change aid.

A massive new transmigration programme under current President Prabowo Subianto is taking place at the same time as Jakarta’s “ecocidal” deforestation regime intensifies in the Melanesian region with the destruction of millions of hectares of tropical rainforest.

“The wealth of West Papua — gas from Bintuni Bay, copper and gold from the Grasberg mine. Palm oil from Merauke — has been sucked out of our land for six decades, while our people are replaced with Javanese settlers loyal to Jakarta,” says a West Papuan leader, Benny Wenda.

Taking the lead
It is critically important that New Zealand and the PIF states take a lead from the Melanesian Spearhead Group — at least those states other than Fiji and Papua New Guinea, which have both been co-opted by Indonesian bribery through economic aid.

They should take a more pro-active stance on West Papuan human rights and socio-political development, with a view to encouraging a process of political self-determination and a new, more credible United Nations supervised vote replacing the 1968 “Act of No Choice”.

With regard to climate change issues, it is essential to address the lack of an officially recognised category for “climate refugee” under international law. It is also important to seek an international framework, convention, protocol and specific guidelines that can provide protection and assistance for people crossing international borders because of climate change.

The existing rights guaranteed refugees — specifically the right to international humanitarian assistance and the right of return — must be extended to “climate refugees” or climate migrants.

This issue should be acted on systematically and with a practical vision by the PIF with the Australian and New Zealand governments. Australia and New Zealand need to respond to Pacific Island States’ (PIS) concerns over climate change and global warming with a greater sense of urgency and resolve.

Regional and country specific climate change plans and policies are needed to deal with large numbers of Pacific refugees or climate-forced migrants, in the event of worsening climate-change scenarios in the future.

This is especially important for New Zealand, as a country with a significant Pacific population (442,632 — 8.9 percent, 2023 NZ Census) with island communities well integrated into the national infrastructure and as a country that is well placed to welcome more Pacific Islanders.

In April 2025, the New Zealand government announced plans to double defence spending as a share of GDP over the next eight years under its long-awaited Defence Capability Plan.

Trump-inspired global arms race
However, the priority appeared to be New Zealand joining a new Donald Trump-inspired global arms race while the country faced no threat, at the expense of the climate crisis, nuclear free and Pacific peace-making capacity that have forged the country’s global reputation.

Speculation was also rife about the possibility of New Zealand joining a second tier of the controversial AUKUS security pact between Australia, the UK and the US, which would raise geopolitical tensions with little benefit for the Pacific region.

As Marshall Islands Journal editor Giff Johnson has remarked, the people of Rongelap changed the course of history for Pacific nuclear justice by taking control of their destiny with the help of Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior.

However, the relocation of the islanders four decades ago has revealed that the legacy of nuclear tests remains unfinished business.

“In the current global turbulence, New Zealand needs to reemphasise the principles and values which drove its nuclear-free legislation and its advocacy for a nuclear-free South Pacific and global nuclear disarmament,” says former New Zealand prime minister Helen Clark.

“New Zealanders were clear — we did not want to be defended by nuclear weapons. We wanted our country to be a force for diplomacy and for dialogue, not for warmongering.”

“On the fateful last voyage,” reflects Greenpeace Aotearoa executive director Dr Russel Norman, “the crew of the Rainbow Warrior, look at us in black and white through the lens of time, and lay down the wero — the challenge. They faced down a nuclear threat to the habitability of the Pacific.

“Do we have the courage and wits to face down the biodiversity and climate crises facing humanity, crises that threaten the habitability of planet Earth?’

To Ngāti Kura kaumatua Dover Samuels, the Rainbow Warrior was “probably the biggest battleship that ever traversed the oceans of the world. But she wasn’t armed with guns, she was armed with peace”.

An edited extract from the final chapter of New Zealand journalist Dr David Robie’s recent book Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage and Legacy of the Rainbow Warrior marking the 40th anniversary of the bombing. He sailed with the Greenpeace crew to Rongelap Atoll for the evacuation of the nuclear health-damaged community and remained on board for 11 weeks. This article was first published by Greenpeace Aotearoa.

• David is speaking about the Rainbow Warrior and nuclear justice tomorrow, 24 March 2026, at Grey Lynn Library, 6-8pm, as part of EcoFest.

It is well known that the people of Bougainville want independence. In the 2019 referendum, 98.3 percent of them voted for it.

And in 2025, Ishmael Toroama, a strong advocate of independence, was re-elected to the position of President of the Autonomous Region of Bougainville, further confirmation of the widespread support for independence among the people of Bougainville.

But what do the people of PNG think about Bougainville independence? Much less is known about this. As a start, we included a question about Bougainville independence in the 2025 annual survey of University of Papua New Guinea (UPNG) students.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville independence reports

When asking the question, we reminded the students we surveyed of the strong support in Bougainville for independence, and told them that, as mentioned above, “in a recent referendum, an overwhelming majority (98.31 percent) of voters in Bougainville chose to have full independence from PNG over greater autonomy.”

We then asked the students to consider this outcome when selecting from one of four options that we presented to them.

They could say that Bougainville should be granted full independence, that it should remain in PNG with greater autonomy, that they oppose any changes in Bougainville’s current status, or that they were unsure.

Only 27 percent of the 389 School of Business and Public Policy students who took the survey supported full independence. The majority, 59 percent said that Bougainville should remain part of PNG but with greater autonomy. Of the balance, 11 percent said they were unsure and 3 percent said that they supported no change in the current status.

Opposition to independence was widespread across all four regions of PNG, but was slightly stronger among students from the Momase and Highlands regions, and lower among students from the Islands and Southern regions.

However, these differences are not statistically significant. Even in the Islands region, which might be expected to be more sympathetic to Bougainville independence, a majority of students were in fact opposed.

The most supportive was the Southern region, but even there 51 percent of students were opposed to independence.

Female students were slightly more supportive of independence (25 percent male vs 30 percent female). Male students were more likely to support greater autonomy (62 percent vs 52 percent) and women were more likely to be unsure (15 percent vs 9 percent). Again these differences were not statistically significant.

In summary, this survey of some almost 400 UPNG students found widespread opposition to Bougainville independence. We want to stress that we are not endorsing these views, nor criticising them. We are just reporting them.

The opposition we find among students is probably reflective of views more generally in PNG, at least among the elite, and might help explain why PNG’s political leaders are dragging their feet on the issue if not “fundamentally opposed” to independence.

Few, such as the former prime minister Peter O’Neill, have come out openly to express their opposition to independence. But few, such as the late Morobe Premier Luther Wenge, have been openly supportive either.

There seems to be a general reluctance among PNG’s political leadership to respond to the 2019 referendum result, much to the frustration of Bougainville’s political leadership.

On the one hand, it seems that no-one wants a confrontation. On the other, PNG’s political leadership, like UPNG’s student body, doesn’t seem to find the 2019 referendum result a convincing reason to support the cause of Bougainville independence.

If our survey is anything to go by, the PNG elite is willing to compromise (to allow Bougainville greater autonomy) but not to support its break away from the nation.

If Bougainville wants independence, it will have to do more to win hearts and minds in the rest of PNG. Our survey shows that it is not enough to simply reiterate the overwhelming support that independence has within Bougainville.

The students were explicitly reminded of this and still only one-quarter supported independence. If Bougainville is to succeed in its independence aspirations, it will need to do more to convince PNG’s elite, or at least its future elite, why it should be allowed to break away.

Anna Kapil is a Lecturer at the University of Papua New Guinea. She completed a Master of International and Development Economics at the Australian National University. Anna was a Greg Taylor Scholar at the Development Policy Centre.

Dr Stephen Howes is director of the Development Policy Centre and professor of economics at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University.

For other findings from the 2025 survey, see this article series and the 2025 PNG Update presentation. The results of the first survey, conducted in 2024, are reported here. Statistical significance was judged using the Chi-square test. Republished from the DevPolicy blog under Creative Commons.

When the Pacific Islands Forum concluded in Honiara last month, leaders pledged regional unity under the motto “Iumi Tugeda” — “We are Together”.

Eighteen Pacific heads of government reached agreements on climate resilience and nuclear-free oceans.

They signed the Pacific Resilience Facility treaty and endorsed Australia’s proposal to jointly host the 2026 COP31 climate summit.

• READ MORE: ULMWP alleges 15 civilians killed in West Papua military operation
• Other West Papua reports

However, the region’s most urgent crisis was once again given only formulaic attention. West Papua, where Indonesian military operations continue to displace and replace tens of thousands of Papuans, was given just one predictable paragraph in the final communiqué.

This reaffirmed Indonesia’s sovereignty, recalled an invitation made six years ago for the UN High Commissioner to visit, and vaguely mentioned a possible leaders’ mission in 2026.

For the Papuan people, who have been waiting for more than half a century to exercise their right to self-determination, this represented no progress. It confirmed a decades-long pattern of acknowledging Jakarta’s tight grip, expressing polite concern and postponing action.

A stolen independence
The crisis in West Papua stems from its unique place in Pacific history. In 1961, the West Papuans established the New Guinea Council, adopted a national anthem and raised the Morning Star flag — years before Samoa gained independence in 1962 and Fiji in 1970.

Papuan delegates had also helped to launch the South Pacific Conference in 1950, which would become the Pacific Islands Forum.

However, this path was abruptly reversed. Under pressure from Cold War currents, the Netherlands transferred administration to Indonesia.

The promised plebiscite was replaced by the 1969 Act of Free Choice, in which 1026 hand-picked Papuans were forced to vote for integration under military coercion.

Despite protests, the UN endorsed the result. West Papua was the first Pacific nation to have its recognised independence reversed during decolonisation.

Systematic blockade
Since the early 1990s, UN officials have been seeking access to West Papua. However, the Indonesians have imposed a complete block on any international institutions and news media entering.

Between 2012 and 2022, multiple UN high commissioners and special rapporteurs requested visits. All were denied.

More than 100 UN member states have publicly supported these requests. It has never occurred. Regional organisations ranging from the Pacific Islands Forum to the Organisation of African, Caribbean and Pacific States have made identical demands. Jakarta ignores them all.

International media outlets face the same barriers. Despite former Indonesian President Joko Widodo’s 2015 declaration that foreign journalists could enter Papua freely, visa restrictions and surveillance have kept the province as among the world’s least reported conflicts.

During the protests in 2019, Indonesia shut down internet access across the territory.
Indonesia calculates that it can ignore international opinion because key partners treat West Papua as a low priority.

Australia and New Zealand balance occasional concern with deeper trade ties. The US and China prioritise strategic interests.

Even during his recent visit to Papua New Guinea, UN Secretary-General António Guterres made no mention of West Papua, despite the conflict lying just across the border.

Bougainville vs West Papua
The Pacific’s inaction is particularly striking when compared to Bougainville. Like West Papua, Bougainville endured a brutal conflict.

Unlike West Papua, however, Bougainville received genuine international support for self-determination. Under UN oversight, Bougainville’s 2019 referendum allowed free voting, with 98 per cent choosing independence.

Today, Bougainville and Papua New Guinea are negotiating a peaceful transition to sovereignty.

West Papua has been denied even this initial step. There is no credible mediation. There is no international accompaniment. There is no timetable for a political solution.

The price of hypocrisy
Pacific leaders are confronted with a fundamental contradiction. They demand bold global action on climate justice, yet turn a blind eye to political injustice on their doorstep.

The ban on raising the Morning Star flag in Honiara, reportedly under pressure from Indonesia, has highlighted this hypocrisy.

The flag symbolises the right of West Papuans to exist as a nation. Prohibiting it at a meeting celebrating regional solidarity revealed the extent of external influence in Pacific decision-making.

This selective solidarity comes at a high cost. It undermines the Pacific’s credibility as a global conscience on climate change and decolonisation.

It leaves Papuans trapped in what they describe as a “slow-motion genocide”. Between 2018 and 2022, an estimated 60,000 to 100,000 people were displaced by Indonesian military operations.

In 2024, Human Rights Watch reported that violence had reached levels unseen in decades.

Breaking the pattern
The Forum could end this cycle by taking practical steps. For example, it could set a deadline of 12 months for an Indonesia-UN agreement on unrestricted access to West Papua.

If no agreement is reached, the Forum could conduct its own investigation with the Melanesian Spearhead Group. It could also make regional programmes contingent on human rights benchmarks, including ensuring humanitarian access and ending internet shutdowns.

Such measures would not breach the Forum’s charter. They would align Pacific diplomacy with the proclaimed values of dignity and solidarity. They would demonstrate that regional unity extends beyond mere rhetoric.

The test of history
The people of West Papua were among the first in Oceania to resist colonial expansion and to form a modern government. They were also the first to experience the reversal of recognised sovereignty.

Until Pacific leaders find the courage to confront Indonesian obstruction and insist on genuine West Papuan self-determination, “Iumi Tugeda” will remain a beautiful slogan shadowed by betrayal.

The region’s moral authority does not depend on eloquence regarding the climate fund, but on whether it confronts its deepest wound.

Any claim to a unified Blue Pacific identity will remain incomplete until the issue of West Papua’s denied independence is finally addressed.

Ali Mirin is a West Papuan academic and writer from the Kimyal tribe of the highlands bordering the Star Mountain region of Papua New Guinea. He holds a Master of Arts in international relations from Flinders University – Australia.

Bougainville’s re-elected President Ishmael Toroama has announced a caretaker government following a formal swearing-in ceremony on Monday in the capital Buka.

The former Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) commander won more than 90,000 votes in a landslide victory after the election on September 5-6.

The interim Bougainville Executive Council (BEC) will consist of the President, the Vice President Ezekiel Masatt and the Member of Parliament for Atolls Amanda Masono.

• READ MORE: ‘We want legitimate leaders’: Bougainvilleans head to the polls amid push for independence

In his address, Toroama said the occasion marked an important step in Bougainville’s democratic process, signifying a time of transition, continuity and renewed commitment, according to a statement on the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) Facebook page.

“During this caretaker period, our priority is to safeguard good governance and maintain the trust and confidence of our people,” Toroama said.

The interim BEC will oversee government operations until the full Cabinet of the Bougainville Executive Council is formed.

The president will choose four cabinet ministers, while the remaining 10 will be selected by regional committees.

Assigning portfolios
However, Toroama will assign portfolios to each of them.

This will take place after the swearing-in of the 5th Bougainville House of Representatives on Friday, October 10.

Toroama added that Bougainvilleans had expressed concern over the conduct of some losing candidates, saying their actions undermine Bougainville’s democratic values.

“It is disappointing that several have chosen to express their dissatisfaction in premature and disorderly ways. Such conduct mocks the democratic values enshrined in the Bougainville Constitution and insults the people of Bougainville, who have spoken with unity and purpose through the ballot box,” he said.

“The people have made their choice, they have elected leaders whom they trust to guide Bougainville through the next phase of our political journey, particularly toward our aspiration for independence.

“Leadership is not about personal ambition. It is about service, humility, and accountability to the people who have placed their faith in us.”

He also called on elected representatives to unite as Bougainville enters a new political chapter.

‘Set aside differences’
“Let us set aside personal differences and work together for the greater good of Bougainville. Our people deserve leadership that is mature, united, and focused on building a future that is peaceful, prosperous, and independent.

“The strength of our democracy lies not in how we win elections, but in how we respect their outcomes and continue to serve our people with humility and purpose,” he wrote.

Meanwhile, the Office of the Bougainville Electoral Commission (OBEC) returned the writs for 45 seats on Monday.

Electoral commissioner Desmond Tsianai handed them to the outgoing Speaker Simon Pentanu, marking the end of the electoral process.

The writs included the presidency, 38-single-member constituencies and six reserved regional seats for women and former combatants.

Tsianai said the democratic spirit of the people of Bougainville was a testament to their unity and resilience.

“To every voter who stood in line with patience, dignity, and determination, we say thank you. You have proven once again that the heart of Bougainville beats strong with a belief in peaceful democratic choice and representation,” said.

More women candidates
“We recorded a total of 408 candidates, including a growing and welcome number of women candidates. Some 21 women contested constituency seats, up from 14 in 2020.”

The presidential race featured seven candidates, reflecting a vibrant and competitive democratic environment, he said.

He said the final electoral role included 238,625 registered voters, the most inclusive and comprehensive roll in the history of the autonomous region.

Notably, he added, 14.3 percent of enrolled voters were aged 18 to 24, a significant increase from 8.9 percent in 2020.

“This shows that our youth are claiming their place in shaping Bougainville’s future. Our systems of verification, oversight, and accountability were tested and they held firm.”

Officials will now begin their post-election review, listening to lessons from this election, to improve the next.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Bougainvilleans went to the polls today, keen to elect a leader who will continue their fight for independence.

“There’s a mood of excitement among the people here,” said Electoral Commissioner Desmond Tsianai.

“It is important that this election is successful and credible, because we want legitimate leaders in the government, who will continue discussions with Papua New Guinea over independence,” he said.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville election reports

Tsianai said there were more than 239,000 registered voters in the autonomous PNG region and he expects a better turnout than the 67 percent during the 2020 election.

“We anticipate voter turnout will increase due to the importance of this election in the political aspirations of Bougainville.”

Tsianai said his office had been proactive, encouraging voters to enrol and reaching out through schools to first-time voters aged 18 and over.

He is adamant Bougainville could achieve a one-day poll, despite the election being rescheduled at the last minute.

Polling pushed back
Polling was scheduled to begin on Thursday but was pushed back a day to allow time to dispatch ballot papers.

In addition, he said, there were some quality control issues concerning serial numbers.

“These are an important safeguard against fraud. We, therefore, took measures to ensure that these issues were rectified, so that electoral integrity was assured.”

The final shipment of ballot papers, which was scheduled for delivery on August 23, finally arrived on September 2, he said.

This did not allow enough time for packing and distribution to enable polling to take place on Thursday.

“The printing of the ballot papers and the delay afterwards was out of our hands, however we’ve taken the necessary steps to ensure the integrity of the process.

The polling period for the elections was from September 2-8, and the office had discretion to select any date within that period based on election planning, he said.

“Rescheduling allowed sufficient time to resolve ballot delivery delays and to ensure that polling teams are ready to serve voters.”

Preventing risk
He said that the rescheduling was done in the interest of voters, candidates and stakeholders, to prevent any risk of disenfranchisement.

“We remain fully committed to delivering a credible election and will continue to provide regular updates to maintain transparency and confidence in the electoral process,” he said.

“We have taken the necessary steps and anticipated that some wards within constituencies have a larger voting population so extra teams had been allocated to those wards so polling can be conducted in a day.”

The dominant issue going into the election remained the quest for independence.

In 2020, there were strong expectations that the autonomous region would soon achieve that, given the result of an historic referendum.

A 97.7 percent majority voted for independence in a referendum which began in November 2019.

However, that has not happened yet, and Port Moresby has yet to concede much ground.

Toroama not pressured
Bougainville’s 544 polling stations will open from 8am to 4pm local time (9am-5pm NZT) in what is the first time the Autonomous Bougainville Government has planned a single day poll.

Some 404 candidates are contesting for 46 seats in the Bougainville Parliament, including a record 34 women.

Six men are challenging Ishmael Toroama for his job.

Toroama recently told RNZ Pacific that he was not feeling any pressure as he sought a second five-year term in office.

“I’m the kind of man that has process. They voted me for the last five years. And if the people wish to put me, the decision, the power to put people, it is democracy. They will vote for me.” he said.

Counting will take place on September 9-21, and writs will be returned to the Speaker of the House the following day.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The dominant issue going into the next election in Bougainville next week is not much different from the last election five years ago.

The autonomous Papua New Guinea region goes to the polls on September 4.

In 2020, there were strong expectations Bougainville would soon be independent, given the result of an overwhelming referendum for independence just months earlier.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville reports

That has not happened yet, and Port Moresby has yet to concede much ground.

Most recently, at Burnham in Christchurch in June, little progress was made, as Massey University academic Dr Anna Powles points out.

“Papua New Guinean Prime Minister James Marape referred to Burnham as a spiritual home of the Bougainville peace process,” she said.

“And yet, on the other hand, you have the Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama saying very clearly that independence was non-negotiable, and setting out a number of terms, including the fact that Bougainville was to become independent by the 1st of September 2027.

“If Papua New Guinea did not ratify that, Bougainville would make a unilateral declaration of independence.”

Seven candidates standing
There are seven people standing for the presidency, including long-time MP in the PNG national Parliament, Joe Lera.

He said everyone wants independence, but he wants to see a more conciliatory tone from the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG).

“Now, what the current government is doing is they are going outside the [Bougainville] Peace Agreement, and they are trying to shortcut based on the [referendum] result. But the Peace Agreement does not say independence will be given to us based on the result,” Lera said.

“What it says is, after we know the result, the two governments must continue to dialogue, consult each other and find ways of how to improve the economy, the law and order issues, the development issues.

“When we fix those, the nation-building pillars, we can then apply for the ratification to take place.”

However, Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama has no intention of deviating from the path he has been following.

“It gives us the opportunity whether the national government likes it or not,” he told RNZ Pacific this week.

“It is a national constitution guarantee of the framework of the Bougainville Peace Agreement, and that is how I’m saying to them, whether we come into consultation, we have different views.

“At least it is the constitutional guaranteed process set in by the National Constitution.”

Achieving sovereignty as soon as possible is the driving force for the man who has been leading Bougainville’s campaign, the Independence Implementation Minister Ezekiel Masatt.

He said the signing of the Melanesian Agreement at Burnham was pivotal.

“We must obtain political independence in order to have some sovereign powers, in order to make some strategic economic decisions,” he said.

“Now, given the Melanesian Agreement where Bougainville can achieve some sovereign powers I think that is a great start in the right direction.”

Masatt is standing in the Tonsu electorate in North Bougainville.

Former army officer Thomas Raivet is running for a second time. He is confident that he and his New Bougainville Party colleagues, Nick Peniai and Joe Lera, can be a formidable presence given the impact of preference votes.

“We believe that we can make a difference, because for the last five years, nothing has really happened here and and maybe five years ago, and maybe you go back 10 years, nothing has really happened for us,” Raivet said.

“I see this as an opportunity just to be part of the development of new Bougainville.”

Sam Kauona, who once led the Bougainville Revolutionary Army alongside Ishmael Toroama, is another presidential candidate.

He has run before but says this time he will win because of the Toroama governmment failure to bring independence.

“Because the government, for the last five years, did not achieve what Bougainvilleans, what we, wanted. They were concentrating on one option only. That’s why it wasted the last five years, and we did not achieve anything.”

The vote in Bougainville is being held over just one day for the first time, with results anticipated within a week.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The President of Bougainville, Ishmael Toroama, says he is not feeling the pressure as he seeks a second five-year term in office.

Bougainville goes to the polls next Thursday, September 4, with 404 candidates vying for 46 seats in the Parliament of the autonomous Papua New Guinea region.

Toroama is being challenged by six others — all men.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville election reports

He spoke with RNZ Pacific as he continues campaigning in Central Bougainville.

Don Wiseman: Last time you and I spoke before an election, you had just been ushering a rock band around Bougainville. It’s a very different situation for you this time round.

Ishmael Toroama: Yes, indeed, it’s a totally different situation. But you know, principle never changes. Principles of everything, in terms of whatever we do, remain the same. But it changes as environment changes.

DW: What are your key planks going into this election? What are the most important things that you’re telling people?

‘Political independence’
IT: It’s what my government has done in the last five years.

I am telling them, firstly, of the political independence. Political independence has been agreed by the national constitution of Papua New Guinea, amendment on part 14, which gives the people of Bougainville the right to vote for independence referendum.

As our leaders at that time, while they were negotiating with late Kabui [first Bougainville President Joseph Kabui], they told the Papua New Guinea government that if you cannot change your constitution, then we will no longer sign a peace agreement that creates that opportunity for Papua New Guinea and Bougainville.

So what I’m telling them is it has been guaranteed by the national constitution, which created the amendment of part 14, the Organic Law on Peace Building, Bougainville Peace Agreement and the Constitution of the Autonomous Bougainville Government.

In all consultation, national constitution guarantees us to even the consultation, even through the definition of independence, which most Bougainvilleans have voted for, which has been defined by the national government, saying that it is a separate state apart from the state of Papua New Guinea.

And the United Nations must also verify that, and that is the definition which national government has given to the people of Bougainville before the actual voting happened. If you closely look at all consultation, the Bougainville Peace Agreement says after the referendum vote made by the people, the two governments will consult over the result.

What I’m telling my people is that as your fifth president in the fourth House of Representatives, we have made a consultation at Kokopo, Wabag, and in Moresby we signed the Era Kone Covenant. And latest is the Melanesian Relationship Agreement [signed at Burnham, New Zealand, in June this year].

Constitutional guarantee
Having said in order that constitutional guarantee as a guarantor guarantees the people’s right to vote for independence, that is what I’m telling them.

DW: Yes but you’re not carrying Port Moresby with you on this. Are you? You guys are not very much closer to resolution of this problem than you were five years ago.

IT: Well, that is in line with the consultation process. Whatever they say to me, I see that. It has been amended of the national constitution, then it gives us the opportunity whether the national government likes it or not.

It is a national constitution guarantee or the framework of the Bougainville Peace Agreement, and that is how I’m saying to them, whether we come into consultation, we have different views.

At least it is the constitutional guaranteed process censored by the National Constitution.

DW: There are people, including some running against you in this election, who are saying that your approach through these negotiations has been too strident, that you go into these meetings making bold statements beforehand and there’s no room to move, that you’re not giving room for negotiation.

Defining result
IT: If you look at all the consultation that we have consulted. You will look at the consultation which I am saying we are consulting over the result. The Bougainville Peace Agreement says that the consultation should be over the result.

And what is the result? It is the 97.7 percent and who has defined the 97.7 percent — it is the national government of Papua New Guinea.

I understand where they’re coming from, because if you want to retain a political power, you can make all sorts of arguments trying to say that President Toroama has not left room, [made] political spaces available.

But if you closely look at what the Bougainville Peace Agreement says, we are consulting over the result, whether these presidents or candidates are saying that I haven’t made a room.

You just look at every space that we have gone into. And a consultation, as per the Bougainville Peace Agreement, is over the result.

What is the result? It is the independence which people voted — 97.7 percent. We cannot deny the people’s power moving into the referendum saying that we want to govern ourselves. So yes, people’s power.

DW: Except you’re overlooking that that referendum is a non-binding referendum?

Where is it non-binding?
IT: Can you specifically say to me, can you give me a clause within the Bougainville Peace Agreement that it says it is a non-binding.

I’m asking you, you will not find any non-binding clause within the framework of the Peace Agreement. It has been cultivated in there by people that want to drive us away from the exact opposition of the people.

There is no clause within the political peace agreement that says non-binding. There is no clause.

DW: We’re here now, just a week out from the election. How will you go?

IT: I’m the kind of man that has process. They voted me for the last five years. And if the people wish to put me [back], the decision, the power to put people, it is democracy. They will vote for me.

If not, they can choose another president. I don’t get too much pressure, but because it has been described within the constitution of the autonomous government that a president can serve two terms, so that’s why I am running.

But I’m not in a pressure mood. I am all right.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Elizabeth Tako Palin is one of five women contesting the Bougainville North women’s reserved seat next month.

It was previously held by Amanda Masono, who has chosen to contest the open Atolls seat, which was once held by her father.

The autonomous Papua New Guinea region is holding a single-day poll on 4 September to elect a new 46-member House.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville election reports

A record 34 women are standing, including 14 in the three seats reserved for women.

Former teacher Palin ran in 2020 and has wide political experience at the local level.

She spoke with RNZ Pacific.

(This transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.)

Elizabeth Palin: I was a former chair lady in the local level government, community government, and I just resigned to contest the seat. I served in the community government and at the ward assembly system for 10 years. But prior to that I was a teacher by profession,

Don Wiseman: Being in the local level government. Is that a full time activity, is it for you?

EP: It is, yes.

DW: What does it involve?

EP: It involves chairing the local level government at the community base level, and also taking care of the five wards within the respective community government that I’m heading.

And, formally, in the first establishment of the first House of Assembly, I was the vice-chair lady. So as one of the ward members in the five wards under the urban council, urban community government. I contested the fourth House and I came second. I came back to be with the community, and then I worked with the people.

I went contested [a second election] and I became the ward member and also lobbied for the chair position, and I became the chairperson.

DW: So you want to be in the ABG [Autonomous Bougainville Government]. What is it you want to achieve there?

EP: Being in the local level government, I have experienced a lot where we do not see the link. We do not really see that link from the top level of leadership down to the local level. We do not really feel it in some sense.

Therefore, I decided that maybe I can be able to contest and get that leadership, and in experiencing my leadership at the ward level and community government level, I believe that I can be able to take that leadership and build that link from the top down to the ward assembly level, which includes the community government and vice versa, from the community government up to the top.

This is what I experienced, and that is the main reason why I am contesting the seat. Also, I believe in my leadership because I have been with the local level government, and I believe I can perform at a much higher level as well.

DW: Yes, well, you will have been campaigning now for weeks, because it’s such a long period of campaigning, isn’t it? How are people reacting to you?

EP: Oh, I have been receiving positive responses from the people, from the voters, in terms of the way I present my campaign strategy, my platform, especially.

I have so far received very positive response from the general public and the voters in the region, and from all the locations that I have conducted my campaign.

DW: Yes, I wouldn’t expect a politician to say anything else going into an election. Independence for Bougainville is, it would seem, very close. How important is it to you that it’s sorted sooner rather than later?

EP: Being a leader, a woman leader in having gone through my people’s experience in terms of fighting for their rights and for their independence, this coming independence, and what we we have been standing for as our political agenda is very, very crucial to me as with the general population of Bougainville.

I cannot say no to that. I do understand a lot of work to do in terms of getting us prepared, in terms of demonstrating the indications and so forth, that we are able to get independence and we are independently ready. But based on the fights of our forefathers and our people and having lost the 20,000 lives, I stand for that.

I believe that such a person like me, a woman with a strong voice at the political scene, in the political scene and level, I can be able to work as a team with the other leaders of Bougainville to get that independence.

But having said that, it does not really mean that that is it. We are ready. As leaders, on the ground and at the different levels of governance, we need to work, and we have this how many years that have been given within the time frame for us to work in order to show that we’re able to be an independent, sovereign state, and that is what I believe in.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

A longtime Bougainville politician, Joe Lera, wants to see widespread changes in the way the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) is run.

The Papua New Guinea region, which is seeking independence from Port Moresby, is holding elections in the first week of September.

Seven candidates are running for president, including Lera.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville independence reports

He held the regional seat in the PNG national Parliament for 10 years before resigning to contest the presidency in the 2020 election.

This time around, Lera is campaigning on what he sees as faults in the approach of the Ishmael Toroama administration and told RNZ Pacific he is offering a different tack.

JOE LERA: This time, people have seen that the current government is the most corrupt. They have addressed only one side of independence, which is the political side, the other two sides, They have not done it very well.

DON WISEMAN: What do we mean by that? We can’t bandy around words like corruption. What do you mean by corruption?

JL: What they have done is huge. They are putting public funds into personal members’ accounts, like the constituency grant – 360,000 kina a year.

DW: As someone who has operated in the national parliament, you know that that is done there as well. So it’s not corrupt necessarily, is it?

JL:Well, when they go into their personal account, they use it for their own family goods, and that development, it should be development funds. The people are not seeing the tangible outcomes in the number two side, which is the development side.

All the roads are bad. The hospitals are now running out of drugs. Doctors are checking the patients, sending them to pharmaceutical shops to buy the medicine, because the hospitals have run out.

DW: These are problems that are affecting the entire country, aren’t they, and there’s a shortage of money. So how would you solve it? What would you do differently?

JL: We will try to make big changes in addressing sustainable development, in agriculture, fishing, forestry, so we can create jobs for the small people.

Instead of talking about big, billion dollar mining projects, which will take a long time, we should start with what we already have, and develop and create opportunities for the people to be engaged in nation building through sustainable development first, then we progress into the higher billion dollar projects.

Now we are going talking about mining when the people don’t have opportunity and they are getting poorer and poorer. That’s one area, the other area, to create change we will try to fix the government structure, from ABG to community governments to village assemblies, down to the chiefs.

At the moment, the policies they have have fragmented the conduit of getting the services from the top government down to to the village people.

DW: In the past, you’ve spoken out against the push for independence, suggesting I think, that Bougainville is not ready yet, and it should take its time. Where do you stand at the moment on the independence question?

JL: The independence question? We are all for it. I’m not against it, but I’m against the process. How they are going about it. I think the answer has been already given in the Bougainville Peace Agreement, which is a joint creation between the PNG and ABG government, and the process is very clear.

Now, what the current government is doing is they are going outside of the Peace Agreement, and they are trying to shortcut based on the [referendum] result.

But the Peace Agreement doe not say independence will be given to us based on the result. What it says is, after we know the result, the two governments must continue to dialogue, consult each other and find ways of how to improve the economy, the law and order issues, the development issues.

When we fix those, the nation building pillars, we can then apply for the ratification to take place.

DW: So you’re talking about something that would be quite a way further down the line than what this current government is talking about?

JL: The issue is timing. They are putting deadlines themselves, and they are trying to push the PNG government to swallow it. The PNG government is a sovereign nation already.

We should respect and honestly, in a family room situation, negotiate, talk with them, as the Peace Agreement says, and reach understanding on the timing and other related issues, but not to even take a confrontational approach, which is what they are doing now, but take a family room approach, where we sit and negotiate in the spirit of the Peace Agreement.

This transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity. Don Wiseman is a senior journalist with RNZ Pacific. This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

More than 400 candidates have put their hands up to contest the Bougainville general election in September, hoping to enter Parliament.

Incumbent President Ishmael Toroama is among the 404 people lining up to win a seat.

Bougainville is involved in the process of achieving independence from Papua New Guinea — an issue expected to dominate campaigning, which lasts until the beginning of September.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville reports

Voting is scheduled to start on September 2, finishing a week later, depending on the weather.

Seven candidates — all men — are contesting the Bougainville presidency. This number is down from when 25 people stood, including two women.

Toroama is seeking a second term and is being challenged by his former colleague in the leadership of the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA), Sam Kauona.

Kauona is one of several contesting a second time, along with Thomas Raivet and a former holder of the Bougainville Regional Seat in the PNG Parliament, Joe Lera.

There are 46 seats to be decided, including six new constituencies.

Two seats will have 21 candidates: the northern seat of Peit and the Ex-Combatants constituency.

Several other constituencies — Haku, Tsitalato, Taonita Tinputz, Taonita Teop, Rau, and Kokoda — also have high numbers of candidates.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The leaders of Bougainville and Papua New Guinea have signed a deal that may bring the autonomous region’s quest for independence closer.

Called “Melanesian Agreement”, the deal was developed earlier this month in 10 days of discussion at the New Zealand army base at Burnham, near Christchurch.

Both governments have agreed that the national Parliament in PNG has a key role in the decision over the push for independence.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville independence reports

They recognise that the Bougainville desire for independence is legitimate, as expressed in a 2019 independence referendum result, and that this is a unique situation in PNG.

That is the agreement’s attempt to overcome pressure from other parts of PNG that are also talking about autonomy.

The parties say they are committed to maintaining a close, peaceful and enduring relationship between PNG and Bougainville.

Both sides said that to bring referendum results to the national Parliament both governments would develop a sessional order, which was a the temporary adjustment of Parliament’s rules.

Bipartisan Parliamentary Committee
They said that a Bipartisan Parliamentary Committee on Bougainville, which would provide information to MPs and the general public about the Bougainville conflict and resolution, is a vital body.

The parties said they would explore the joint creation of a Melanesian framework with agreed timelines, for a pathway forwards, that may form part of the Joint Consultations Report presented to the 11th National Parliament.

Once the Bipartisan Committee completes its work, the results of the referendum and the Joint Consultation Report would be taken to the Parliament.

The parties said they would accept the decision of the national Parliament, in the first instance, regarding the referendum results, and then commit to further consultations if needed, and this would be in an agreed timeline.

In the meantime, institutional strengthening and institutional building within Bougainville would continue.

To ensure progress is made and political commitment is sustained, the monitoring of this Melanesian Agreement could include an international component, a Parliamentary component, and the Bipartisan Parliamentary Committee, all with UN support.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Reports in Papua New Guinea say the governments of Bougainville and PNG have agreed to table the 2019 independence referendum results in Parliament.

While discussions are ongoing, some degree of consensus has been reached during the talks, being held at Burnham Military Camp, just outside of Christchurch in New Zealand’s South Island.

The talks are not open to the media.

• READ MORE:  Bougainville wants independence. China’s support for a controversial mine could pave the way
• Other Bougainville reports

A massive 97.7 percent of Bougainvillians voted for independence in 2019.

Former Bougainville president John Momis told delegates in Burnham to “take the bull by the horn” and confront the independence issue without further delay.

Both governments have agreed to present three highly pivotal documents to the PNG National Parliament.

The commitment was formally conveyed by PNG’s Minister of Bougainville Affairs, Manaseh Makiba.

Only sovereignty acceptable
Meanwhile, the ABG President, Ishmael Toroama, said Bougainville would not accept a governance model that did not grant sovereignty.

This comes amid talk of other options, such as self-government in free association.

To achieve membership of the United Nations sovereignty is needed.

Writing in the Post-Courier, journalist Gorethy Kenneth said the Bougainville national leaders, for the “first time have come out in aligning with the Bougainville team in New Zealand”.

She reported that Police Minister and Bougainville regional MP Peter Tsiamalili Jr said he was in a peculiar position but he represented the 97.7 percent who voted for independence and he would go with the wishes of his people.

The ICT Minister, and South Bougainville MP Timothy Masiu also said his one vote in Parliament would be for independence as far as his people were concerned.

The PNG government has spoken previously of fears that independence for Bougainville would encourage other provinces to seek autonomy.

Provinces, such as New Ireland, have made no secret of their dissatisfaction with Port Moresby and desire to control more of their own affairs.

But the Bougainville Minister of Independence Implementation, Ezekiel Massat, said Bougainville’s status was constitutionally “ring-fenced” and could not set a precedent for other provinces.

He said “under the Bougainville Peace Agreement, independence is a compulsory option”.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Bougainville, an autonomous archipelago currently part of Papua New Guinea, is determined to become the world’s newest country.

To support this process, it’s offering foreign investors access to a long-shuttered copper and gold mine. Formerly owned by the Australian company Rio Tinto, the Panguna mine caused displacement and severe environmental damage when it operated between 1972 and 1989.

It also sparked a decade-long civil war from 1988 to 1998 that killed an estimated 10,000 to 15,000 civilians and caused enduring traumas and divisions.

• READ MORE: 28 years later: NZ to host Bougainville talks for a peaceful future
• Burnham Camp – the spiritual home of Bougainville peace process – Marape
• Other Bougainville reports

Industry players believe 5.3 million tonnes of copper and 547 tonnes of gold remain at the site. This is attracting foreign interest, including from China.

Australia views Bougainville as strategically important to its “inner security arc”. The main island is about 1500 km from Queensland’s Port Douglas.

Given this, the possibility of China’s increasing presence in Bougainville raises concerns about shifting allegiances and the potential for Beijing to exert greater influence over the region.

Australia’s tangled history in Bougainville
Bougainville is a small island group in the South Pacific with a population of about 300,000. It consists of two main islands: Buka in the north and Bougainville Island in the south.

Bougainville has a long history of unwanted interference from outsiders, including missionaries, plantation owners and colonial administrations (German, British, Japanese and Australian).

Two weeks before Papua New Guinea received its independence from Australia in 1975, Bougainvilleans sought to split away, unilaterally declaring their own independence. This declaration was ignored in both Canberra and Port Moresby, but Bougainville was given a certain degree of autonomy to remain within the new nation of PNG.

The opening of the Panguna mine in the 1970s further fractured relations between Australia and Bougainville.

Landowners opposed the environmental degradation and limited revenues they received from the mine. The influx of foreign workers from Australia, PNG and China also led to resentment. Violent resistance grew, eventually halting mining operations and expelling almost all foreigners.

Under the leadership of Francis Ona, the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) fought a long civil war to restore Bougainville to Me’ekamui, or the “Holy Land” it once was.

Australia supported the PNG government’s efforts to quell the uprising with military equipment, including weapons and helicopters.

After the war ended, Australia helped broker the Bougainville Peace Agreement led by New Zealand in 2001. Although aid programmes have since begun to heal the rift between Australia and Bougainville, many Bougainvilleans feel Canberra continues to favour PNG’s territorial integrity.

In 2019, Bougainvilleans voted overwhelmingly for independence in a referendum. Australia’s response, however, was ambiguous.

Despite a slow and frustrating ratification process, Bougainvilleans remain adamant they will become independent by 2027.

As Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama, a former BRA commander, told me in 2024:

“We are moving forward. And it’s the people’s vision: independence. I’m saying, no earlier than 2025, no later than 2027.

“My benchmark is 2026, the first of September. I will declare. No matter what happens. I will declare independence on our republican constitution.”

Major issues to overcome
Bougainville leaders see the reopening of Panguna mine as key to financing independence. Bougainville Copper Limited, the Rio Tinto subsidiary that once operated the mine, backs this assessment.

The Bougainville Autonomous Government has built its own gold refinery and hopes to create its own sovereign wealth fund to support independence. The mine would generate much-needed revenue, infrastructure and jobs for the new nation.

But reopening the mine would also require addressing the ongoing environmental and social issues it has caused. These include polluted rivers and water sources, landslides, flooding, chemical waste hazards, the loss of food security, displacement, and damage to sacred sites.

Many of these issues have been exacerbated by years of small-scale alluvial mining by Bougainvilleans themselves, eroding the main road into Panguna.

Some also worry reopening the mine could reignite conflict, as landowners are divided about the project. Mismanagement of royalties could also stoke social tensions.

Violence related to competition over alluvial mining has already been increasing at the mine.

More broadly, Bougainville is faced with widespread corruption and poor governance.

The Bougainville government cannot deal with these complex issues on its own. Nor can it finance the infrastructure and development needed to reopen the mine. This is why it’s seeking foreign investors.

Open for business
Historically, China has a strong interest in the region. According to Pacific researcher Dr Anna Powles, Chinese efforts to build relationships with Bougainville’s political elite have increased over the years.

Chinese investors have offered development packages contingent on long-term mining revenues and Bougainville’s independence. Bougainville is showing interest.

Patrick Nisira, the Minister for commerce, Trade, Industry and Economic Development, said last year the proposed Chinese infrastructure investment was “aligning perfectly with Bougainville’s nationhood aspirations”.

The government has also reportedly made overtures to the United States, offering a military base in Bougainville in return for support for reopening the mine.

Given American demand for minerals, Bougainville could very well end up in the middle of a struggle between China and the US over influence in the new nation, and thus in our region.

Which path will Bougainville and Australia take?
There is support in Bougainville for a future without large-scale mining. One minister, Geraldine Paul, has been promoting the islands’ booming cocoa industry and fisheries to support an independent Bougainville.

The new nation will also need new laws to hold the government accountable and protect the people and culture of Bougainville. As Paul told me in 2024:

“[…]the most important thing is we need to make sure that we invest in our foundation and that’s building our family and culture. Everything starts from there.”

What happens in Bougainville affects Australia and the broader security dynamics in the Indo-Pacific. With September 1, 2026, just around the corner, it is time for Australia to intensify its diplomatic and economic relationships with Bougainville to maintain regional stability.

Dr Anna-Karina Hermkens is a senior lecturer and researcher in anthropology, Macquarie University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

America’s retreat from foreign aid is being felt deeply in Pacific media, where pivotal outlets are being shuttered and journalists work unpaid.

The result is fewer investigations into dubiously motivated politicians, glimpses into conflicts otherwise unseen and a less diverse media in a region which desperately needs it.

“It is a huge disappointment … a senseless waste,” Benar News’ Australian former head of Pacific news Stefan Armbruster said after seeing his outlet go under.

• READ MORE: Political pressure, bribes, self-censorship ‘greatest threats’ to Pacific media freedom
• NZ fares well in latest RSF press freedom index as authoritarian regimes stifle Asia-Pacific media
• Fiji coup culture and political meddling in media education given airing

Benar News, In-depth Solomons and Inside PNG are three digital outlets which enjoyed US support but have been hit by President Donald Trump’s about-face on aid.

Benar closed its doors in April after an executive order disestablishing Voice of America, which the United States created during World War II to combat Nazi propaganda.

An offshoot of Radio Free Asia (RFA) focused on Southeast Asia and the Pacific, Benar kept a close eye on abuses in West Papua, massacres and gender-based violence in Papua New Guinea and more.

The Pacific arm quickly became indispensable to many, with a team of reporters and freelancers working in 15 countries on a budget under A$A million.

Coverage of decolonisation
“Our coverage of decolonisation in the Pacific received huge interest, as did our coverage of the lack of women’s representation in parliaments, human rights, media freedom, deep sea mining and more,” Armbruster said.

In-depth Solomons, a Honiara-based digital outlet, is another facing an existential threat despite a proud record of investigative and award-winning reporting.

Last week, it was honoured with a peer-nominated award from the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan for a year-long probe into former prime minister Manasseh Sogavare’s property holdings.

“We’re just holding on,” editor and co-founder Ofani Eremae said.

A US-centred think tank continues to pay the wage of one journalist, while others have not drawn a salary since January.

“It has had an impact on our operations. We used to travel out to do stories across the provinces. That has not been done since early this year,” Eremae said.

A private donor came forward after learning of the cuts with a one-off grant that was used for rent to secure the office, he said.

USAID budget axed
Its funding shortfall — like Port Moresby-based outlet Inside PNG — is linked to USAID, the world’s biggest single funder of development assistance, until Trump axed its multi-billion dollar budget.

Much of USAID’s funding was spent on humanitarian causes — such as vaccines, clean water supplies and food security — but some was also earmarked for media in developing nations, with the aim of bolstering fragile democracies.

Inside PNG used its support to build an audience of tens of thousands with incisive reports on PNG politics: not just Port Moresby, but in the regions including independence-seeking province Bougainville that has a long history of conflict.

“The current lack of funding has unfortunately had a dual impact, affecting both our dedicated staff, whom we’re currently unable to pay, and our day-to-day operations,” Inside PNG managing director Kila Wani said.

“We’ve had to let off 80 percent of staff from payroll which is a big hit because we’re not a very big team.

“Logistically, it’s become challenging to carry out our work as we normally would.”

Other media entities in the region have suffered hits, but declined to share their stories.

Funding hits damaging
The funding hits are all the more damaging given the challenges faced by the Pacific, as outlined in the Pacific Islands Media Freedom Index and RSF World Press Freedom Index.

The latest PFF report listed a string of challenges, notably weak legal protections for free speech, political interference on editorial independence, and a lack of funding underpinning high-quality media, in the region.

The burning question for these outlets — and their audiences — is do other sources of funding exist to fill the gap?

Inside PNG is refocusing energy on attracting new donors, as is In-depth Solomons, which has also turned to crowdfunding.

The Australian and New Zealand governments have also provided targeted support for the media sector across the region, including ABC International Development (ABCID), which has enjoyed a budget increase from Anthony Albanese’s government.

Inside PNG and In-depth Solomons both receive training and content-focused grants from ABCID, which helps, but this does not fund the underpinning costs for a media business or keep on the lights.

Both Eremae, who edited two major newspapers before founding the investigative outlet, and Armbruster, a long-time SBS correspondent, expressed their dismay at the US pivot away from the Pacific.

‘Huge mistake’ by US
“It’s a huge mistake on the part of the US … the world’s leading democracy. The media is one of the pillars of democracy,” Eremae said.

“It is, I believe, in the interests of the US and other democratic countries to give funding to media in countries like the Solomon Islands where we cannot survive due to lack of advertising (budgets).

As a veteran of Pacific reporting, Armbruster said he had witnessed US disinterest in the region contribute to the wider geopolitical struggle for influence.

“The US government was trying to re-establish its presence after vacating the space decades ago. It had promised to re-engage, dedicating funding largely driven by its efforts to counter China, only to now betray those expectations,” he said.

“The US government has senselessly destroyed a highly valued news service in the Pacific. An own goal.”

Ben McKay is an AAP journalist. Republished from National Indigenous Times in Australia.

In recent weeks, Bougainville has taken the initiative, boldly stating that it expects to be independent by 1 September 2027.

It also expects the PNG Parliament to quickly ratify the 2019 referendum, in which an overwhelming majority of Bougainvilleans supported independence.

In a third move, it established a Constitution Commission and included it within the region’s autonomous Parliament.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville reports

To learn more, RNZ Pacific spoke with Australian National University academic Dr Thiago Oppermann, who has spent many years in both Bougainville and PNG.

Don Wiseman: We’ve had five-and-a-half years since the Bougainville referendum, but very suddenly in the last couple of months, it would seem that Bougainville is picking up pace and trying to really make some progress with this march towards independence, as they see it.

Are they overplaying their hand?

Dr Thiago Oppermann: I do not believe that they are overplaying their hand. I think that the impression that is apparent of a sudden flurry of activity, arises partly because for the first two years after the referendum, there was a very slow pace.

One of the shortcomings of the Bougainville Peace Agreement (BPA) was that it did not set out a very clear post-referendum path. That part of the process was not as well designed as the parts leading to the referendum, and that left a great deal of uncertainty as to how to structure negotiations, how things should be conducted, and quite substantial differences in the views of the Papua New Guinean government and the ABG (Autonomous Bougainville Government), as to how the referendum result would be processed further.

For instance, how it would it need to be tabled in Parliament, what kind of vote would be required for it, would a negotiation between the parties lead to an agreement that then is presented to the Parliament, and how would that negotiation work? All these areas, they were not prescriptive in the BPA.

That led to a period of a good two years in which there was very slow process and then attempts to get some some movement. I would say that in that period, the views of the Bougainvilleans and the Papua New Guineans became quite entrenched in quite different camps, and something I think would have to give eventually.

Why the Bougainvilleans have moved towards this point now, I think that it bears pointing out that there has been a long process that has been unfolding, for more than two years now, of beginning the organic process of developing a Bougainvillean constitutional process with this constitutional development committees across the island doing a lot of work, and that has now borne fruit, is how I would describe it.

It happens at a point where the process has been unblocked by the appointment of Sir Jerry Mataparae, which I think sets a new vigour into the process. It looks now like it’s heading towards some form of outcome. And that being the case, the Bougainvilleans have made their position quite clear.

DW: Well, Bougainville, in fact, is saying it will be independent by 1st September 2027. How likely do you think that is?

TO: I think there’s a question that comes before that. When Bougainville says that they will be independent by such a date, what we need to first consider is that the process of mediation is still unfolding.

I think that the first thing to consider is, what would that independence look like, and what scope is there within the mediation for finding some compromise that still suits Papua New Guinea. I think that there’s a much greater range of outcomes than people realise within this sort of umbrella of independence, the Bougainvilleans themselves, have moved to a position of understanding independence in much more nuanced terms than previously.

You might imagine that in the aftermath of this fairly brutal and bitter civil conflict, the idea of independence at that time was quite a radical cut towards “full bruk loose” as they say.

But the reality is that for many post colonial and new states since World War Two, there are many different kinds of independence and the degree to which there remains a kind of attachment with or relationship with the so called parent colonial country is variable, I should add.

I do not want to digress too much, but this concept of the parent colonial country is something that I heard quite a lot of when I was studying the referendum itself. Many people would say that the relationship that they had to Papua New Guinea was not one of enmity or of like running away, it was more a question of there being a parent and Bougainville having now grown up to the point where the child, Bougainville, is ready to go off and set up its own house.

Many people thought of it in those terms. Now I think that in concrete terms that can be articulated in many different ways when we think about international law and the status of different sovereign nations around the world.

DW: If we can just look at some of the possibilities in terms of the way in which this independence might be interpreted. My understanding is, for Bougainville it’s vital that they have a degree of sovereignty that will allow them to join organisations like the United Nations, but they’re not necessarily looking to be fully independent of PNG.

TO: Yes, I think that there would be like a process underway in Bougainville for understanding what that would look like.

There are certainly people who would have a view that is still more firmly towards full independence. And there will be others who understand some type of free association arrangements or something that still retains a closer relationship with Papua New Guinea.

I do not think many people have illusions that Bougainville could, for instance, suddenly break loose of the very deep economic connections it has with Papua New Guinea, not only those of government funding, but the commercial connections which are very, very deep. So suddenly making that disappear is not something people believe it’s possible.

But there are many other options that are on the table. I think what Bougainville is doing by having the announcement of the Independence Day is setting for Papua New Guinea saying, like, “here is the terms of the debate that we are prepared to consider”. But within that there is still a great deal of giving and taking.

DW: Now within the parliament in PNG, I think Bougainville has felt for some time that there hasn’t been a great deal of understanding of what Bougainville has been through, or what it is Bougainville is trying to achieve. There’s a very different lineup of MPs to what they were at the turn of the century when the Bougainville Peace Agreement was finalised. So what are they thinking, the MPs from other parts of the country? Are they going to be supportive, or are they just thinking about the impact on their own patch?

TO: I am not entirely sure what the MPs think, and they are a very diverse bunch of people. The sort of concern I think that many have, certainly more senior ones, is that they do not want to be the people in charge when this large chunk of the country secedes.

I think that is something that is important, and we do not want to be patronising the Papua New Guineans, who have a great deal of national pride, and it is not an event of celebration to see what is going on.

For many, it is quite a tragic chain of events. I am not entirely sure what the bulk of MPs believes about this. We have conducted some research, which is non randomised, but it is quite large scale, probing attitudes towards Bougainvillean independence in 2022, around the time of the election.

What we found, which is quite surprising, is that while, of course, Bougainville has the highest support for independence of any place in Papua New Guinea, there are substantial numbers of people outside Bougainville that are sympathetic to Bougainvillean independence or sympathetic towards implementing the referendum.

I think that would be the wording, I would choose, quite large numbers of people. So, as well as, many people who are very much undecided on the issues. From a Papua New Guinean perspective, the views are much more subtle than you might think are the case. By comparison, if you did a survey in Madrid of how many people support Catalan independence, you would not see figures similar to the ones that we find for Papua New Guinea.

DW: Bougainville is due to go to elections later this year. The ABG has stated that it wants this matter sorted, I think, at the time that the election writs are issued sometime in June. Will it be able to do this do you think?

TO: It’s always difficult to predict anything, especially the future. That goes double in Papua New Guinea and Bougainville. I think the reality is that the nature of negotiations here and in Bougainville, there’s a great deal of personal connections and toing and froing that will be taking place.

It is very hard to fit that onto a clear timeline. I would describe that as perhaps aspirational, but it would be, it would be good. Whether this is, you know, a question of electoral politics within Bougainville, I think there would be, like, a more or less unanimous view in Bougainville that this needs to move forward as soon as possible. But I don’t know that a timeline is realistic.

The concerns that I would have about this, Don, would be not just about sort of questions of capacity and what happens in the negotiations in Bougainville, but we also need to think about what is happening in Papua New Guinea, and this goes for the entire process.

But here, in this case, PNG has its hands full with many other issues as well. There is a set of like LLG [Local Level Government] elections about to happen, so there are a great deal of things for the government to attend to. I wonder how viable it is to come up with a solution in a short time, but they are certainly capable of surprising everybody.

DW: The Prime Minister, James Marape, has said on a number of occasions that Bougainville is not economically ready or it hasn’t got the security situation under control. And my understanding is that when this was raised at the last meeting, there was quite a lot of giggling going on, because people were comparing what’s happened in Bougainville with what’s happening around the rest of the country, including in Southern Highlands, the province of Mr Marape.

TO: I think you know for me when I think about this, because I have worked with Bougainvilleans for a long time, and have worked with Papua New Guineans for a long time as well. The sense that I have is really one of quite sadness and a great missed opportunity.

Because if we wind the clock back to 1975, Bougainville declared independence, trying to pre-empt [the establishment of] Papua New Guinea. And that set in train a set of events that drastically reformed the Papua New Guinean political Constitution. Many of the sort of characteristic institutions we see now in Papua New Guinea, such as provinces, came about partly because of that.

That crisis, that first independence crisis, the first secession crisis, was resolved through deep changes to Papua New Guinea and to Bougainville, in which the country was able to grow and move forward.

What we see now, though, is this sort of view that Bougainville problems must all be solved in Bougainville, but in fact, many of the problems that are said to be Bougainville problems are Papua New Guinea problems, and that would include issues such as the economic difficulties that Bougainville finds itself in.

I mean, there are many ironies with this kind of criticism that Bougainville is not economically viable. One of them being that when Papua New Guinea became independent, it was largely dependent on Bougainville at that time. So Bougainvilleans are aware of this, and don’t really welcome that kind of idea.

But I think that more deeply there were some really important lessons I believe that could have been learned from the peace process that might have been very useful in other areas of Papua New Guinea, and because Bougainville has been kind of seen as this place apart, virtually as a foreign nation, those lessons have not, unfortunately, filtered back to Papua New Guinea in a way that might have been very helpful for everybody.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. The transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.

This week Cambodia marks the 50th anniversary of the fall of Phnom Penh to the murderous Khmer Rouge, and Vietnam celebrates the fall of Saigon to North Vietnamese forces in April 1975.

They are being commemorated very differently; after all, there’s nothing to celebrate in Cambodia. Its capital Phnom Penh was emptied, and its people had to then endure the “killing fields” and the darkest years of its modern existence under Khmer Rouge rule.

Over the border in Vietnam, however, there will be modest celebrations for their victory against US (and Australian) forces at the end of this month.

• READ MORE: Other West Papua liberation reports

Yet, this week’s news of Indonesia considering a Russian request to base aircraft at the Biak airbase in West Papua throws in stark relief a troubling question I have long asked — did Australia back the wrong war 63 years ago? These different areas — and histories — of Southeast Asia may seem disconnected, but allow me to draw some links.

Through the 1950s until the early 1960s, it was official Australian policy under the Menzies government to support The Netherlands as it prepared West Papua for independence, knowing its people were ethnically and religiously different from the rest of Indonesia.

They are a Christian Melanesian people who look east to Papua New Guinea (PNG) and the Pacific, not west to Muslim Asia. Australia at the time was administering and beginning to prepare PNG for self-rule.

The Second World War had shown the importance of West Papua (then part of Dutch New Guinea) to Australian security, as it had been a base for Japanese air raids over northern Australia.

Japanese beeline to Sorong
Early in the war, Japanese forces made a beeline to Sorong on the Bird’s Head Peninsula of West Papua for its abundance of high-quality oil. Former Australian prime minister Gough Whitlam served in a RAAF unit briefly stationed in Merauke in West Papua.

By 1962, the US wanted Indonesia to annex West Papua as a way of splitting Chinese and Russian influence in the region, as well as getting at the biggest gold deposit on earth at the Grasberg mine, something which US company Freeport continues to mine, controversially, today.

Following the so-called Bunker Agreement signed in New York in 1962, The Netherlands reluctantly agreed to relinquish West Papua to Indonesia under US pressure. Australia, too, folded in line with US interests.

That would also be the year when Australia sent its first group of 30 military advisers to Vietnam. Instead of backing West Papuan nationhood, Australia joined the US in suppressing Vietnam’s.

As a result of US arm-twisting, Australia ceded its own strategic interests in allowing Indonesia to expand eastwards into Pacific territories by swallowing West Papua. Instead, Australians trooped off to fight the unwinnable wars of Indochina.

To me, it remains one of the great what-ifs of Australian strategic history — if Australia had held the line with the Dutch against US moves, then West Papua today would be free, the East Timor invasion of 1975 was unlikely to have ever happened and Australia might not have been dragged into the Vietnam War.

Instead, as Cambodia and Vietnam mark their anniversaries this month, Australia continues to be reminded of the potential threat Indonesian-controlled West Papua has posed to Australia and the Pacific since it gave way to US interests in 1962.

Russian space agency plans
Nor is this the first time Russia has deployed assets to West Papua. Last year, Russian media reported plans under way for the Russian space agency Roscosmos to help Indonesia build a space base on Biak island.

In 2017, RAAF Tindal was scrambled just before Christmas to monitor Russian Tu95 nuclear “Bear” bombers doing their first-ever sorties in the South Pacific, flying between Australia and Papua New Guinea. I wrote not long afterwards how Australia was becoming “caught in a pincer” between Indonesian and Russian interests on Indonesia’s side and Chinese moves coming through the Pacific on the other.

All because we have abandoned the West Papuans to endure their own “slow-motion genocide” under Indonesian rule. Church groups and NGOs estimate up to 500,000 Papuans have perished under 60 years of Indonesian military rule, while Jakarta refuses to allow international media and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights to visit.

Alex Sobel, an MP in the UK Parliament, last week called on Indonesia to allow the UN High Commissioner to visit but it is exceedingly rare to hear any Australian MPs ask questions about our neighbour West Papua in the Australian Parliament.

Canberra continues to enhance security relations with Indonesia in a naive belief that the nation is our ally against an assertive China. This ignores Jakarta’s deepening relations with both Russia and China, and avoids any mention of ongoing atrocities in West Papua or the fact that jihadi groups are operating close to Australia’s border.

Indonesia’s militarisation of West Papua, jihadi infiltration and now the potential for Russia to use airbases or space bases on Biak should all be “red lines” for Australia, yet successive governments remain desperate not to criticise Indonesia.

Ignoring actual ‘hot war’
Australia’s national security establishment remains focused on grand global strategy and acquiring over-priced gear, while ignoring the only actual “hot war” in our region.

Our geography has not changed; the most important line of defence for Australia remains the islands of Melanesia to our north and the co-operation and friendship of its peoples.

Strong independence movements in West Papua, Bougainville and New Caledonia all materially affect Australian security but Canberra can always be relied on to defer to Indonesian, American and French interests in these places, rather than what is ultimately in Australian — and Pacific Islander — interests.

Australia needs to develop a defence policy centred on a “Melanesia First” strategy from Timor to Fiji, radiating outwards. Yet Australia keeps deferring to external interests, to our cost, as history continues to remind us.

Ben Bohane is a Vanuatu-based photojournalist and policy analyst who has reported across Asia and the Pacific for the past 36 years. His website is benbohane.com  This article was first published by The Sydney Morning Herald and is republished with the author’s permission.

Autonomous Bougainville Government President Ishmael Toroama has condemned the circulation of an artificial intelligence (AI)-generated video depicting a physical confrontation between him and Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape.

The clip, first shared on Facebook last week, is generated from the above picture of Toroama and Marape taken at a news conference in September 2024, where the two leaders announced the appointment of former New Zealand Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae as the independent moderator for the Bougainville peace talks.

It shows Toroama punching Marape from a sitting position as both fall down. The post has amassed almost 190,000 views on Facebook and more than 360 comments.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville independence reports

In a statement today, President Toroama said such content could have a negative impact on Bougainville’s efforts toward independence.

He said the “reckless misuse of artificial intelligence and social media platforms has the potential to damage the hard-earned trust and mutual respect” between the two nations.

“This video is not only false and malicious — it is dangerous,” the ABG leader said.

“It threatens to undermine the ongoing spirit of dialogue, peace, and cooperation that both our governments have worked tirelessly to build.”

Toroama calls for identifying of source
Toroama wants the National Information and Communications Technology Authority (NICTA) of PNG to find the source of the video.

He said that while freedom of expression was a democratic value, it was also a privilege that carried responsibilities.

He said freedom of expression should not be twisted through misinformation.

“These freedoms must be exercised with respect for the truth. Misusing AI tools to spread falsehoods not only discredits individuals but can destabilise entire communities.”

He has urged the content creators to reflect on the ethical implications of their digital actions.

Toroama also called on social media platforms and regulatory bodies to play a bigger role in stopping the spread of misleading AI-generated content.

“As we move further into the digital age, we must develop a collective moral compass to guide the use of powerful technologies like artificial intelligence,” he said.

“Truth must remain the foundation of all communication, both online and offline.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The Pacific’s peak diplomatic bodies have signalled they are ready to engage with Papua New Guinea’s Autonomous Government of Bougainville as mediation begins on the delayed ratification of its successful 2019 independence referendum.

PNG and Bougainville’s leaders met in the capital Port Moresby this week with a moderator to start negotiations on the implementation of the UN-supervised Bougainville Peace Agreement and referendum.

Ahead of the talks, ABG’s President Ishmael Toroama moved to sideline a key sticking point over PNG parliamentary ratification of the vote, with the announcement last week that Bougainville would unilaterally declare independence on September 1, 2027.

• READ MORE: PNG and Bougainville to hold more talks on independence issue
• Other Bougainville reports

The region’s two leading intergovernmental organisations — Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) and Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) — have traditionally deferred to member state PNG on discussion of Bougainville independence as an internal matter.

But as a declaration of nationhood becomes increasingly likely and near, there has been a subtle shift.

“It’s their [PNG’s] prerogative but if this matter were raised formally, even by Bougainville themselves, we can start discussion on that,” PIF Secretary-General Baron Waqa told a press briefing at its headquarters in Fiji on Monday.

“Whatever happens, I think the issue would have to be decided by our leaders later this year,” he said of the annual PIF meeting to be held in Solomon Islands in September.

Marked peace deal
The last time the Pacific’s leaders included discussion of Bougainville in their official communique was in 2004 to mark the disarmament of the island under the peace deal.

Waqa said Bougainville had made no formal approach to PIF — a grouping of 18 Pacific states and territories — but it was closely monitoring developments on what could eventually lead to the creation of a new member state.

In 2024, Toroama told BenarNews he would be seeking observer status at the subregional MSG — grouping PNG, Fiji, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and New Caledonia’s FLNKS — as Bougainville’s first diplomatic foray.

No application has been made yet but MSG acting Director-General Ilan Kiloe told BenarNews they were also keeping a close watch.

“Our rules and regulations require that we engage through PNG and we will take our cue from them,” Kiloe said, adding while the MSG respects the sovereignty of its members, “if requested, we will provide assistance” to Bougainville.

“The purpose and reason the MSG was established initially was to advance the collective interests of the Melanesian countries, in particular, to assist those yet to attain independence,” he said. “And to provide support towards their aim of becoming independent countries.”

The 2001 peace agreement ended more than a decade of bloody conflict  known as the Bougainville crisis, that resulted in the deaths of up to 15,000 people, and laid out a roadmap for disarmament and the referendum in 2019.

‘We need support’
Under the agreement, PNG retains responsibility for foreign affairs but allows for the ABG to engage externally for trade and with “regional organisations.”

“We need countries to support us, we need to talk to those countries [ahead of independence],” Toroama told BenarNews last September.

The referendum on independence was supported by 97.7 percent of Bougainvillians and the outcome was due to be ratified by PNG’s Parliament in 2020, but was deferred because of the covid-19 pandemic.

Discussions by the two parties since on whether a simple or two-thirds majority vote by parliamentarians was required has further delayed the process.

Toroama stood firm on the issue of ratification on the first day of discussions moderated by New Zealand’s Sir Jerry Mataparae, saying his people voted for independence and the talks were to define the “new relationship” between two independent states.

Last week, the 15 members of the Bougainville Leaders Independence Consultation Forum issued a statement declaring PNG had no authority to veto the referendum result and recommended September 1, 2027 as the declaration date.

“As far as I am concerned, the process of negotiating independence was concluded with the referendum,” Toroama said.

Implementation moderation
“My understanding is that this moderation is about reaching agreement on implementing the referendum result of independence.”

He told Marape “to take ownership and endorse independence in this 11th Parliament.”

PNG’s prime minister responded by praising the 25 years of peace “without a single bullet fired” but warned Bougainville was not ready for independence.

“Economic independence must precede political independence,” Marape said. “The long-term sustainability of Bougainville must be factored into these discussions.”

“About 95 percent of Bougainville’s budget is currently reliant on external support, including funding from the PNG government and international donors.”

Proposals to reopen Rio Tinto’s former Panguna gold and copper mine in Bougainville, that sparked its civil conflict, is a regular feature of debate about its economic future.

Marape also suggested people may be secretly harbouring weapons in breach of the peace agreement and called on the UN to clarify the outcome of the disarmament process it supervised.

“Headlines have come out that guns remain in Bougainville. United Nations, how come guns remain in Bougainville?” Marape asked on Monday.

“You need to tell me. This is something you know. I thought all guns were removed from Bougainville.”

PNG relies on aid
By comparison, PNG has heavily relied on foreign financial assistance since independence, currently receiving at about US$320 million (1.3 billion kina) a year in budgetary support from Australia, and suffers regular tribal violence and massacres involving firearms including assault rifles.

Bougainville Vice-President Patrick Nisira rejected Marape’s concerns about weapons, the Post-Courier newspaper reported.

“The usage of those guns, there is no evidence of that and if you look at the data on Bougainville where [there are] incidents of guns, it is actually very low,” he said.

Further talks are planned and are due to produce a report for the national Parliament by mid-2025, ahead of elections in Bougainville and PNG’s 50th anniversary celebrations in September.

Republished from BenarNews with permission.

The parties involved in talks aimed at resolving an impasse over Bougainville’s push for independence are planning to meet several more times before a deadline in June.

The leaders of Papua New Guinea and Bougainville have been meeting all week in Port Moresby, with former New Zealand Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae serving as moderator.

The question before them hinges on the conditions for tabling the results of the 2019 Bougainville referendum in the PNG Parliament, in which there was overwhelming support for independence.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainvlle independence reports

PNG wants an absolute majority of MPs to agree to the tabling, while Bougainville says it should be a simple majority.

Bougainville says changes to the PNG Constitution would come later, and that is when an absolute majority is appropriate.

Bougainville’s President Ishmael Toroama has suggested a solution could be reached outside of Parliament, but PNG Prime Minister James Marape has questioned the readiness of Bougainville to run itself, given there are still guns in the community and the local economy is miniscule.

Sources at the talks say that, with the parties having now stated their positions, several more meetings are planned where decisions will be reached on the way forward.

Burnham key to civil war end
One of those meetings is expected to take place at Burnham, New Zealand.

It was preliminary talks at Burnham in 1997 that led to the end of the bloody 10-year-long civil war in Bougainville.

Bougainville is holding elections in September, and the writs are being issued in June, hence the desire that the process to determine its political future is in place by then.

Last week, Bougainville leaders declared they wanted independence in place by 1 September 2027.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The former Papua New Guinea Defence Force (PNGDF) commander who defied a government decision to send mercenaries to Bougainville during the civil war in the late 1990s has paid tribute to Sir Julius Chan, prime minister at the time.

Retired Major-General Jerry Singirok, who effectively ended the Bougainville War and caused Sir Julius to step aside as Prime Minister in 1997, expressed his condolences, saying he had the highest respect for Sir Julius — who died on Thursday aged 85 — for upholding the constitution when the people demanded it.

“Today, I mourn with his family, the people of New Ireland and the nation for his loss. We are for ever grateful for such a selfless servant as Sir Julius Chan,” he said.

• READ MORE: Sir Julius Chan, one of Papua New Guinea’s founding fathers, dies aged 85
• A Matter of Conscience: The Sandline affair
• Other Sir Julius Chan reports

As a captain, Jerry Singirok had served on the PNGDF’s first-ever overseas combat deployment in Vanuatu to quell an independence rebellion.

The decision to send PNGDF forces to Vanuatu was made when Sir Julius was prime minister in 1980.

Seventeen years later, again under Sir Julius’ leadership, the 38-year-old Singirok was elevated to be the PNGDF commander as the government struggled to put an end to the decade-long Bougainville War.

Sandline affair
In late 1996, the Sir Julius-led government signed a secret US$38 million deal with Sandline International, a UK-based mercenary company.

Under the arrangement, 44 British, South African and Australian mercenaries supported by the PNGDF, would be sent in to Bougainville to end the conflict.

Singirok disagreed with the decision, disarmed and arrested the mercenaries during the night of 16 March 1997, and with the backing of the army he called for Sir Julius to step aside as prime minster. Sir Julius’ defiance triggered violent protests.

“Yes, I disagreed with him and opposed the use of mercenaries on Bougainville and the nation mobilised and expelled Sandline mercenaries,” he said.

“But it did not once dampen my respect for him.”

Under immense public pressure, Sir Julius stepped aside.

Throughout the period of unrest, Singirok maintained that the military operation called “Opareisen Rausim Kwik” (Tok Pisin for “Get rid of them quickly”), was aimed at expelling mercenaries and was not a coup against the government.

His book about the so-called Sandline affair, A Matter of Conscience, was published in 2023.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Papua New Guineans have launched an outpouring of grief and appreciation for the life of one of their national founding fathers — Sir Julius Chan.

Sir Julius, 85, died in his home province of New Ireland just after midday yesterday, marking an end to a long political career spanning half a century.

Papua New Guineans dubbed him the “Last Man Standing,” as he was last of the founding members of Parliament from the Independence era.

• READ MORE: PM Marape declares week of national mourning for Late Sir Julius Chan
• Other tributes to Sir Julius Chan

Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister James Marape informed members of cabinet of Sir Julius Chan’s passing.

“It is with great sadness that I announce the passing of the Last Man Standing. While Sir Michael Somare was the father of our country, the late Sir Julius was the father of our modern economy,” he said.

“He conceived the kina and toea. He was our country’s first finance minister and our second Prime Minister.”

Marape has declared a week of national mourning to honour the life and legacy Sir Julius Chan, and announced plans for a state funeral and low key celebrations for the country’s 50th independence anniversary in September.

In the annals of Papua New Guinea’s political history, few figures loom as large — or as controversially — as Sir Julius Chan. A statesman whose career spans five decades, his legacy is etched with bold decisions that sparked both admiration and outrage.

From deploying troops to a Pacific neighbour to facing global criticism for being the Prime Minister who hired foreign mercenaries in a bid to end a civil war, his leadership tested the boundaries of convention and reshaped the nation’s trajectory.

Start of a long political career
He entered politics in the twilight of colonial rule. He was elected to the House of Assembly in 1968. By 1976, as PNG’s first finance minister, he navigated the economic turbulence of independence, advocating for foreign investment and resource development.

Within PNG politics, Sir Julius was seen as a tactician, weaving through the complexities of tribal and national politics and seizing opportunities when available.

In 1980, he initiated the first-ever vote of no confidence motion against close friend and Prime Minister Michael Somare, ousting him on the floor of Parliament.

His first term as prime minister from 1980 to 1982, solidified his reputation as a pragmatist.

Facing fiscal strain, he championed austerity, infrastructure projects and devalued the PNG currency.

But it was a foreign policy move that drew regional attention.

A Tok Piksa tribute to Sir Julius Chan.  Video: EMTV

Vanuatu 1980: A controversial intervention
In 1980, he authorised the deployment of PNG troops on its first international deployment: Vanuatu.

The mission was aimed at quelling a rebellion against Vanuatu’s newly independent government.

In Parliament, he argued that the deployment was necessary for regional stability and stamped PNG’s role as an important player in the Pacific.

Critics called it overreach as PNG was not even past its first decade as an independent country. However, the deployment earned PNG the respect from Vanuatu and its Pacific neighbours — for the first time in a young nation’s budding history, that standing up for a Pacific brother when no one else would, was enough for a new regional respect for PNG.

The operation ended swiftly, but the precedent set by PNG’s military would reverberate for decades.

The Bougainville crisis and the mercenary gamble
His second term as prime minister from 1994 to 1997, collided with PNG’s most protracted conflict: the Bougainville Civil War.

By 1996, the crisis had claimed 20,000 lives, crippled the economy, and exposed the PNG Defence Force’s limitations.

Desperate to break the stalemate, his government signed a secretive $36 million contract with Sandline International, a UK-based private mercenary group, to crush the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA).

When the deal leaked in 1997, public fury erupted.

The PNGDF, led by Brigadier-General Jerry Singirok, arrested the mercenaries and demanded Chan’s resignation.

Sir Julius stood defiant. Critics, however, saw betrayal with many saying hiring outsiders was an affront to sovereignty.

Under pressure, he stepped aside pending an inquiry. Though exonerated of corruption, his political capital evaporated. The Sandline Affair became a cautionary tale of desperation and overreach.

Resilience and redemption
His career, however, refused to end in scandal. After a decade in the political wilderness, he returned as New Ireland Governor in 2007, championing provincial autonomy and education reforms.

In 2015, he published his memoir, confronting the Sandline chapter head-on.

His peers acknowledged his tenacity with founding Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare, before his passing, pointing out how both men had separated politics from their personal friendship for over 50 years.

Culture as foundation
Despite rising to political leadership at the national level, and having a strong hand in the formation of our country’s economic and financial stability, and using its young military force to nurture Pacific solidarity, Sir Julius will always be remembered for his respect of culture and tradition.

His elevation and acknowledgment of the MaiMai, New Ireland’s Chieftan System as a recognised decision-making body within the New Ireland Provincial Government and the Provincial Assembly, was testament to Sir Julius’ own devotion and respect for traditional New Ireland culture.

His creation of a pension for the wisened population of his home province, not only assured him continuous support from New Ireland’s older population at every election, but it set an example of the importance of traditional systems of governance and decision-making.

To the world, he was a new country’s financial whiz kid, growing up in an environment rooted in traditional culture, and navigating a young Papua New Guinea as a mixed race leader saw him become one of PNG’s finest leaders.

To the country, he will always be remembered as the “Last Man Standing”.

But to his people of New Ireland, he will, over the coming weeks, be accorded the highest of traditional and customary acknowledgements that only the people of New Ireland will be able to bestow on such a Great Man. A Great Chief. A Great Leader.

They will say for one last time: ‘Lapun i go nau. Wok bilong em i pinis.’ (The old man has left, his work here is done).

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

COMMENTARY: By Tess Newton Cain

Vanuatu’s devastating earthquake and dramatic political developments in Tonga and New Caledonia at the end of 2024 set the tone for the coming year in the Pacific.

The incoming Trump administration adds another level of uncertainty, ranging from the geostrategic competition with China and the region’s resulting militarisation through to the U.S. response to climate change.

And decolonisation for a number of territories in the Pacific will remain in focus as the region’s largest country celebrates its 50th anniversary of independence.

The deadly 7.3 earthquake that struck Port Vila on December 17 has left Vanuatu reeling. As the country moves from response to recovery, the full impacts of the damage will come to light.

The economic hit will be significant, with some businesses announcing that they will not open until well into the New Year or later.

Amid the physical carnage there’s Vanuatu’s political turmoil, with a snap general election triggered in November before the disaster struck to go ahead on January 16.

On Christmas Eve a new prime minister was elected in Tonga. ‘Aisake Valu Eke is a veteran politician, who has previously served as Minister of Finance. He succeeded Siaosi Sovaleni who resigned suddenly after a prolonged period of tension between his office and the Tongan royal family.

Eke takes the reins as Tonga heads towards national elections, due before the end of November. He will likely want to keep things stable and low key between now and then.

Fall of New Caledonia government
In Kanaky New Caledonia, the resignation of the Calédonie Ensemble party — also on Christmas Eve — led to the fall of the French territory’s government.

After last year’s violence and civil disorder – that crippled the economy but stopped a controversial electoral reform — the political turmoil jeopardises about US$77 million (75 million euro) of a US$237 million recovery funding package from France.

In addition, and given the fall of the Barnier government in Paris, attempts to reach a workable political settlement in New Caledonia are likely to be severely hampered, including any further movement to secure independence.

In France’s other Pacific territory, the government of French Polynesia is expected to step up its campaign for decolonisation from the European power.

Possibly the biggest party in the Pacific in 2025 will be the 50th anniversary of Papua New Guinea’s independence from Australia, accompanied hopefully by some reflection and action about the country’s future.

Eagerly awaited also will be the data from the country’s flawed census last year, due for release on the same day — September 16. But the celebrations will also serve as a reminder of unfinished self-determination business, with its Autonomous Region of Bougainville preparing for their independence declaration in the next two years.

The shadow of geopolitics looms large in the Pacific islands region. There is no reason to think that will change this year.

Trump administration unkowns
A significant unknown is how the incoming Trump administration will alter policy and funding settings, if at all. The current (re)engagement by the US in the region started with Trump during his first incumbency. His 2019 meeting with the then leaders of the compact states — Federated States of Micronesia, Palau, Republic of Marshall Islands — at the White House was a pivotal moment.

Under Biden, billions of dollars have been committed to “securitise” the region in response to China. This year, we expect to see US marines start to transfer in numbers from Okinawa to Guam.

However, given Trump’s history and rhetoric when it comes to climate change, there is some concern about how reliable an ally the US will be when it comes to this vital security challenge for the region.

The last time Trump entered the White House, he withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement and he is widely expected to do the same again this time around.

In addition to polls in Tonga and Vanuatu, elections will be held in the Federated States of Micronesia, Nauru, New Caledonia and for the Autonomous Bougainville Government.

There will also be a federal election in Australia, the biggest aid donor in the Pacific, and a change in government will almost certainly have impacts in the region.

Given the sway that the national security community has on both sides of Australian politics, the centrality of Pacific engagement to foreign policy, particularly in response to China, is unlikely to change.

Likely climate policy change
How that manifests could look quite different under a conservative Liberal/National party government. The most likely change is in climate policy, including an avowed commitment to invest in nuclear power.

A refusal to shift away from fossil fuels or commit to enhanced finance for adaptation by a new administration could reignite tensions within the Pacific Islands Forum that have, to some extent, been quietened under Labor’s Albanese government.

Who is in government could also impact on the bid to host COP31 in 2026, with a decision between candidates Turkey and Australia not due until June, after the poll.

Pacific leaders and advocates face a systemic challenge regarding climate change. With the rise in conflict and geopolitical competition, the global focus on the climate crisis has weakened. The prevailing sense of disappointment over COP29 last year is likely to continue as partners’ engagement becomes increasingly securitised.

A major global event for this year is the Oceans Summit which will be held in Nice, France, in June. This is a critical forum for Pacific countries to take their climate diplomacy to a new level and attack the problem at its core.

In 2023, the G20 countries were responsible for 76 percent of global emissions. By capitalising on the geopolitical moment, the Pacific could nudge the key players to greater ambition.

Several G20 countries are seeking to expand and deepen their influence in the region alongside the five largest emitters — China, US, India, Russia, and Japan — all of which have strategic interests in the Pacific.

Given the increasingly transactional nature of Pacific engagement, 2025 should present an opportunity for Pacific governments to leverage their geostrategic capital in ways that will address human security for their peoples.

Dr Tess Newton Cain is a principal consultant at Sustineo P/L and adjunct associate professor at the Griffith Asia Institute. She is a former lecturer at the University of the South Pacific and has over 25 years of experience working in the Pacific islands region. The views expressed here are hers, not those of BenarNews/RFA. Republished from BenarNews with permission.

The first large-scale environmental impact assessment of Rio Tinto’s abandoned Panguna mine in Papua New Guinea has found local communities face life-threatening risks from its legacy.

The independent study was initiated after frustrated landowners in PNG’s Autonomous Region of Bougainville took their longstanding grievances against Rio Tinto to the Australian government in 2020.

British-Australian Rio Tinto has accepted the findings of the report released on Friday but has not responded to calls by landowners and affected communities to fund the clean-up.

• READ MORE: Other Panguna mine reports

Rio Tinto abandoned one of the world’s largest gold and copper mines in 1989 when a long-running dispute with landowners over the inequitable distribution of the royalties turned into an armed conflict.

The Panguna Mine Legacy Impact Assessment report found the mine infrastructure, pit and levee banks pose “very high risks,” while landslides and exposure to mine and industrial chemicals present “medium to high” risks to local communities.

Flooding in downstream from Panguna — caused by a billion tons of mine tailings dumped into the Jaba-Kawerong river system — was reported as posing “very high” actual and potential human rights risks.

“The most serious concern is the potential impact to the right to life from unstable structures, and landform collapses and flooding hazards,” the report concluded, with the access to healthy environment, water, food and housing also impacted.

More than 25,000 people are estimated to live in the affected area, on the island of 300,000 in PNG’s east on the border with Solomon Islands.

“Rio Tinto must take responsibility for its legacy and fund the long-term solutions we need so that we can live on our land in safety again,” Theonila Roka Matbob, lead complainant and Bougainville parliamentarian, said in a statement.

“We never chose this mine, but we live with its consequences every day, trying to find ways to survive in the wasteland that has been left behind.”

“What the communities are demanding to know now is what the next step is. A commitment to remediation is where the data is pointing us to, and that’s what the people are waiting for.”

In August, Rio Tinto and its former subsidiary and mine operator Bougainville Copper Limited along with the Autonomous Bougainville Government signed an MoU to mitigate the risks of the ageing infrastructure in the former Panguna mine area.

Last month the three parties struck an agreement to form a “roundtable.”

Rio Tinto in a statement after the report’s release said the roundtable “plans to address the findings and develop a remedy mechanism consistent with the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.”

“While we continue to review the report, we recognize the gravity of the impacts identified and accept the findings,” chief executive of Rio Tinto’s Australia operations Kellie Parker said.

Rio Tinto divested its majority stake in the mine to the PNG and ABG governments in 2016, and reportedly wrote to the ABG saying it bore no responsibility.

Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama in welcoming the report thanked Rio Tinto “for opening up to this process and giving it genuine attention and input.”

In a statement he said it was a “significant milestone” that would help with the “move away from the damage and turmoil of the past and strengthen our pathway towards a stronger future.”

Bougainville voted for independence from PNG in 2019, with 97.7 per cent favoring nationhood.

Exploitation of Panguna’s estimated U.S.$60b in ore reserves has been touted as a major future source of income to fund independence. The referendum result has yet to be ratified by PNG’s parliament.

The first report of the Panguna Mine Legacy Impact Assessment identified what needs to be addressed or mitigated and what warrants further investigation.

The second phase of the process will conduct more intensive studies, with a second report to make recommendations on how the “complex” impacts should be remedied.

A 10-year civil war left up to 15,000 dead and 70,000 displaced across Bougainville as PNG forces –supplied with Australian weapons and helicopters – battled the poorly armed Bougainville Revolutionary Army.

Panguna remained a “no-go zone” despite the Bougainville Peace Agreement in 2001, and access has still been restricted in the decades since by a road block of former BRA fighters.

A complaint filed by the Australian-based Human Rights Law Centre on behalf of affected communities with the Australian government initiated the non-binding, international mechanism to report on “responsible business conduct.”

They alleged that Rio Tinto was responsible for “significant breaches of the OECD guidelines relating to the serious, ongoing environmental and human rights violations arising from the operation of its former Panguna mine.”

“This landmark report validates what communities in Bougainville have been saying for decades – the Panguna mine has left them living with an ongoing environmental and human rights disaster,” HRLC legal director Keren Adams said in a statement.

“There are strong expectations in Bougainville that Rio Tinto will now take swift action to help address the impacts and dangers communities are living with.”

The two-year, on-site independent scientific investigation by Australian engineering services company Tetra Tech Coffey made 24 recommendations on impacts to address and what needs further investigation.

Comprehensive field studies included soil, water and food testing, hydrology and geo-morphology analysis, and hundreds of community surveys and interviews.

Outstanding demands from the community include that Rio Tinto publicly commit to addressing the impacts, provide a timetable, contribute to a fund for immediate and long-term remediation and rehabilitation and undertake a formal reconciliation as per Bougainville custom.

A class action lawsuit brought by 5000 Bougainvilleans against Rio Tinto and subsidiary Bougainville Copper Limited for billions in compensation earlier this year is unrelated to the impact assessment reports. Rio Tinto has said it will strongly defend its position.

Republished from BenarNews with permission.

An initial hearing of a class action against mining giant Rio Tinto over the toxic legacy of the Panguna copper mine on the autonomous island of Bougainville has been held in Papua New Guinea.

The lawsuit against Rio Tinto and its subsidiary Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL) is seeking compensation, expected to be in the billions of dollars, for what plaintiffs allege is historic mismanagement of the massive open copper-and-gold mine between 1972 and 1989.

More than 5000 claimants backed by anonymous investors are seeking damages for the destruction that sparked a 10-year-long civil war.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville and independence reports

The Panguna mine closed in 1989 after anger about pollution and the unequal distribution of profits sparked a landowner rebellion. As many as 20,000 people — or 10 percent of Bougainville’s population — are estimated to have died in the violence that followed between pro-inependence rebels and PNG.

Although a peace process was brokered in 2001 with New Zealand support, deep political divisions remain and there has never been remediation for Panguna’s environmental and psychological scars.

The initial hearing for the lawsuit took place on Wednesday, a day ahead of schedule, at the National Court in Port Moresby, said Matthew Mennilli, a partner at Sydney-based Morris Mennilli.

Mennilli, who is from one of two law firms acting on behalf of the plaintiffs, said he was unable to provide further details as court orders had not yet been formally entered.

A defence submitted
Rio Tinto did not respond to specific questions regarding this week’s hearing, but said in a statement on September 23 it had submitted a defence and would strongly defend its position in the case.

The lawsuit is made up by the majority of villagers in the affected area of Bougainville, an autonomous province within PNG, situated some 800km east of the capital Port Moresby.

At least 71 local clan leaders support the claim, with the lead claimant named as former senior Bougainville political leader and chief of the Basking Taingku clan Martin Miriori.

The lawsuit is being bankrolled by Panguna Mine Action, a limited liability company that stands to reap between 20-40 percent of any payout depending on how long the case takes, according to litigation funding documents cited by the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.

While the lawsuit has support from a large number of local villagers, some observers fear it could upset social cohesion on Bougainville and potentially derail another long-standing remediation effort.

The class action is running in parallel with an independent assessment of the mine’s legacy, supported by human rights groups and the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG), and funded by Rio Tinto.

Rio Tinto agreed in 2021 to take part in the Panguna Mine Legacy Impact Assessment after the Melbourne-based Human Rights Law Centre filed a complaint with the Australian government, on behalf of Bougainville residents.

Legacy of destruction
The group said the Anglo-Australian mining giant has failed to address Panguna’s legacy of destruction, including the alleged dumping of more than a billion tonnes of mine waste into rivers that continues to affect health, the environment and livelihoods.

The assessment, which is being done by environmental consulting firm Tetra Tech Coffey, includes extensive consultation with local communities and the first phase of the evaluation is expected to be delivered next month.

ABG President Ishmael Toroama has called the Rio Tinto class action the highest form of treason and an obstacle to the government’s economic independence agenda.

“This class action is an attack on Bougainville’s hard-fought unity to date,” he said in May.

In February, the autonomous government granted Australian-listed Bougainville Copper a five-year exploration licence to revive the Panguna mine site.

The Bougainville government is hoping its reopening will fund independence. In a non-binding 2019 referendum — which was part of the 2001 peace agreement — 97.7 percent of the island’s inhabitants voted for independence.

PNG leaders resist independence
But PNG leaders have resisted the result, fearful that by granting independence it could encourage breakaway movements in other regions of the volatile Pacific island country.

Former New Zealand Governor-General Sir Jerry Mateparae was appointed last month as an independent moderator to help the two parties agree on terms of a parliamentary vote needed to ratify the referendum.

In response to the class action, Rio Tinto said last month its focus remained on “constructive engagement and meaningful action with local stakeholders” through the legacy assessment.

The company said it was “seeking to partner with key stakeholders, such as the ABG and BCL, to design and implement a remedy framework.”

Copyright ©2015-2024, BenarNews. Republished with the permission of BenarNews.

High in the forested mountains of Papua New Guinea’s Bougainville Island lies an abandoned, kilometer-wide crater cut deep into the earth.

Formerly one of the world’s largest gold and copper mines, the open pit now serves as an unsightly monument to the environmental and social chaos that underground riches can create.

Run for years by a subsidiary of Anglo-Australian giant Rio Tinto, the Panguna mine earned millions for Papua New Guinea (PNG) and helped bankroll its newfound independence. But it also poured waste into local waterways and fuelled anger among locals who felt robbed of the profits.

• READ MORE: Other Pangune mine reports

When an armed uprising ultimately shuttered the mine in 1989, the impoverished island was left reeling.

Nearly three decades later, in late 2022, human rights activists, the local government, and the mine’s former operators joined forces to produce a definitive assessment of the mine’s toxic legacy.

Their report, due to be released later this month, will become the basis for negotiations aimed at getting the mining companies to finally clean up the mess and compensate affected communities.

But its supporters now worry their efforts will be undermined by a class-action lawsuit launched in May against the mine’s erstwhile operators. The legal effort is being championed by former rebel leaders — and backed by anonymous offshore investors who stand to make hundreds of millions of dollars if it succeeds.

Worldwide litigation boom
The lawsuit is part of a worldwide boom in litigation financing that seeks to take multinational companies to task for ecological or social damage while potentially reaping a fortune for lawyers and funders.

Critics in Bougainville worry the lawsuit will reopen old wounds at a time when the island is making a push to break free of Papua New Guinea and become the world’s newest sovereign nation. Many Bougainvilleans are hoping to reopen the mine, using its wealth to fund their own independence this time around.

The region’s government and many local leaders believe the class action could put the mine’s revival at risk. There are also concerns the lawsuit would leave many Bougainvilleans empty handed, while the anonymous foreign investors would walk away with a significant share of the payout.

Unlike the official assessment, which seeks to identify everyone who needs to be compensated, the class action will only share its winnings — which could potentially be in the billions of dollars — with the locals who have signed on. Others will get nothing.

“There’s already fragmentation in the community and families are already divided,” said Theonila Roka Matbob, who represents the area around Panguna in the local Parliament and has helped lead the government-backed assessment process as a minister in the Autonomous Bougainville government.

She speaks from personal experience. The chief litigant in the class-action lawsuit, Martin Miriori, is her uncle. The two are no longer on speaking terms.

A losing deal
Gouged from Bougainville’s lush volcanic heart, the Panguna mine in its heyday supplied as much as 45 percent of PNG’s export revenue, providing it with the financial means to achieve independence from Australia in 1975.

The windfall, however, did not extend to Bougainvilleans themselves. Ethnically and culturally distinct from the rest of PNG’s population, they saw Panguna as a symbol of external domination.

The mine delivered only a miserly 2-percent share of its profits to their island — along with years of environmental havoc.

During the 17 years of Panguna’s operation — from 1972 to 1989 — over a billion metric tons of toxic mine waste and electric blue copper runoff flooded rivers that flowed downstream towards communities of subsistence farmers. The result was poisoned drinking water, infertile land, and children who were drowned or injured trying to cross engorged waterways.

In 1989, enraged Bougainville locals launched an armed rebellion against the PNG government. The mine was shut down, closing off a vital source of revenue for the national government in Port Moresby.

A brutal civil war raged on for nearly a decade, leaving more than 15,000 people dead, while a naval blockade by PNG’s military obliterated the island’s economy.

A peace deal in 2000 granted Bougainville substantial autonomy. But nearly a quarter-century later, the legacy of Panguna and the war it provoked is still deeply felt.

Few paved roads, bridges
There are few paved roads and bridges in the island’s interior. Residents earn a modest living through cocoa and coconut farming, or by unregulated artisanal mining in and around the abandoned Panguna crater.

Rivers polluted by years of runoff are still an otherworldly shade of milky blue.

At least 300,000 people are estimated to live on Bougainville, including as many as 15,000 who live downstream of the mine. Of those, some 4500 have joined Miriori — Roka’s estranged uncle and a tribal leader whose brother, Joseph Kabui, served as the first president of autonomous Bougainville — in seeking restitution through the class-action suit.

“We’ve got to make people happy,” Miriori said. “They’ve lost their land forever, environment forever. Their hunting grounds. Their spiritual, sacred grounds.”

‘Alert to opportunities’
Miriori took many by surprise when he became the public face of the suit filed in PNG’s National Court in May against Rio Tinto and its former local subsidiary, Bougainville Copper Limited.

While the tribal leader and former rebel is a well-known figure in Bougainville, the funders of the lawsuit are not. They have managed to keep their identities secret in part because the company behind the suit, Panguna Mine Action LLC, is registered on Nevis, a small Caribbean island that does not require companies to publicly disclose their shareholders and directors.

Miriori declined to comment on who was behind the company, saying, “I will not tell you where the funding is based … you can source that from our people down there [in Australia].”

James Sing, an Australian based in New York, is Panguna Mine Action’s chief public representative. He initially agreed to an interview, but later referred reporters back to a London-based public relations agency, Sans Frontières Associates.

The agency declined to reveal Panguna Mine Action’s investors.

Litigation funding documents obtained by OCCRP, however, shed some light on the history of the case. The documents show that Panguna Mine Action began to investigate the possibility of a class-action suit as early as July 2021.

The Bougainvillean claimants, led by Miriori, were formally brought into an agreement with the company and its Australian and PNG lawyers in November 2022. The suit was publicly announced this May.

Handsome profit
The lawsuit’s investors stand to profit handsomely from any eventual settlement: Panguna Mine Action is poised to receive a cut of 20 to 40 percent of any payout resulting from the suit, with the percentage increasing the longer the process takes, the funding documents show.

In interviews and statements, both Miriori and Panguna Mine Action have put the potential value of any award in the billions of dollars.

The lawsuit’s financiers defend their substantial share of the potential benefits as standard practice.

“The costs of launching and running the class action against a global miner are significant, and almost certainly could not be met from within Bougainville without funding from an external party,” the company said in its statement.

Panguna Mine Action added it would bear sole responsibility for costs if the lawsuit is unsuccessful.

According to Michael Russell, a Sydney-based class action defence lawyer, such funding arrangements are typical in the burgeoning world of litigation finance, where investors seek out cases that promote virtuous social causes while offering huge potential payoffs.

A similar case is unfolding in Latin America, where more than 720,000 Brazilians are seeking $46.5 billion as part of a gargantuan class action against mining giant BHP and its local subsidiary for their role in a 2015 dam collapse.

In such cases, funders can justify walking away with significant cuts of any winnings because of the substantial risk they face of losing their investment if a case fails, Russell said.

Such cases were rarely initiated at the grassroots level by the victims themselves, he added.

“Most of the time, either the plaintiff firms or the funders will be the catalyst for a claim,” he said. “They are very alert to opportunities.”

Rival restitution plans
Government officials including Miriori’s niece, Roka, say the class-action case, which is due to hold opening arguments in October, threatens to derail the ongoing impact assessment aimed at calculating the full cost of the mine’s environmental impact and developing recommendations for addressing the damage.

The assessment, which counts community members among its stakeholders and bills itself as an independent review, is supported by Australia’s Human Rights Law Centre, which has hailed the project as “an important step” towards rectifying the mine’s devastating impact on thousands of Bougainvilleans.

However, while Rio Tinto and Bougainville Copper are both funding the project, they have not yet committed to paying for any compensation or cleanup. Roka said she was concerned the lawsuit could reduce the company’s willingness to engage with the process, since it could view the assessment as a tool that could be used against them in the courtroom.

Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama backs the impact assessment and has lambasted the class action suit as the work of “faceless investors . . .  taking advantage of vulnerable groups.” (His office did not respond to an interview request.)

He also expressed concern that the court proceedings threaten to “disrupt” his government’s efforts to reopen the mine, which still holds an estimated $60 billion in untapped deposits.

Bougainville’s leaders see the mine as key to securing the island’s economic future as it sets out to form an independent state — a dream that drew overwhelming public support in a 2019 referendum.

Exploration licence
Earlier this year Toroama’s government granted Bougainville Copper a five-year exploration licence for the Panguna site.

The lack of media and polling in Bougainville make it hard to measure public opinion on plans to reactivate the mine, but many locals appear to support reopening it under local control as an essential tool for achieving independence.

Bougainville Copper’s brand is still toxically associated with Rio Tinto and its past abuses, despite the fact that the international mining giant gave away its majority stake for no money in 2016.

The publicly traded company is now majority co-owned by the governments of PNG and Bougainville, and Port Moresby has pledged to hand over all its shares to the autonomous region in the near future.

Panguna Mine Action acknowledges that its effort could stand in the way of the mine’s reopening — but the company says that is a good thing.

“It is our understanding that the people of Bougainville do not wish mining to be recommenced under any circumstances or, alternatively, unless Rio Tinto and Bougainville Copper acknowledge the past, pay compensation and remediate the rivers and surrounding valley,” the company said in a statement.

Rio Tinto declined to comment. Mel Togolo, the chairman of Bougainville Copper, told OCCRP that the lawsuit was the work of “a foreign funder who no doubt is seeking a return on an investment.”

View of the tailings located downstream of the Panguna mine. Photo: OCCRP / Aubrey Belford

‘Only those who have signed will benefit’
The fight over Panguna adds even more uncertainty to long-running anxiety over Bougainville’s future.

With global copper prices soaring on high demand for renewable energy and electric vehicles, the Panguna mine would be an attractive prize for both Western mining companies and firms from China, which is dramatically expanding its influence in the South Pacific.

Since a future Bougainvillean state would be economically dependent on the mine’s revenue, some have raised concerns that control of the mine could become a proxy battle for geopolitical influence in the broader region.

For his part, Miriori expressed little concern that a multibillion-dollar payout might stir resentment by reaching only a fraction of the people affected by the mine’s environmental destruction.

“Only those who signed will benefit,” he said, adding that the opportunity was made “very clear to people” through awareness campaigns.

“Those who have not signed, it’s their freedom of choice.”

Among those who did not sign is Wendy Bowara, 48, who lives in Dapera, a bleak settlement built on a hill of mine waste. Bowara said she is looking to the government-backed assessment, not the lawsuit, to deliver compensation and clean up Panguna’s toxic legacy.

“We are living on top of chemicals,” she said. “Copper concentration is high. I don’t know if the food is good to eat or if it’s healthy to drink the water.”

But while it may seem odd given her grim surroundings, Borawa says she strongly supports reopening the mine.

“It funded the independence of Papua New Guinea,” Bowara said. “Why can’t we use it to fund our own independence?”

Allan Gioni contributed reporting.

Aubrey Belford is the Pacific editor for the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting project (OCCRP). Republished with permission.

There is an important story to be told behind the story Aotearoa New Zealand’s mainstream media has been reporting on in Kanaky New Caledonia. Beyond the efforts to evacuate New Zealanders lies a struggle for indigenous sovereignty and self-determination we here in Aotearoa can relate to.

Aotearoa is part of a whānau of Pacific nations, interconnected by Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa. The history of Aotearoa is intricately woven into the broader history of the Pacific, where cultural interactions have shaped a rich tapestry over centuries.

The whakapapa connections between tangata whenua and tagata moana inform my political stance and commitment to indigenous rights throughout the Pacific. What happens in one part of the South Pacific ripples across to all of us that call the Pacific Ocean home.

• READ MORE:  Kanaky New Caledonia unrest: Macron lifts state of emergency ‘for time being’
• French repressive policies in New Caledonia have ‘betrayed’ Kanak hopes — David Robie video
• Amid Kanaky New Caledonia’s unrest, I saw first-hand the same colonial white privilege that caused it
• West Papua independence group slams French ‘modern-day colonialism’
• Other Kanaky New Caledonia reports

Since the late 1980s the Kanak independence movement showed itself to be consistently engaging with the Accords with Paris process in their struggle for self-determination.

The Nouméa Accord set out a framework for transferring power to the people of New Caledonia, through a series of referenda. It was only after France moved to unilaterally break with the accords and declare independence off the table that the country returned to a state of unrest.

Civil unrest in and around the capital Nouméa which has continued for two weeks, was prompted by Kanak anger over Paris changing the constitution to open up electoral rolls in its “overseas territory” in a way that effectively dilutes the voting power of the indigenous people.

Coming after the confused end of the Nouméa Accord in 2021, which left New Caledonia’s self-determination path clouded with uncertainty, it was inevitable that there would be trouble.

Flew halfway across world
That France’s President Emmanuel Macron flew across the world to Noumea last week for one day of talks in a bid to end the civil unrest underlines the seriousness of the crisis.

But while the deployment of more French security forces to the territory may have succeeded in quelling the worst of the unrest for now, Macron’s visit was unsuccessful because he failed to commit to pulling back on the electoral changes or to signal a meaningful way forward on independence for New Caledonia.

Paris’ tone-deafness to the Kanaks’ concerns was evident in its refusal to postpone the last of the three referendums under the Nouméa Accord during the pandemic, when the indigenous Melanesians boycotted the poll because it was a time of mourning in their communities. Kanaks consider that last referendum to have no legitimacy.

But Macron’s government has simply cast aside the accord process to move ahead unilaterally with a new statute for New Caledonia.

As the Kanaky Aotearoa Solidarity group said in a letter to the French Ambassador in Wellington this week, “it is regrettable that France’s decision to obstruct the legitimate aspirations of the Kanak people to their right to self-determination has led to such destruction and loss of life”.

Why should New Zealand care about the crisis? New Caledonia is practically Aotearoa’s next door neighbour — a three-hour flight from Auckland. Natural disasters in the Pacific such as cyclones remind us fairly regularly how our country has a leading role to play in the region.

But we can’t take this role for granted, nor choose to look the other way because our “ally“ France has it under control. And we certainly shouldn’t ignore the roots of a crisis in a neighbouring territory where frustrations have boiled over in a pattern that’s not unusual in the Pacific Islands region, and especially Melanesia.

There is an urgent need for regional assistance to drive reconciliation. The Pacific Islands Forum, as the premier regional organisation, must move beyond words and take concrete actions to support the Kanak people.

Biketawa Declaration provides a mechanism
The forum’s Biketawa Declaration provides a mechanism for regional responses to crisis management and conflict resolution. The New Caledonian crisis surely qualifies, although France would be uncomfortable with any forum intervention.

But acting in good faith as a member of the regional family is what Paris signed up to when its territories in the Pacific were granted full forum membership.

Why is a European nation like France still holding on to its colonial possessions in the Pacific? Kanaky New Caledonia, Maohi Nui French Polynesia, and Wallis & Futuna are on the UN list of non-self-governing territories for whom decolonisation is incomplete.

However, in the case of Kanaky, Paris’ determination to hold on is partly due to a desire for global influence and is also, in no small way, linked to the fact that the territory has over 20 percent of the world’s known nickel reserves.

Failing to address the remnants of colonialism will continue to devastate lives and livelihoods across Oceania, as evidenced by the struggles in Bougainville, Māo’hi Nui, West Papua, and Guåhan.

New Zealand should be supportive of an efficient and orderly decolonisation process. We can’t rely on France alone to achieve this, especially as the unrest in New Caledonia is the inevitable result of years of political and social marginalisation of Kanak people.

The struggle of indigenous Kanaks in New Caledonia is part of a broader movement for self-determination and anti-colonialism across the Pacific. By supporting the Kanak people’s self-determination, we honour our shared history and whakapapa connections, advocating for a future where indigenous rights and aspirations are respected and upheld.

Kanaky Au Pouvoir.

Teanau Tuiono is a Green Party MP in Aotearoa New Zealand and its spokesperson for Pasifika peoples. This article was first published by The Press and is republished by Asia Pacific Report with the author’s permission.

Bougainville Affairs Minister Manasseh Makiba has described the Post-Courier’s front page story yesterday regarding a meeting between Bougainville and national government leaders as “sensationalised” and without substance.

The Autonomous Bougainville Government (AGB) had warned it might use “other avenues to gain its independence” should the PNG government “continue to be mischievous” in dealing with the Bougainville independence agenda.

Makiba said the report was the work of individuals with vested interests and was designed to derail the progress made so far over the Bougainville Peace Agreement (BPA).

• READ MORE: Other PNG independence reports

He also announced that the Joint Supervisory Body (JSB) meeting scheduled for yesterday had been postponed until tomorrow because agendas had not been supplied on time by the joint technical team (JTT) headed by the Chief Secretary and his Bougainvillean counterpart Kearneth Nanei.

“The restoration development grants, Bougainville Copper Ltd shares, and fisheries revenue sharing agreement were matters being dealt with by the joint technical team due to the technical and legal nature of the process,” Makiba said.

“The joint technical team comprises departmental heads and technical professionals from both the national government and the Autonomous Bougainville Government [which] will conduct consultations before jointly drawing up agendas for the JSB to deliberate.”

Makiba said the system currently in place through the joint technical team was very transparent and allowed for constructive discussions from both sides before it got to the political level.

‘Sticky subjects’ resolved
“Any disagreement or issues relating to any sticky subjects are resolved at that committee level,” Makiba said.

“To suggest or imply that the government is bulldozing matters or turning a deaf ear to any issue is an understatement,” Makiba said.

He urged both parties to respect the peace agreement.

The Bougainville warning was sounded by ABG Attorney-General and Independence Implementation Minister Ezekiel Massat just as the ABG delegation headed to Port Moresby for the JSB meeting with the national government.

The Bougainville delegation, led by President Ishmael Toroama, is due to meet with the national government to discuss the ratification process outlined in the Bougainville Peace Agreement and the constitution.

Massat said that there had been events that had happened which Bougainville had not been consulted on by the national government, consequently defeating the purpose of the peace agreement.

He cited the appointment of Police Assistant Commissioner Anthony Wagambie Jr and the current JSB meeting which had been called and changed by the national government without consulting ABG.

Resolution from last JSB
“While the ABG will be participating, it wants to see the two parties set into motion the resolution from the last JSB, for the parties to agree to call in a moderator to try to resolve the impasse over how results from the 2019 Referendum will be tabled and ratified by the National Parliament,” Massat said.

The ABG also demands that a bipartisan committee be established comprising national and Bougainville members to urgently communicate awareness about the Bougainville issue and independence agenda to all members of Parliament before the ratification vote.

Massat said the lack of consultation of the national government might create “suspicion and mistrust” and Bougainville might be forced to pursue other legal means to achieve the “Bougainville people’s dreams of independence” as shown in the overwhelming majority vote in the 2019 referendum.

Republished with permission.

Papua New Guinea and Bougainville appear no closer to the tabling in the National Parliament of the referendum on independence.

The non-binding referendum, conducted in 2019, as required by the Bougainville Peace Agreement of 2001, resulted in 97.8 percent of voters supporting independence for a region torn apart by civil war in the 1990s.

It was to be tabled and ratified last year but was delayed further by the threat of a no-confidence vote in the Marape government, which has led to Parliament not sitting again until the last week of May.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville independence reports

A sticking point for both parties are the conditions under which MPs would vote on ratification.

Bougainville believes this should require a simple parliamentary majority but the PNG Minister of Bougainville Affairs, Manasseh Makiba, has set a two-thirds majority of MPs — an absolute majority.

The Bougainville minister overseeing the implementation of independence, Ezekiel Masatt, believes this is not valid, at this point, but would be later, when a constitutional amendment becomes necessary.

Masatt has also warned that ratification of the referendum is not Bougainville’s only path to independence.

Close to completing constitution
He said Bougainville is close to completing the writing of its own constitution and using this document, it could declare its independence, bypassing the PNG Parliament.

“Having that constitution we would be following in the footsteps of Papua New Guinea in adopting that constitution and then getting independence by adopting that independent constitution,” Masatt said.

“And the precedent is Papua New Guinea. We are not doing anything unlawful. That is how Papua New Guinea attained its independence from Australia.”

The second draft of the Bougainville constitution is due at the end of this month.

Meanwhile, Masatt is pursuing the plan for a moderator to be brought in to solve the issues holding up progress.

Bougainville has a timetable laid out to achieve its goal of independence by 2025 at the earliest, or 2027 at the latest.

Moderator would be beneficial
Masatt said to overcome the delay a working moderator would be beneficial, and that role could be much broader than the referendum issue.

“Every time we vote at a JSB [meeting of the Joint Supervisory Body involving both governments] we make commitments and we say all these things need to be attended to and when we come back to the next JSB the same issues are still littering the JSB agenda, because apparently nobody has worked on it.”

Masatt believes this working moderator could provide expert conflict resolution skills, and would bring staff who could deal with the other issues not confined to a ratification agenda, but the general autonomy issues affecting Bougainville’s relationship with Port Moresby.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama has called on Prime Minister James Marape to spell out “clearly and honestly” his fears about Bougainville obtaining independence from Papua New Guinea.

Toroama made this call over the PNG government’s delay of the referendum ratification process, which has been stalled beyond the required period for Parliament to give its blessing under the provisions of the Bougainville Peace Agreement (BPA).

The national government and ABG convened the Joint Supervisory Body (JSB) meeting in Port Moresby yesterday where Marape and Toroama both addressed the members.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville independence reports

“Honourable Prime Minister what is your fear? Toroama asked. “What is your apprehension?

“Is it that we will have nothing to do with PNG? Is it to do with the rest of the country seeking the union of PNG?

“Is it that you no longer take our referendum seriously?

“I appeal that we resort to our Melanesian customs, values, strengths which will continue to serve us.

‘Ultimate cry for freedom’
“Honourable Prime Minister, our position on this ratification pathway is simple.

“Bougainvilleans have voted for independence. That is the outcome that the BPA talks about as being subject to the ratification of the national Parliament; and that is the outcome that the national Parliament has to confirm, endorse, sanction, finalise, or ratify, according to Melanesian culture and protocol,” Toroama said.

“Honourable Prime Minister, we must not forget that Bougainville’s journey as a result of the conflict and the ultimate cry for freedom, self-determination and independence has been long, challenging and without a doubt, costly.

“More than 20,000 lives have been lost, infrastructure demolished to basically nothing and the rule of law, while being reconstructed slowly, mainly exists through traditional laws and systems.”

However, said President Toroama, on 30 August 2001, a peace deal had been secured by the people of Bougainville with the government of Papua New Guinea.

“It stopped a decade old conflict, established an autonomous government, and guaranteed a referendum to be held after 10 years but no later than 15 years.

“This was the Bougainville Peace Agreement — a peace deal that has been hailed as a great success story.

“Many years have gone by and the novelty of it all has rubbed off to some extent, yet its real value lies in the unknown nature of the referendum pillar of the agreement.

“The people of Bougainville have democratically exercised their constitutionally guaranteed right to choose their future and have voted for independence through a stunning 97.7 percent vote.”

Republished with permission.

Papua New Guinea’s Minister of Bougainville Affairs, Manasseh Makiba, believes an absolute majority is needed for the vote on the Bougainville referendum because it involves changing the constitution.

Makiba told Parliament last month that two thirds of MPs would need to support the independence push, drawing the ire of Bougainville’s Minister of Independence Mission Implementation Ezekiel Massatt.

Massatt said officials from both governments had already agreed that a simple majority would suffice.

• READ MORE: PNG Parliament to decide on Bougainville
• Other Bougainville reports

Last month Massatt told RNZ Pacific that what transpired in the last session of Parliament gave the Bougainville leadership no confidence that they could achieve independence under a government led by Prime Minister James Marape.

But Makiba said the Bougainville Peace Agreement and the Constitution allowed for Parliament to make a decision on the 2019 Bougainville referendum which resulted in a 97.7 percent vote in favour of independence.

The National newspaper reports Makiba saying that, as an issue of sovereignty, the vote on Bougainville’s future has to be done with the same majority as that required for constitutional amendments.

He said officials had overstepped their authority in making a commitment to a simple majority.

Prerogative of Parliament
Makiba said it remained the prerogative of the Parliament to make its decision as to the appropriate voting majority.

He also rejected claims from Massatt that the national government was putting up roadblocks.

Makiba said the national government had been very supportive and committed to implementing the provisions of the Bougainville Peace Agreement and the PNG Constitution.

He said leaders needed to refrain from misleading people with the wrong information.

“The people must hear the correct information and the process and rule of law must be respected, followed, and upheld at all times,” he said.

“If certain leaders are not happy with the ratification process proposed to the Parliament to debate and adopt by way of Sessional Order they have the option to go to the Supreme Court to get interpretation on the ratification process,” he said.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

A cabinet minister in Bougainville is furious that the Papua New Guinea government has decided to make a vote on independence an absolute majority instead of the agreed simple majority.

Last week, the PNG Minister of Bougainville Affairs, Manaseh Makiba, made a long-awaited parliamentary statement on Bougainville’s independence referendum, committing to tabling the document before the end of this year.

PNG MPs will be asked, at some point in the coming years, to vote on the independence question based on negotiations over the referendum outcome which voted almost 98 percent in support of independence from PNG.

• READ MORE: Other Bougainville reports

But Makiba angered Bougainville by unilaterally announcing changes to the nature of that vote.

Bougainville’s Minister of Independence Mission Implementation, Ezekiel Massatt, said the PNG government has switched from the agreed simple majority of votes to an absolute majority, which is two-thirds of the 118 MPs.

“We are unhappy about that particular aspect. We think, that while the NEC (PNG National Executive Council) has the authority to initiate matters that go before Parliament, it’s a matter that should have been run past our side and we could have that argument of whether it should be a simple majority or an absolute majority.”

No confidence in Marape government
Massatt said what transpired in the last session of Parliament gave the Bougainville leadership no confidence that they could achieve independence under a government led by Prime Minister James Marape.

He said they are putting as many obstacles in the way of Bougainville independence as possible, including the ongoing debacle over finance, despite Makiba claiming Bougainville was the biggest recipient of funding among the 22 provinces.

Bougainville, under the Peace Agreement, is guaranteed funding called the Peace and Restoration Grants, which Massatt estimates is now a billion kina (NZ$453 million) in arrears.

Added to this are the annual provincial grants and a separate promise from Prime Minister Marape of 100 million kina (NZ$45 million) each year for several years.

But Massatt said this money is not coming through, or at the very most just trickling through.

Marape told Parliament the Bougainville issue remained the single biggest matter before MPs.

He said his government was committed to seeing the Bougainville Peace Agreement process through to its proper conclusion.

Shareholding not transferred
The Prime Minister also told MPs the government had followed through on its promise to give its 36 percent shareholding in Bougainville Copper Ltd (BCL) to the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG), but that had not happened.

The ABG has earmarked the re-opening of the Panguna mine, which was run by BCL, as a critical part of establishing the region’s economic viability.

Attempts to reach Makiba for comment on the matters raised by Ezekiel Massatt, have, so far, been unsuccessful.

A Joint Supervisory Body meeting, where representatives of both governments discuss issues pertinent to them, is set to be held in Madang in two weeks time.

A non-binding referendum held in Bougainville in 2019 resulted in 97.7 percent of Bougainvilleans supporting independence.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The pro-independence United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) has welcomed Vanuatu Deputy Prime Minister Jotham Napat’s comments on West Papua during this week’s diplomatic visit to Indonesia.

In a joint press conference with Indonesian Vice-President Ma’ruf Amin, Napat restated his commitment to the “Melanesian way”.

Movement president Benny Wenda has issued a statement saying that hearing those words, “I was reminded of Vanuatu’s founding Father Walter Lini, who said that ‘Vanuatu will not be entirely free until all Melanesia is free from colonial rule’ — West Papua and Kanaky included.”

• READ MORE: Other Vanuatu and West Papua reports

The Melanesian way had been shown in full membership of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) being extended to the Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS), despite them representing a Melanesian people rather than a Melanesian state [New Caledonia], Wenda said.

It has also been demonstrated in Papua New Guinea’s approach to Bougainville, where Prime Minister Marape showed true moral courage by respecting their right to self-determination with a 98 percent vote in favour of independence in 2019.

“Vanuatu has always shown the same courage in supporting West Papuan freedom. By referencing the Melanesian way in the joint press conference, Deputy Napat was conveying to Indonesia the message Moses gave to Phaoroah: ‘let my people go’,” Wenda said.

“As West Papuans we are also committed to Melanesian values. This is why we have turned to our Melanesian family in seeking full membership of the MSG.

Vanuatu ‘steadfast in support’
“In their role as chair of the Melanesian Spearhead Group, Vanuatu has been steadfast in supporting ULMWP full membership.

“At this crucial hour, we need all Melanesian leaders to show the same commitment, and help bring West Papua home to its Melanesian family.

“Indonesia must respect Vanuatu and other Melanesian nations by allowing the fulfillment of this decades-long dream.”

To resolve the West Papuan issue peacefully in the Melanesian way, the first step was admitting the ULMWP as a full member of the MSG at the forthcoming summit of the group, Wenda said.

The joint Indonesia-Vanuatu foreign ministers media statement from Jakarta.

Jakarta announces ‘development steering committee’
RNZ Pacific reports that the joint talks between Vanuatu and Indonesia this week had West Papua high on the agenda

The talks have come amid tensions in the region, and ahead of a state visit next month to Papua New Guinea by Indonesian President Joko Widodo.

Indonesia’s state-owned news agency Antara reports Vice-President Amin meeting with Minister Napat in Jakarta on Monday.

Vanuatu has strongly supported the pro-independence push in West Papua for many years and Antara reports the issue of conflict in the Melanesian region was discussed.

Amin announced a Papua Special Autonomy Development Acceleration Steering Committee had been formed to evaluate development in the Papua region.

“The granting of this special autonomy has been planned for the long term up to 2042,” he said.

Amin said Indonesia “respected the diversity” in West Papua.

Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama today condemned a visiting Papua New Guinean member of Parliament for “mocking” the autonomous region’s independence aspirations during a drunken exchange in Buka last week, saying that he must “atone for his blunder”.

A video of Ijivitari MP David Arore allegedly abusing security guards and airport staff while getting ready to board a plane out of Buka last Friday has stirred wide condemnation by national and Bougainville leaders.

“Let us take this criticism in our stride and use this as motivation to continue to develop and progress,” President Toroama said in a statement, adding that sovereignty was “rightfully ours to claim”.

• READ MORE: President Toroama’s response to David Arore’s behaviour
• Makiba not impressed by Arore’s drunken behaviour
• Other Bougainville independence reports

“We are a people who have withstood tougher challenges than the words of a drunken man,” he said.

Arore’s visit to Bougainville was part of a delegation led by the Minister for Bougainville Affairs, Mannaseh Makiba. The visit was to help national MPs better understand the autonomous arrangements on Bougainville and meet local leaders and the people.

Toroama said the trip was a success but strongly criticised the behaviour of MP Arore, saying he did not have the “right to use it to insult our leaders and our people”.

“Sovereignty is rightfully ours to claim, we have paid for it with the unfair exploitation of our resources, our lives and the blood of the people who sacrificed their lives fighting for their freedom in an unjust war,” President Toroama said, referring to the now-closed rich Panguna copper mine and the decade-long civil war over the exploitation and environmental degradation.

Unfair comparison
It was unfair for Arore to even compare infrastructure development on Bougainville to that of the rest of the country because Bougainville was a post-conflict region that was only now “steadily gaining traction on development and peace”.

“Bougainville bankrolled PNG’s independence and set the very foundation for every form of development in this country,” President Toroama said.

“Subsequently, we had a war waged on our people by the very same government we built.

“You [Arore] can mock our shortcomings in development but do not mock the sanctity of our aspirations to be an independent nation.”

President Toroama thanked Bougainvilleans who witnessed Arore’s “tirade of insults” directed at the Air Niugini and National Airports Corporation (NAC) staff for “maintaining civility”.

“In this respect we proved that despite his inebriated state and the discourteous behaviour our people still showed respect for the office that he occupies as a national leader.”

But President Toroama called for an investigation, saying Arore “understands our Melanesian traditions” and he was “stlll subservient to the law”.

Minister apologises
A PNG Post-Courier report by Gorethy Kenneth and Miriam Zarriga said the delegation leader, Bougainville Affairs Minister Manasseh Makibe, had apologised for the behaviour of MP Arore.

“We left in good note. However, such behaviour by an MP is wrong and unacceptable,” Makiba said.

“We will not allow the unfortunate incident to deter the progress we have made and good working relationship we have with Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) leadership and people.

“We were not aware of this incident until now. Generally, our visit was well appreciated by ABG.

“I apologise for Mr Arore’s behaviour.”

According to reports, Arore insinuated that Bougainville’s independence was “not negotiable”, among other derogative comments he made at that time.

Arore told the Post-Courier he would not apologise as what he had said was not intended to upset Bougainville, its people and the leadership.

“I will not apologise. I have nothing to apologise for because I did not say something wrong, I did not abuse anyone and there was no commotion,” Arore claimed.

“All I said was, ‘Yumi laik kisim independence (if we want independence), yumi stretim balus na stretim hausik (we must fix our airport and our hospital)’.

“I said these same sentiments in Manus, where I said to the leaders there, ‘Manus has a big and very good airport but the town is in shambles’.

“I think we have made this very minor issue a very big one.”

‘We’ll have him arrested’
Police Commissioner David Manning said the incident of a MP allegedly drunk and disorderly on a flight would be investigated with him waiting on NAC and Air Niugini for a report and complaint.

“We will have him arrested. We are awaiting the NAC and Air Niugini,” he said.

Civil Aviation Minister Walter Schnaubelt said: “He (Arore) was also allowed to board the plane drunk, which is a security breach.

“So (we are) getting a report from our team on the ground so further preventative action can be taken. This sort of behaviour must not be tolerated, and we leaders must lead by example at all times.”

MP Arore is a member of PNG’s parliamentary law and order committee. The Ijivitari Open electorate is in Oro province.

In 2019, a non-binding independence referendum was held in Bougainville with 98.31 percent of voters supporting independence from Papua New Guinea.

Report compiled from Bougainville News and the PNG Post-Courier with permission.

On the 61st anniversary of the first raising of West Papua’s symbol of independence — 1 December 1961 — the Morning Star flag:

We, the Indigenous caucus of the movement for self-determination, decolonisation, nuclear justice, and demilitarisation of the Pacific, call for coordinated action for key campaigns that impact the human rights, sovereignty, wellbeing and prosperity of Pacific peoples across our region.

As guardians of our Wansolwara (Tok Pisin term meaning “One Salt Water,” or “One Ocean, One People”), we are united in seeking the protection, genuine security and vitality for the spiritual, cultural and economic base for our lives, and we will defend it at all costs. We affirm the kōrero of the late Father Walter Lini, “No one is free, until everyone is free!”

• LISTEN TO RNZ MORNING REPORT: Activists, academics fight plans to put nuclear waste in Pacific Ocean

We thank the mana whenua of Ōtepoti, Te Ao o Rongomaraeroa, the National Centre for Peace and Conflict and Kā Rakahau o Te Ao Tūroa Centre for Sustainability at the University of Otago for their hospitality in welcoming us as their Pacific whānau to their unceded and sovereign lands of Aotearoa.

We acknowledge the genealogy of resistance we share with community activists who laid the mat in our shared struggles in the 1970s and 1980s. Our gathering comes 40 years after the first Te Hui Oranga o Te Moana Nui a Kiwa, hosted by the Pacific Peoples Anti Nuclear Action Committee (PPANAC) at Tātai Hono in Tamaki Makaurau.

Self-determination and decolonisation
We remain steadfast in our continuing solidarity with our sisters and brothers in West Papua, who are surviving from and resisting against the Indonesian genocidal regime, injustice and oppression. We bear witness for millions of West Papuans murdered by this brutal occupation. We will not be silent until the right to self-determination of West Papua is fully achieved.

We urge our Forum leaders to follow through with Indonesia to finalise the visit from the UN Commissioner for Human Rights to West Papua, as agreed in the Leaders Communiqué 2019 resolution.

We are united in reaffirming the inalienable right of all Indigenous peoples to self-determination and demand the sovereignty of West Papua, Kanaky, Mā’ohi Nui, Bougainville, Hawai’i, Guåhan, the Northern Mariana Islands, Rapa Nui, Aotearoa, and First Nations of the lands now called Australia.

Of priority, we call on the French government to implement the United Nations self-governing protocols in Mā’ohi Nui and Kanaky. We urge France to comply with the resolution set forth on May 17th, 2013 which declared French Polynesia to be a non-self-governing territory, and the successive resolutions from 2013 to 2022. The “empty seat policy” that the administering power has been practising since 2013 and attempts to remove Mā’ohi Nui from the list of countries to be decolonised have to stop. We call on France to immediately resume its participation in the work of the C-24 and the 4th Commission of the United Nations.

Nuclear justice
We grieve for the survivors and victims who lost their lives to the nuclear violence caused by over 315 nuclear weapons detonated in Marshall Islands, Australia, Kiribati, Johnston Atoll and Mā’ohi Nui by the United States, United Kingdom/Australia and France. The legacy and ongoing nuclear violence in our region is unfinished business and calls for recognition, reconciliation and reparations to be made by nuclear colonisers are long overdue.

We call for the United States, United Kingdom/Australia and France to deliver fair and just
compensation to Indigenous civilians, workers and servicemen for the health and environmental harms, including intergenerational trauma caused by nuclear testing programs (and subsequent illegal medical experiments in the Marshall Islands). The compensation schemes currently in place in all states constitute a grave political failure of these aforementioned nuclear testing states and serve to deceive the world that they are recognising their responsibility to address the nuclear legacy. We call for the United States, United Kingdom/Australia, and France to establish or otherwise significantly improve
accessible healthcare systems and develop and fund cancer facilities within the Marshall Islands, Kiribati/Australia and Mā’ohi Nui respectively, where alarming rates of cancers, birth defects and other related diseases continue to claim lives and cause socio-economic distress to those affected. The descendants of the thousands of dead and the thousands of sick are still waiting for real justice to be put in place with the supervision of the international community.

We demand that the French government take full responsibility for the racist genocidal health effects of nuclear testing on generations of Mā’ohi and provide full transparency, rapid assessment and urgent action for nuclear contamination risks. While the President of France boasts on the international stage of his major environmental and ecological transition projects, in the territory of Mā’ohi Nui, the French government’s instructions are to definitively “turn the page of nuclear history.” This is a white-washing and colonial gas-lighting attitude towards the citizens and now the mokopuna of Mā’ohi Nui. It is
imperative for France to produce the long-awaited report on the environmental, economic and sanitary consequences of its 193 nuclear tests conducted between 1966 and 1996.

We proclaim our commitment to the abolition of nuclear weapons and call all states of the Pacific region who have not done so to sign and ratify the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), namely Australia, the Solomon Islands, Tonga, Papua New Guinea, the Federated States of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands. We urge Pacific nations along with the world’s governments to contribute to the international trust fund for victims of nuclear weapons implemented by the TPNW. We urge Aotearoa/New Zealand and other states who have ratified the TPNW to follow through on their commitment to nuclear survivors, and to create a world free from the threat and harm of nuclear weapons through the universalisation of the TPNW. There can be no peace without justice.

We oppose the despicable proposal of Japan and the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) to dump 1.3 million tonnes of radioactive wastewater next year in 2023, and support in solidarity with the citizens of Japan, East Asian states and Micronesian states who sit on the frontlines of this crisis. This is an act of trans-boundary harm upon the Pacific. We call on the New Zealand government and others to stay true to its commitment to a Nuclear Free Pacific and bring a case under the international tribunal for the Law of the Sea against the proposed radioactive release from TEPCO’s Fukushima Daiichi planned from 2023 to 2053.

Demilitarisation
We condemn the geopolitical order forced upon our nations by imperial powers, who claim to be our friends, yet treat our islands as collateral damage and use financial blackmail to bully us into submission. We demand that the United States remove and remediate all military bases, infrastructure, debris and nuclear and chemical waste from the Pacific. Of priority is the US-owned nuclear waste storage site of Runit Dome on Enewetak Atoll which threatens nuclear contamination of the ocean and marine-life, on which our lives depend. Furthermore, we call for all remaining American UXOs (unexploded ordnances) from World War II in the Solomon Islands, which cause the preventable deaths of more than 20 people every year to be removed immediately!

We support in solidarity with Kānaka Maoli and demand the immediate end to the biennial RIMPAC (Rim of the Pacific) exercises hosted in Honolulu, Hawai’i. We urge all the present participating militaries of RIMPAC to withdraw their participation in the desecration and plunder of Indigenous lands and seas. We support in solidarity with the Marianas and demand an end to munitions testing in the Northern Marianas and the development of new military bases. We rebuke the AUKUS trilateral military pact and the militarisation of unceded Aboriginal lands of the northern arc of Australia and are outraged at Australia’s plans to permit further military bases, six nuclear-capable B52s and eight nuclear-powered submarines to use our Pacific Ocean as a military playground and nuclear highway.

We call on all those committed to ending militarism in the Pacific to gather and organise in Hawai’i between 6-16 June 2024, during the Festival of the Pacific and bring these issues to the forefront to renew our regional solidarity and form a new coalition to build power to oppose all forms of military exercises (RIMPAC also returns in July -August 2024) and instead promote the genuine security of clean water, safe housing, healthcare and generative economies, rather than those of extraction and perpetual readiness for war.

We view colonial powers and their militaries to be the biggest contributors to the climate crisis, the continued extractive mining of our lands and seabeds and the exploitation of our resources. These exacerbate and are exacerbated by unjust structures of colonialism, militarism and geopolitical abuse. This environmental destruction shifts the costs to Pacific and Indigenous communities who are responsible for less than 1 percent of global climate emissions.

As Pacific peoples deeply familiar with the destruction of nuclear imperialism, we strongly disapprove of the new propaganda of nuclear industry lobbyists, attempting to sell nuclear power as the best solution for climate change. Similarly, we oppose the Deep Sea Mining (DSM) industry lobbyists that promote DSM as necessary for green technologies. We call for a Fossil Fuel Non-proliferation Treaty to be implemented by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and for safe and equitable transition to better energy solutions. We reject any military solution for the climate crisis!

We recognise the urgent need for a regional coordinator to be instituted to strategise collective grassroots movements for self-determination, decolonisation, nuclear justice and demilitarisation.

Our existence is our resistance.

We, the guardians of our Wansolwara, are determined to carry on the legacy and vision for a Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific.

• More information

The Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) wants to delay the next meeting of the Joint Supervisory Body with the Papua New Guinea government, claiming Port Moresby is “dragging the chain” on drawing up critical constitutional regulations..

The key focus of the ABG is on achieving independence by 2027 by the latest.

This latest dispute comes despite both governments committing last April to the Era Kone Covenant which lays out how the independence referendum results would be tabled in the national Parliament, and the manner in which that institution may ratify the results.

• READ MORE: Other reports on Bougainville independence

At that time Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama commended the national government for its unwavering support for the Bougainville Peace Process.

He said the Era Kone Covenant laid out a timeline and a roadmap for the ratification of the referendum results in the national Parliament.

PNG Prime Minister James Marape at the time reaffirmed his commitment to the outcomes, saying his government would continue to work within the spirit of the peace agreement.

“We’ve established a pathway that we should work towards and we on the national government side, I just want to assure Bougainville that it doesn’t matter who sits in this chair in 3 months’ time, the work for Bougainville has been set and the work we have set will continue on,” Marape said.

Failed to engage
But a national government’s technical team has since failed to engage with its Bougainville counterparts to develop a jointly agreed draft of the regulations.

ABG Minister Ezekiel Masatt said this week this lack of commitment from the national government has frustrated the ABG leadership and prompted its call for a deferral of the Joint Supervisory Body meeting.

The PNG government, and its technical team, have called for nationwide consultations on the Bougainville issue, but Masatt said the ABG’s position was that ratification of the outcome of the consultation on independence was for the national Parliament and not all the citizens of PNG.

He said there was no legal basis for such a proposed nationwide consultation.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama says Bougainville’s future as an independent sovereign nation is inevitable and nothing can change the resolve of the government and people from achieving sovereignty.

And he warned in the Autonomous Bougainville Parliament that no foreign government or foreign leader would dictate to Bougainville the outcome of the Bougainville peace process.

He said it was an outcome that would be negotiated with the government of PNG through the legal framework that guided this process.

• READ MORE: Other reports on Bougainville’s future

In his address to the ABG Parliament, An irate Toroama responded to the Australian Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles whose remarks on Bougainville’s political future were addressing the members of the House of Representatives.

“From the outset, let me say it once more within this Honourable House that Bougainville’s future as an independent sovereign nation is inevitable,” the president said.

“There is nothing that can change the resolve of our government and our people from achieving sovereignty as an independent nation.

“I would like to comment on the statement by the Australian Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Marles whose remarks on Bougainville’s political future has finally made Australia’s position very clear.

Australia ‘bargained neutrality’
“Australia has bargained their neutrality in the Bougainville peace process for the sake of geopolitical manoeuvering and maintaining control of the Pacific region from their perceived threat of Chinese influence in the region.

“Deputy Prime Minister Marles claims Australia is being neutral in the Bougainville peace process.

“However, his remarks pledging Australia’s support to the government of Papua New Guinea just as we are preparing for the ratification contradicts his statement.

“The pledge can be viewed as a calculated move to intimidate Bougainville and pre-empt the outcome of the ratification by the National Parliament of Papua New Guinea.

“As a witness and signatory to the Bougainville Peace Agreement, the Australian Government should maintain its neutrality instead of pre-empting the outcome of our political future.”

Direct intervention
In principle, this pre-emptive act in itself was a direct intervention by the Australian government on the internal affairs of Papua New Guinea.

“It is an action that will directly influence the National Government.”

This had given rise to questions on Australia’s continued involvement in the peace process and their presence on Bougainville.

“As President of Bougainville, I am not in a position to comment nor speculate on the foreign policy of foreign governments who have diplomatic relations with Papua New Guinea.

“Though we do not have foreign affairs powers, countries dealing with Bougainville must understand that our political arrangements are not the same as the other provincial governments of Papua New Guinea.”

Gorethy Kenneth is a PNG Post-Courier journalist. Republished with permission.

The tears came freely as the birth of the new nation of Papua New Guinea was heralded by a new flag — the Glorious Red, Black and Gold.

Tears of joy, tears of freedom, tears of sadness, all rolled into one on the momentous occasion of the end of an era of colonialism.

Julius Chan, then a raw young politician and a prolific crusader for the cause of independence, remembers the occasion like it was yesterday.

• READ MORE: Auckland’s PNG community celebrates Independence Day

And his tears overwhelmed the man from New Ireland, which implored an euphoric realisation of freedom after years of political bickering against Australia.

On the morning of 16 September 1975, the flag of Australia was lowered at the Sir Hubert Murray Stadium in Port Moresby.

With pomp and ceremony, the flag of the new nation of Papua New Guinea — the Kumul soaring over the Southern Cross constellation — was raised to signify the birth of our country.

These are solemn moments.

Flag raising touched hearts
The flag raising touched the hearts and lives of the people who were there, who were witnesses of a dramatic shift in colonization and democracy.

Many people cried, many in sadness and many more in joy. It is a moment etched in time, a proud moment of nationhood.

One man who was there, and who has carried the country through thick and thin is PNG’s longest serving parliamentarian and the Last Knight Standing, Sir Julius Chan.

In an exclusive interview with the Post-Courier’s senior reporter Gorethy Kenneth, Sir Julius remembers the solemnity of the moment.

“I shed tears of joy and sadness, the old had ended, and a new was beginning,” Sir Julius reminisced.

“I do remember very clearly the Australian flag being lowered, folded and presented by John Guise to Prince Charles — now our King Charles III — who then presented it to the Australian Governor-General Sir John Kerr.

“And when the Papua New Guinea flag was hoisted, at that very moment, how I felt? …well, very sensational, I was proud, a sensation of final achievement of a goal in life, I had my head down, first, I tilted my head up watching the flag being raised, and each time the PNG flag was raised by the bearers, there was feeling of pride, sensation,” he said.

Finally ‘broken free’
“I had a few tears, I felt, in my gut, for the first time that I had finally broken free of the colonial yoke, that is when I knew we were free. That was probably the most memorable moment.

“It is 47 years now and my greatest wish is that we make the best of what we have, never give up and don’t expect anything from nothing and everything.

“Life is not meant to be easy and to achieve anything in life; we got to work for it.

“And also probably we really have to reiterate corruption — corruption is so bad and it’s not paid for by the ordinary people that they playing with little games, corruption is wild at the top, that’s what I really think and that the three arms of government must act in accordance with the constitutional spirit of the constitution.

“They must not fear to intervene in the area in which the Constitution requires them to.

“It’s all about justice delayed is the cause and the root of all the evils happening today.”

Sir Julius said that at the stroke of midnight on September 1975 a fireworks display lit up the Port Moresby sky to signal the beginning of independence for Papua New Guinea.

The Australian flag, which had been flown since 1906, was lowered for the last time at dusk on 16 September 1975 and handed to Prince Charles, the heir to the British throne, who passed it on to Australia’s Governor General, Sir John Kerr.

Drums beat all night
All through the day and night, the beat of drums could be heard as members of tribes from all over the new nation of jungles and mountainous islands danced in celebration of their new identity.

Papua New Guinea, a nation of 2.6 million inhabitants most of whom lived in very rural settings, had to deal with a situation. Fifteen days before the independence, a declaration of independence was made on September 1 by a secessionist movement on Bougainville.

This declaration which posed a direct threat to the new central government’s authority was dispelled.

“We were still united,” Sir Julius said.

“Our Independence Day celebrations were massive and probably organised on a scale far superior to any other form of gathering in the country before or since.

“You ask anybody why 16 September 1975 was chosen as the official date, I do not think they could tell you.

“Perhaps it was nominated because it was convenient for the Australian Governor-General Sir John Kerr, or for Prince Charles, who came as the Queen’s special representative.

“Gough Whitlam as Prime Minister of Australia came, as well as Malcolm Fraser, who was then opposition leader.”

Good job governing
Australia had governed the enormous, rugged land, and had done a good job.

“I believe what they did was quite appropriate for a country at that stage of development,” he said.

“Any other colonial power such as Britain or Germany would run PNG in a completely different way. Australia was a very young country as they had only come into a Federation in 1901 and they were not entrenched in colonial rule, they themselves were treading on new ground.”

The flag lowering ceremony and fireworks display marked the end of efforts by the Australian Government of Prime Minister Gough Whitlam to thrust Papua New Guinea into independence and thus rid itself of the stigma of colonial rule.

Speaking at the ceremony, Sir John Guise, the first Governor-General of Papua New Guinea, said it was important that people realised the spirit in which the flag was being lowered.

“We are lowering it,” he said, “not tearing it down.”

Sir John Kerr said the ceremony did not mark the end of Australia’s interest in Papua New Guinea or involvement with it.

Australia, he said, “remains deeply and irrevocably committed to Papua New Guinea.”

But for 39-year-old Michael Somare, the last chief minister during colonial rule and now the nation’s first prime minister, and for other members of his government, Australia’s concern and involvement could be greater than it is.

Republished with permission.

Prime Minister James Marape says Papua New Guineans will be consulted on key constitutional questions relating to Bougainville’s 97.7 percent vote for independence.

In his maiden speech after being voted in as the country’s 9th Prime Minister, he said the issue infringed on PNG’s national unity and it touched on sovereignty, which was a huge constitutional burden for the government and the people.

He said the Autonomous Region of Bougainville was an important agenda for his government and that by 2024 the referendum vote issue would be brought to Parliament.

• READ MORE: Other PNG elections reports

“This question for Bougainville is a test to our national union. We will consult with the rest of the country because our people must have a say,” Marape said in his speech.

“This year and first half of next year we will consult the country on some of the key constitutional questions and we will work to the plan that we set out in Wabag, in that by 2024 we bring the matter to Parliament.

“It is a political question so a political solution must be found.

“I have and continue to have one vote. But the question on altering our national boundary is a constitutional matter, and the entire nation must be consulted. The result of the referendum stands as high as Mt Wilhelm. It cannot be diluted.

“We will deliver on that political commitment to find that political solution that is mutually acceptable to Bougainville and Papua New Guinea.

“The journey is still a long way ahead … when our union is in question, it infringes on our national unity, it touches on our sovereignty which is a huge constitutional burden on us.

“Our union together was placed together by the constitutional definition in 1975, it will only take a constitutional amendment to unbundle this union.

“I want to ask Bougainvilleans, fear not, Papua New Guineans fear not. Let’s take this journey together and we find a political solution to this political question to our people in Bougainville.”

Gorethy Kenneth is a PNG Post-Courier senior journalist. Republished with permission.

Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama has visited Guava village in the heartland of the Panguna mine in Central Bougainville to pay his respects to the resting place of Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) leader Francis Ona.

It was the first time President Toroama had visited Guava in 25 years after the 1997 Roreinang coup that split the BRA into two factions.

Ona, who was president and supreme commander of the BRA, favoured a “fight to the last man’’ strategy.

• READ MORE: Bougainville war and peace

The other faction, headed by his second-in-command Joseph Kabui, wanted a peaceful solution to the Bougainville Civil War.

President Toroama, who was then the BRA’s chief of defence, sided with Kabui and so began the peace talks that would result in a ceasefire and the eventual signing of the Bougainville Peace Agreement in 2001.

Ona remained in Panguna with his Mekamui faction.

“As a young man, in 1989 I joined many others in the Bougainville Civil War,” Toroama said.

“We were not called, nor were we recruited.

‘Revolutionary ideals’
“We simply believed in Francis Ona’s revolutionary ideals to protect the land and our people,’’ Toroama said.

“Within the first 18 months, we had closed the Panguna mine and began our fight for political independence.

“We started the revolution with bows and arrows in 1989 but towards the end we were launching offensives against the security forces with better equipment and tactics.

“From 1989 to 1997 we gave our lives to protect Francis Ona and his dreams of independence for Bougainville,’’ President Toroama said.

“I am here today to remind the family of Francis Ona and the people of Guava and Panguna that my commitment to the revolutionary ideals of our leader has not wavered.’’

Republished with permission.

A plan to create three new provinces in the Papua region highlights how Jakarta’s development approach has failed to resolve a long-running conflict.

In April of this year, Indonesia’s Parliament approved a plan to create three new provinces in Papua, the easternmost region of the archipelago.

Government officials have described the creation of the new administrative units as an effort to accelerate the development of the outlying region, which has long lagged behind the other more densely populated islands.

• READ MORE: Other West Papuan independence reports

But Papua’s problem isn’t a lack of development — it’s a lack of justice for West Papuans.

In the plan to subdivide Indonesia’s two most sparsely populated provinces — Papua and West Papua — many people sense a kind of “end game” strategy by Indonesia’s government that is expected to worsen the long-running conflict in Papua, something countries in the region can ill afford to ignore.

The province plan comes in the twilight of President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo’s second and final term in office, a term marked by an escalation of violence between fighters of the pro-independence West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB) and the Indonesian security forces.

Jokowi has ordered huge military operations in the central regencies of Nduga, Puncak Jaya, Intan Jaya, Maybrat and regions near the border with Papua New Guinea (PNG).

1960s armed wing
The TPNPB is the armed wing of the Organisasi Papua Merdeka (OPM), or Free Papua Movement, which was created in the 1960s by so-called West Papuan freedom fighters.

They opposed the Indonesian Army, which had begun occupying parts of West Papua after the Dutch withdrew in 1962, even before the United Nations Temporary Executive Authority had completed its period of mandated administration in 1963.

After Papua officially joined Indonesia in a 1969 UN referendum that many Papuans view as flawed, the OPM grew rapidly in the late 1970s, with fighters joining its ranks across West Papua. Their operations mainly consisted of attacking Indonesian patrols.

In 1984, when a West Papuan insurgent attack sparked large Indonesian military deployments in and around the capital Jayapura, the subsequent brutal sweep operations triggered a mass exodus of around 10,000 Papuan refugees to PNG.

At the time, when questioned in Jakarta about the impacts of military operations in Papua, a leading Indonesian Foreign Ministry official shrugged it off and stated that the government was introducing colour television in Papua and was doing its best to accelerate development there.

Nearly 40 years later, with the Papuan conflict reaching a new pitch of tension, the government’s narrative has barely changed.

Conflict continues at the cost of mass displacement in Papua’s highlands. Human rights bodies have stated that intensified bursts of fighting between TPNPB guerrillas and the Indonesian army since late 2018 have displaced at least 60,000 Papuans.

Figures hard to verify
Exact figures remain difficult to verify because Jakarta still obstructs access to the region for foreign media and human rights workers. Since the Indonesian takeover of Papua in the 1960s, West Papua’s history has been marked by persistent human rights abuses.

In recent years, the UN Human Rights Commissioner has repeatedly pressed for access to the region, without success.

In April, Jokowi’s cabinet, including Home Affairs Minister Tito Karnavian, a former police chief, and fellow hardliner Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto, introduced a draft for a long-anticipated creation of three new provinces — Central Papua, South Papua, and Central Highlands Papua –– in addition to the two existing provinces of Papua and West Papua.

This initiative has met with strong opposition from indigenous Papuans. Well before the recent cabinet decision, Papua’s provincial Governor Lukas Enembe warned against it, fearing new provinces could pave the way for more transmigrants and more problems for Papuans, although in recent days he has reportedly offered qualified support for dividing Papua based on customary territories.

He was not alone in speaking up. On May 10, thousands of Papuans from the Papuan provinces and in major cities in other parts of Indonesia took to the streets to protest Jakarta’s creation of extra provinces.

Protests were met head on by heavy security forces responses including the use of water cannons and detention. Papuans were frustrated because their views had not been incorporated in Jakarta’s decision making.

As Emanuel Gobay, director of the Papua Legal Aid Institute, told The Diplomat, the region’s Special Autonomy Law, passed in 2001, requires the central government to conduct a public survey starting from the village level to the head of districts where the expansion will be carried out.

“The central government has introduced the planned expansion policy on its own initiative, without any aspirations from the grassroots communities,” Gobay explained.

Delineated history
For years, the Indonesian government has characterised West Papua as being backward in terms of social and human development, claiming that it needs Indonesian help to advance.

Certainly, poverty has been a problem in Papua, but that’s not unique across the republic. Yet, for decades Papua was effectively isolated by central government, often leaving the public in the dark about what has been going on there.

The social media age has lifted the lid on Papua a little, stirring international attention intermittently. As part of Jakarta’s response, social media bots have been deployed across the internet, spreading state propaganda and targeting human rights workers, journalists, or anyone drawing attention to Papua.

The bots say everything is good in Papua, look at all the development happening, 3G internet, roads. In a sense, it’s true that infrastructure development has increased in recent years.

Compared to neighbouring PNG, Papua and West Papua provinces are well developed in terms of basic services and roads. But it’s not necessarily the sort of development that Papuans themselves want or need.

The lack of a genuine self-determination process in the 1960s remains a core injustice that holds Papua back. Since then, thousands of indigenous Papuans have lost their lives in what is considered one of the most militarised zones in the wider region. Some research puts the death toll as high as 500,000.

One of them was Theys Eluays, a tribal chief who became a figurehead for Papuan independence aspirations and a strong critic of the first plan to divide Papua into two provinces, until he was assassinated by members of the Kopassus special forces unit in 2001.

Military elite have major interests
Indonesia’s political elite and military establishment have extensive interests in Papua’s abundant natural resource wealth. The new provincial divisions would enable more opportunities for the exploitation of these resources, largely for the benefit of people other than Papuans themselves.

The new provinces would be merely the latest in a series of delineations imposed on Papua by others, a process that runs from the marking of the western half of New Guinea as a Dutch colony in the 1880s, to the contentious transferal of control of the territory to Indonesia in the 1960s, to Jakarta’s subsequent reconfigurations of the province, especially after the enactment of the Special Autonomy Law in response to Papuan demands for independence.

The plan for further subdivisions did not emerge overnight. It has been mooted for decades by Indonesia’s powerful Golkar party as a way to cement sovereign control of the restive eastern region. In the 1980s, proposals for dividing Irian Jaya, as it was then known, into as many as six provinces were fleshed out at national seminars on regional development and gained interest from elites in Jakarta.

Even in these early seminar discussions, Papuan representatives warned that provincial splits could have a negative impact on local indigenous communities, whose interests were clearly not represented in provincial subdivision plans.

Although the idea of provincial expansion in Irian Jaya ended up on President Suharto’s desk, it hadn’t got off the ground by the time he stepped down in 1998.

During the subsequent tenure of President B.J. Habibie, Papuan tribal and civil community leaders were among the “Team of 100″ Papuans invited to the presidential palace for a dialogue, during which they asked for independence. Habibie told the Team to go home and rethink its request.

During the term of President Abdurrahman Wahid, the spiritual leader of Nahdlatul Ulama, Indonesia’s largest Islamic organisation, West Papuans were granted the concession of being able to raise the banned Papuan nationalist Morning Star flag, on the condition that it be hoisted two inches beneath the flag of the Indonesian republic.

The administration of the next president, Megawati Sukarnoputri, initiated a law that granted Papua Special Autonomy status and created a second province, West Papua (Papua Barat) — the first splitting of provinces.

Local resentment
Since Papua became a part of the Republic of Indonesia, Jakarta has introduced various laws aimed ostensibly at improving the welfare of indigenous Papuans. These have overwhelmingly been met with suspicion and skepticism by the Papuans.

Special Autonomy is widely regarded by Papuans to have failed on the promise to empower them in their own homeland, where they instead continue to be victims of racism and human rights violations, and their indigenous culture is increasingly threatened.

Due to large scale exploitation of Papua’s natural wealth, Papuans have been losing access to the forests, mountains, and rivers which were essential to their people’s way of life for centuries.

International companies such as Freeport McMoRan, Rio Tinto, BP, Shell, and multinational oil palm players operate here in commercialising Papua’s mineral, gas, forestry and other resources. There is little consideration about the sustainability of indigenous customs, which has only added to the long list of Papuan grievances.

Now that Jakarta is drawing more administrative lines through this cradle of native rainforest and immense biodiversity, Gobay expects new provinces to have three major impacts.

“First, it will create an environment for more land grabbing. Either through the granting of mining permits to foreign exploration companies or through the construction of other additional government enterprises on customary land,” he said.

“Secondly, marginalisation of Papuans on their own land would only increase,” he added.

Thirdly, he expected a rise in human rights violations.

The Papuan People’s Assembly (MRP), a cultural protection body born from the Special Autonomy Law, has filed for a judicial review of the provincial subdivision plan with Indonesia’s Constitutional Court, and asked the House of Representatives in Jakarta to postpone the New Autonomous Region Bill for Central Papua, South Papua, and Central Highlands Papua.

The court is expected to hold a hearing in the next month.

Minorities in their own land
The provincial split is bound to accelerate the steady reconfiguration of Papua’s demographics.

“If we make a rough estimate, almost 50 percent of the population of West Papua is not indigenous anymore,” said Cahyo Pamungkas of the Jakarta-based National Research and Innovation Agency.

He noted that transmigrants from other parts of Indonesia not only dominated Papua’s local economy but also its regional politics. For instance, there remain only three native Papuan representatives out of 21 legislative members in Merauke district, where some 70 percent of the population are non-Papuans.

Pamungkas also disputed the recent claims of Indonesia’s coordinating minister for legal, political and security affairs, Mahfud MD, that 82 percent of Papuans supported the proposed province splits.

“The survey should have been opened to the public. Who were interviewed and how many respondents participated? What was the survey method?” he asked, adding that such misleading statements are likely to foster additional distrust in the government.

So too can repeated arrests of young Papuans for exercising their democratic voice. Esther Haluk, a democratic rights activist from Papua, was arrested by security forces during the May 10 protests.

“New provinces will pave the way for more new military bases, new facilities for security apparatus. More military, more opposition, more human rights violations. This is like reinstating the Suharto era all over again in Papua,” she said.

Sectarian tensions
Sectarian tensions between indigenous Papuans and Indonesian settlers remain a tinderbox, particularly since major anti-racism protests in 2019. A disturbing factor in the deadly unrest around those protests was the role of pro-Indonesian militias, recalling the violence-soaked last days of Timor-Leste prior to its independence in 2002.

More transmigrants could pave way for more conflict in Papua, and more conflict could potentially justify more military deployment, which adds to the climate of persistent human rights abuses against Papuans.

Haluk said newly arrived migrants are often favored by officials in being able to take up local privileges such as jobs within the public service and government, especially if they have relatives already in Papua. Many have also been able to buy land.

“This is a real form of settler colonialism, a form of colonization that aims to replace the indigenous people of the colonised area with settlers from colonial society,” she said. “In this type of colonialism, indigenous people are not only threatened with losing their territory, but also their way of life and identity that’s been passed down to them from generation to generation.”

Regional implications
By exacerbating conflict in West Papua, the provinces plan could also prove problematic for neighbouring countries, none more so than PNG. Through no fault of its own, PNG has long been lumped with spillover problems from the conflict in West Papua, including the movement of arms and military actors across the two regions’ porous 750km border, refugees fleeing from Indonesian authorities, and the displacement of village communities in the border area.

The covid-19 pandemic also showed that when things get bad on the western side of the border, the problem spreads to PNG, beyond the control of either government.

PNG leaders have cordial exchanges with Indonesian counterparts but the Melanesian government is all too aware of the power imbalance when it comes to the elephant in the room, West Papua.

PNG’s Petroleum Minister Kerenga Kua, who has previously travelled to Jakarta as a member of high-level government delegations, attested to the limited options available to PNG for addressing the West Papua crisis.

“PNG has no capacity to raise the issue,” Kua said. “We can express our concern and our grief and disappointment over the manner in which the Indonesian government is administering its responsibilities over the people of West Papua.

“However there’s nothing much else we can do, especially when larger powers in our region like Australia remain tight-lipped over the issue. Of what constructive value would it be for PNG to venture into that landscape without proper support?”

He added: “So we are very guarded about what we say, because there’s no doubt about the concern that we have in this country.”

Refugees there to stay
Kua says many West Papuans who came across the border as refugees are there to stay: “We don’t complain about that. We just feel that this part of the country is theirs as much as the other side of the island is theirs.”

PNG’s policy on West Papua, where it rarely exercises a voice, has left it looking weak on the issue. The most vocal of the leading political players in PNG, the governor of the National Capital District, Powes Parkop, says that for too long, PNG government policy on West Papua has been dictated by fear of Indonesia and assumptions that make it convenient for leaders to not do anything about it.

While PNG hopes the West Papua problem will go away, Indonesia’s government is also burying its head in the sand by portraying West Papua’s problems as a development issue.

“It’s a human rights issue and we should solve it at that level. It’s about the right to self-determination,” Parkop said.

“PNG holds the key to the future peaceful resolution of Papua. If we rise above our fear and be bold and brave by having an open dialogue with the Indonesian government, I’m sure we’ll make progress.”

Following upcoming elections in PNG, a new government will take power in early August. It’s unwise to bet on the result, but former Prime Minister Peter O’Neill is one of the contenders to take office, and he, more than incumbent James Marape, has been able to project PNG’s role as a regional leader among the Pacific Islands.

He is also one of the few to have expressed strong concern about human rights abuses and violence against West Papuans.

‘Hope government will be brave’
“I hope the new government will be brave enough and have a constructive dialogue with Indonesia’s government so we can find a long-lasting solution,” Parkop said.

“As long as Indonesia and PNG continue to pretend it won’t go away, it will only get worse, and it is getting worse.”

Parkop added that because of the huge economic potential of New Guinea, “the future can be brighter for both sides if the problem is confronted with honesty”.

According to Kua, Indonesia’s government made a commitment to empowering Papuans to run their own territory within the structure of the Republic, a pledge which should be honored. Regional support would help encourage Indonesia in this direction.

“Australia, New Zealand, PNG, those of us from the Pacific all have to stand united until some other wholesale answers are found to the plight of the people of West Papua,” he said. “The interim relief is to continue to press for increased delegated powers to (Papua). So they have more and more say about their own destiny.”

The Papuan independence movement has managed to gain a foothold in the regional architecture, most notably with the admission of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) to the Melanesian Spearhead Group regional bloc, whose founding aim is the decolonisation of all Melanesian peoples. But Indonesia’s successful diplomatic efforts in the region have provided a counterweight to regional calls for Papuan independence.

However, 2019 saw a rare moment of regional unity when the Pacific Islands Forum, which is made up of 18 member countries, including French territories New Caledonia and French Polynesia, resolved to push Indonesia to allow the UN Human Rights Commissioner access to Papua to produce an independent report on the situation.

Human rights unity stalled
Then the pandemic came along and the matter stalled.

“Following that, the Pacific Island states who are members of the ACP (African, Caribbean and Pacific bloc) supported the same resolution at (its) General Assembly in Kenya,” said Vanuatu’s opposition leader Ralph Regenvanu, who was foreign minister at the time of the Forum resolution. Since then, he said, there had been “nothing explicit.”

Papua remains of great concern to Pacific Islanders, Regenvanu explained, noting that Indonesia’s plan for new provinces was set to cause “accelerated destruction of the natural environment and the social fabric, more dissipation of the political will.”

The Papua conflict has fallen largely on deaf ears in both Canberra and Wellington, each of which is hesitant to jeopardise its relations with Indonesia. Australia’s new Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited Jakarta soon after coming to power last month, showing that the country’s relationship with Indonesia is a priority.

But as the conflict worsens in neighboring West Papua, Australia’s involvement in training and funding of Indonesian military and police forces who are accused of human rights violations in Papua grows ever more problematic.

Under Albanese, Canberra is unlikely to spring any surprises on Jakarta regarding West Papua, but neither can it ignore the momentum for decolonisation in the Pacific without adding to the sense of betrayal Pacific Island countries feel towards Canberra over the question of climate change.

Major self-determination questions are pressing on its doorstep, both in New Caledonia, where the messy culmination of the Noumea Accord means the territory’s future status is uncertain, and in Bougainville where 98 percent of people voted for independence from PNG in a non-binding referendum in 2019.

Ratifying the referendum
PNG’s next Parliament is due to decide whether to ratify the referendum result, and while political leaders don’t wish to trigger the break-up of PNG, they know that failure to respond to such an emphatic call by Bougainvilleans would spell trouble.

While in Parkop’s view Bougainville and West Papua are not the same, there are lessons to be drawn from the two cases.

“In the past PNG has been looking at (Bougainville) from the development perspective, and we have tried so many things: changed the constitution, gave them autonomy, gave them more money, and so on.

“It did not solve the problem,” he said. “And now in PNG, it’s a reckoning time.”

He added: “So the Indonesians have to come to terms with this. Otherwise if they only see this as a development issue, they will miss the entire story, and it can only get worse, whatever they do.”

Much is riding on the Bougainville and New Caledonia questions, and fears that China could step in to back a new independent nation are part of the reason why Australia would prefer the status quo to remain in place, and probably the same for West Papua and Indonesia.

The 2006 Lombok Treaty between Indonesia and Australia, which prohibits any interference in each nation’s sovereignty, makes it hard for Canberra to speak out. But it could also play into China’s hands if Australia and New Zealand keep ignoring the requests of Pacific Island nations about West Papua.

Opportunities for resolution
Means of resolving the Papua conflict exist, but they aren’t development or military-based approaches. And as far as Jakarta is concerned, independence is out of the question.

Professor Bilveer Singh, an international relations specialist from the National Singapore University, told The Diplomat in 2019 that West Papuan independence was a pipe dream. Internal divisions among the Papuan independence movement are identified as a barrier.

The head of the ULMWP, Benny Wenda, sought to address this with decisive leadership by declaring an interim government of West Papua last year, but the move was criticised by some key players in the movement.

While Papua is unlikely to be another Timor-Leste, Singh wrote, an Aceh or Mindanao model with greater autonomy would be more achievable. Furthermore, Jakarta could allow Papuans to hoist their own colors under Indonesian sovereignty.

Declaring tribal areas as conservation regions is an option, too. More significantly, Papua could also become a self-governing state in free association with Indonesia, like the Cook Islands and Niue are with New Zealand, or even follow the model of Chechnya in Russia.

To be able to manage their own security and governance, and allow their culture to thrive, would answer a lot of Papuans’ grievances. A non-binding independence referendum, as PNG has allowed for Bougainville, would be a good starting point.

If Papuans are as content with Indonesian rule as Jakarta claims, a referendum would be instructive.

Meaningful dialogue necessary
At the very least, in a bid to stop the conflict, meaningful dialogue is necessary. Jokowi has reportedly given approval for Indonesia’s national human rights body to host a dialogue with pro-independence factions, including those residing abroad.

Leaders of the TPNPB and ULMWP have indicated they are interested in a dialogue only on condition that it is brokered by a foreign, neutral third party mandated by the UN.

The Papuans aren’t in a position to dictate such terms, unless international pressure weighs into the equation. They are however also highly unlikely to stop resisting Indonesian rule while their sense of injustice remains.

“The Papuan conflict is not about colour television or 3G internet, it’s about indigenous dignity and a stand against militarism,” Haluk said.

As well as drawing new lines on the map, the plan for more provinces in Papua draws a new line in the sand, beyond which the conflict in Indonesia’s easternmost region will become much more intractable.

No amount of development will stop this until Jakarta shifts its thinking on how to address the region’s core problem. The opposite of poverty isn’t wealth, it’s justice.

Co-authors and journalists Aprila Wayar (West Papua) and Johnny Blades (Aotearoa New Zealand) are contributors to The Diplomat. Republished with permission by the authors.

Last week the Bougainville Autonomous Government announced an agreement had been reach with Panguna landowners to reopen the island’s controversial gold and copper mine.

Once the backbone of the Papua New Guinea economy, Panguna has been idle since the civil war began more than 30 years ago — a war the mine was at least partly responsible for.

But now the leaders of the five major clans in the Panguna area — Basikang, Kurabang, Bakoringu, Barapang and Mantaa — have said they will allow the mine to reopen.

Don Wiseman of RNZ Pacific asked Islands Business specialist writer on PNG Kevin McQuillan about the significance of the decision:

KMcQ: “This is hugely significant. It’s significant for the people of Bougainville, the Bougainville Autonomous Government, the national government, and, dare I say, probably the whole region. But on the other hand, it also creates a huge dilemma for the national government. Panguna was probably the second biggest copper and gold mine in the world, and at one point and accounted for two fifths of Papua New Guinea’s GDP.

“So when it was operating, that was a huge source of income for the national government. But it wasn’t so much of course, for the people of Bougainville, which prompted the 10 years civil war in part. The other element of that civil war, apart from the poor income that the operators gave the people of Bougainville was the environmental damage to the island of Bougainville.”

DW: President Ishmael Toroama has said that being able to open Panguna again is a critical step on the road to independence, in terms of showing economic viability.

KMcQ: “Yes. And that’s reflected also in the fact that there’s been mounting pressure over the last probably 10 or more years for the mine to open because the generations coming through have had very little in the way of food, shelter, clothing, educational opportunities, so on and so forth. And a lot of that pressure to reopen has come from the younger generation, because they want the opportunities that they know exist.

“For the national government it creates the dilemma of having agreed to discuss Bougainville breaking away, but not wanting to break away. What does it do to keep Bougainville within the fold, because the potential income for not just for Bougainville but for the country as a whole is enormous — 42 percent of GDP when it was operating.

“It may not be as much when it does get back up and running, but it will certainly be a significant contributor to the PNG economy. So where [Prime Minister James] Marape and whoever takes over as prime minister, if he loses the election this year, goes with discussions on Bougainville and its independence is hugely significant for the country as a whole.”

DW: This idea that President Toroama has of it being a conduit to independence may in fact work in the other direction.

KMcQ: “Well, it all depends on the negotiating skills really. The other element that comes into play is that BCL — Bougainville Copper Ltd — is now jointly controlled by the Papua New Guinea government and the Bougainville Autonomous Government, through a company called Bougainville Minerals Ltd. They both own a 36.4 percent share in Bougainville Copper.

“Over the past few years there have been promises from the national government to transfer that 36.4 percent shareholding that the national government has to the people Bougainville, which would give it roughly 72 percent shareholding in Bougainville Copper. It’s never happened.

“The national government has held off transferring that money despite the promises that it would do so. And this is going to be a key negotiating point in the future of independence. The national government, of course, does not want Bougainville to go independent. And there are options. There are other options.

“It’s not a binary choice of either independence or not. It could be that the negotiations see the Bougainville area stay within, if you like the parameters of Papua New Guinea, but having a high degree of independence. But whatever that actually means, nobody’s really going to know until the negotiations finish.”

DW: Yes. So the PNG government could hold on to shareholding and still earn from Panguna. Even if it went to this lesser form of independence.

KMcQ: “Yes, it could. But you can really bet your bottom dollar that if the national government holds on to its 36.4 percent shareholding, which was given to it by Rio Tinto, despite those promises, that will be a matter of a court case.”

DW: Now you talk about a lot of people being very keen to see the mine reopened. But there are also many, many people who certainly don’t want to see it reopen.

KMcQ: “They do but what has given this announcement the impetus is that clan chiefs’ representatives from the five major clans from the area have agreed to this resolution to re-open the mine.

“There will always be opposition to reopening the mine. There always has been, even over the last 10 years, when previous president of Bougainville, Fr John Momis, wanted the mine to reopen.

“There was a significant minority. Well, a vocal minority is probably more accurate, deeply opposed to the reopening of mine on environmental grounds.”

DW: With these announcements the minuscule share price for Bougainville Copper has soared.

KMcQ: “Well, it has doubled on news of this announcement. And it means that BCL has a market capitalisation of around about NZ$260 to NZ$265 or NZ$270 million . The point about the doubling of the share prices is the support that it reflects for the re-opening of mine.

“Plus it also, it paves the way for a company to be a little bit more settled in the prospects of the process of reopening the mine. The last valuation that they had to reopen the mine, which was several years ago now, said that it would cost between around about NZ$6 billion to reopen the mine. But over its lifetime, it would earn roughly $75 billion.

“So it’s a high risk, high reward investment. But the fact that this resolution has been made, declared, share prices doubled. It means that Bougainville Copper is probably a lot more confident this week than it was last week that it could go ahead and do some preparatory work for the reopening of the mine, which could take five to seven years.”

DW: They are just eyewatering figures aren’t they?

KMcQ: Well, it shows the potential. I mean this is a mine that was the second biggest gold and copper mine in the world. And there will be a lot of companies, global companies keen to get involved. Rio Tinto has put its fingers into the air and sniffed the wind and it realises that this could finally happen.

DW: You mean Rio Tinto is lining up to to work with its former company?

KMcQ: “Well, it certainly looks that way. In 2016, because of the criticism that Rio Tinto had, or was receiving because of the huge environmental damage that it caused to the Bougainville area, it gave away its mine.

“It had a choice of either fixing up the environment or walking away, as it saw it. So it walked away — gave those shares equally to the Bougainville government and the national government. But now it wants to get back involved.

“And over the last week it has been talking about repairing some of the environmental damage that it caused during the mine’s operation. But there are other companies involved around the world, which could get involved.

“I’m thinking Glencore, the Swiss-based development company could get involved as well. Now, the reason why this is important is because BCL does not have the financial wherewithal to go and reopen the mine at a cost of $6 billion.

“And it’s only gotten roughly NZ$260 million in play. And really, it doesn’t have the expertise to reopen the mine, develop it, run it. It would have to go into partnership with one of the big mining companies Rio Tinto, or Glencore, or somebody else.

“The former president, Sir John Momis, had negotiations or had talked to China about the possibility of a Chinese company moving in and developing the mine. So in the current climate of debate around China’s role in South Pacific, one has to wonder just what impact that might have on the Australian, New Zealand, American governments.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The dormant Bougainville Copper Limited share value has more than doubled overnight on the Australian Stock Exchange following a resolution to reopen the rich but controversial Panguna copper mine.

Landowners from the mine area and the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) signed a joint resolution last Friday to reopen the mine, causing the leap in its share price.

The ABG’s current 36.4 percent (146,175,449 shares) shareholding was worth K146.2 million (NZ$63 million) when the shares were worth 40 cents each on Thursday.

• READ MORE: Panguna mine at centre of bloody Bougainville conflict set to reopen after 30 years

On Friday afternoon, however, the share value was worth K325.2 million (NZ$152 million) when they increased and closed at 89 cents, a jump of 122.5 per cent.

That is an increase of K179 million (NZ$89 million).

It shows what a little bit of good news and perhaps a demonstration of confidence in Bougainville can do.

ABG President Ishmael Toroama acknowledged and congratulated the five clans and their respective leadership for taking the bold stand to reopen the mine.

Facilitate reopening process
Toroama said that following the signing of the joint resolutions, the ABG through the Department of Mineral and Energy Resources and other relevant departments, would now work together with the landowner groups to facilitate the process towards the reopening.

The ABG government is confident that the mine reopening would be a major boost for Bougainville’s economic future and at the same time guarantee Bougainville’s political independence.

“Today marks the ending and the beginning of a new chapter, a chapter to realize Bougainville’s independence,” Toroama said.

BCL general manager and secretary Mark Hitchcock said the significant increase in the volume of BOC’s securities traded from 10 February 2022 to 11 February 2022 and the article published on the Autonomous Bougainville Government website entitled “Panguna Landowners and ABG agree to reopen Panguna Mine” dated 11 February 2022 contributed to the latter.

“We understand the article published relates to resolutions passed during a Panguna landowner summit that was supported by the ABG,” he said.

“The landowners appear to have agreed to work co-operatively with the ABG to reopen the Panguna Mine.

“According to the article the resolutions were endorsed by the chiefs of the five major Panguna clans and the ABG will now work with landowners to facilitate a process towards reopening.

Fair representation of events
“If the article is a fair representation of the events, then this would appear to demonstrate unity amongst the landowners and, would also boost confidence in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville as it pursues economic independence.

“Bougainville Copper Limited is engaged in investment activities.

The company’s assets include the Panguna mine and associated facilities on Bougainville, and equities listed on the Australian Securities Exchange.

“There is no change in the status of the shareholdings of the Autonomous Bougainville Government (ABG) and PNG shareholdings in BOC.

The PNG government’s commitment to transfer their shares to the ABG remains pending and both governments continue to hold 36.4 percent each of the shares in BOC.

“The judicial review of the ABG’s decision not to renew the exploration licence over Panguna remains in process and we anticipate proceedings to commence in the first quarter of 2022.”

The ABG has a 36.4 percent ownership stake in BCL, which is set to become a 72.8 percent majority share with the PNG national government committed to transferring over its 36.4 percent share.

Active presence on the ground
Hitchcock said BCL had long had an active presence on the ground in Bougainville with a locally engaged team.

It had continued supporting community projects and other initiatives.

Bougainville Copper’s board has strong levels of local representation with four prominent Bougainvillean directors – Sir Mel Togolo, David Osikore, James Rutana and Kearnneth Nanei.

Other board members are Sir Rabbie Namaliu, Sir Moi Avei, Dame Carol Kidu and Peter Graham.

“Over time, BCL has transformed into a truly local company,” Hitchcock said.

Decade-long civil war
Panguna mine was at the centre of a decade-long civil war between rebels in Bougainville and Papua New Guinea security forces, reports The Guardian.

It was once one of the world’s largest and most profitable copper and goldmines and still contains an estimated 5.3 mllion tonnes of copper and 19.3m ounces of gold, which would make the reserves worth about $60 billion at today’s prices.

In 1989, amid rising community anger at the environmental damage and the inequitable division of the mine’s profits, locals forced closure of the mine, blowing up Panguna’s power lines and sabotaging operations.

The PNG government sent in troops against its own citizens to restart the foreign-owned mine, sparking a bloody, decade-long civil war. A peace settlement was brokered by New Zealand in 2001.

Gorethy Kenneth is a senior PNG Post-Courier journalist. This article is republished with permission.

The Pacific year has closed with growing tensions over sovereignty and self-determination issues and growing stress over the ravages of covid-19 pandemic in a region that was largely virus-free in 2020.

Just two days before the year 2021 wrapped up, Bougainville President Ishmael Toroama took the extraordinary statement of denying any involvement by the people or government of the autonomous region of Papua New Guinea being involved in any “secret plot” to overthrow the Manasseh Sogavare government in Solomon Islands.

Insisting that Bougainville is “neutral” in the conflict in neighbouring Solomon Islands where riots last month were fuelled by anti-Chinese hostilities, Toroama blamed one of PNG’s two daily newspapers for stirring the controversy.

• READ MORE: Flashback to Kanaky in the 1980s – ‘Blood on their Banner’
• New Caledonia referendum: France’s last pocket of settler colonialism
• Solomon Islands riots push nation into slippery slide of self-implosion
• ‘Secret plot’ uncovered

“Contrary to the sensationalised report in the Post-Courier (Thursday, December 30, 2021) we do not have a vested interest in the conflict and Bougainville has nothing to gain from overthrowing a democratically elected leader of a foreign nation,” Toroama said.

The frontpage report in the Post-Courier appeared to be a beat-up just at the time Australia was announcing a wind down of the peacekeeping role in the Solomon Islands. A multilateral Pacific force of more than 200 Australian, Fiji, New Zealand and PNG police and military have been deployed since the riots in a bid to ward off further strife.

PNG Police Commissioner David Manning confirmed to the newspaper having receiving reports of Papua New Guineans allegedly training with Solomon Islanders to overthrow the Sogavare government in the New Year.

According to the Post-Courier’s Gorethy Kenneth, reports reaching Manning had claimed that Bougainvilleans with connections to Solomon Islanders had “joined forces with an illegal group in Malaita to train them and supply arms”.

The Bougainvilleans were also accused of “leading this alleged covert operation” in an effort to cause division in Solomon Islands.

However, Foreign Affairs Minister Soroi Eoe told the newspaper there had been no official information or reports of this alleged operation. The Solomon Islands Foreign Ministry was also cool over the reports.

Warning over ‘sensationalism’

Toroama warned news media against sensationalising national security issues with its Pacific neighbours, saying the Bougainville Peace Agreement “explicitly forbids Bougainville to engage in any foreign relations so it is absurd to assume that Bougainville would jeopardise our own political aspirations by acting in defiance” of these provisions.

This is a highly sensitive time for Bougainville’s political aspirations as it negotiates a path in response the 98 percent nonbinding vote in support of independence during the 2019 referendum.

In contrast, another Melanesian territory’s self-determination aspirations received a setback in the third and final referendum on independence in Kanaky New Caledonia on December 12 where a decisive more than 96 percent voted “non”.

However, less than half (43.87 percent) of the electorate voted – far less than the “yes” vote last year – in response to the boycott called by a coalition of seven Kanak independence groups out of respect to the disproportionate number of indigenous people among the 280 who had died in the recent covid-19 outbreak.

The result was a dramatic reversal of the two previous referendums in 2018 and 2020 where there was a growing vote for independence and the flawed nature of the final plebiscite has been condemned by critics as undoing three decades of progress in decolonisation and race relations.

In 2018, only 57 percent opposed independence and this dropped to 53 percent in 2020 with every indication that the pro-independence “oui” vote would rise further for this third plebiscite in spite of the demographic odds against the indigenous Kanaks who make up just 40 percent of the territory’s population of 280,000.

The result is now likely in inflame tensions and make it difficult to negotiate a shared future with France which annexed Melanesian territory in 1853 and turned it into a penal colony for political prisoners.

Kanaky turbulence in 1980s
A turbulent period in the 1980s – known locally as “Les événements” – culminated in a farcical referendum on independence in 1987 which returned a 98 percent rejection of independence. This was boycotted by the pro-independence groups when then President François Mitterrand broke a promise that short-term French residents would not be able to vote.

The turnout was 59 percent but skewed by the demographics. The UN Special Committee on Decolonisation declined to send observers as that plebiscite did not honour the process of “decolonisation”.

A Kanak international advocate of the Confédération Nationale du Travail (CNT) trade union and USTKE member, Rock Haocas, says from Paris that the latest referendum is “a betrayal” of the past three decades of progress and jeopardises negotiations for a future statute on the future of Kanaky New Caledonia.

The pro-independence parties have refused to negotiate on the future until after the French presidential elections in April this year. A new political arrangement is due in 18 months.

In the meantime, the result is being challenged in France’s constitutional court.

“The people have made concessions,” Haocas told Asia Pacific Report, referencing the many occasions indigenous Kanaks have done so, such as:

• Concessions to the “two colours, one people” agreement with the Union Caledonian party in 1953;
• Recognition of the “victims of history” in Nainville-Les-Roches in 1983;
• The Matignon and Oudnot Agreement in 1988;
• The Nouméa Accord in 1998; and
• The opening of the electoral body (to the native).

‘Getting closer to each other’
“The period of the agreements allowed the different communities to get to know each other, to get closer to each other, to be together in schools, to work together in companies and development projects, to travel in France, the Pacific, and in other countries,” says Haocas.

“It’s also the time of the internet. Colonisation is not hidden in Kanaky anymore; it faces the world. People talk about it more easily. The demand for independence has become more explainable, and more exportable. There has been more talk of interdependence, and no longer of a strict break with France.

“But for the last referendum France banked on the fear of one with the other to preserve its own interests.”

Is this a return to the dark days of 1987 when France conducted the “sham referendum”?

“We’re not really in the same context. We are here in the framework of the Nouméa Accord with three consultations — and for which we asked for the postponement of the last one scheduled for December 12,” says Haocas.

“It was for health reasons with its cultural and societal impacts that made the campaign difficult, it was not fundamentally for political reasons.

“The French state does not discuss, does not seek consensus — it imposes, even if it means going back on its word.”

Haocas says it is now time to reflect and analyse the results of the referendum.

“The result of the ballot box speaks for itself. Note the calm in the pro-independence world. Now there are no longer three actors — the indépendantistes, the anti-independence and the state – but two, the indépendantistes and the state.”

Rock Haocas in a 2018 interview before the the three referendums on independence. Video: CNT union

Comparisons between Kanaky and Palestine
In a devastating critique of the failings of the referendum and of the sincerity of France’s about-turn in its three-decade decolonisation policy, Professor Joseph Massad, a specialist in modern Arab politics and intellectual history at Columbia University, New York, made comparisons with Israeli occupation and apartheid in Palestine.

“Its expected result was a defeat for the cause of independence. It seems that European settler-colonies remain beholden to the white colonists, not only in the larger white settler-colonies in the Americas and Oceania, but also in the smaller ones, whether in the South Pacific, Southern Africa, Palestine, or Hawai’i,” wrote Dr Massad in Middle East Eye.

“Just as Palestine is the only intact European settler-colony in the Arab world after the end of Italian settler-colonialism in Libya in the 1940s and 1950s, the end of French settler-colonialism in Morocco and Tunisia in the 1950s, and the liberation of Algeria in 1962 (some of Algeria’s French colonists left for New Caledonia), Kanaky remains the only major country subject to French settler-colonialism after the independence of most of its island neighbours.

“As with the colonised Palestinians, who have less rights than those acquired by the Kanaks in the last half century, and who remain subject to the racialised power of their colonisers, the colonised Kanaks remain subject to the racialised power of the white French colonists and their mother country.

“No wonder [President Emmanuel] Macron is as ebullient and proud as Israel’s leaders.”

West Papuan hopes elusive as violence worsens
Hopes for a new United Nations-supervised referendum for West Papua have remained elusive for the Melanesian region colonised by Indonesia in the 1960s and annexed after a sham plebiscite known euphemistically as the “Act of Free Choice” in 1969 when 1025 men and women hand-picked by the Indonesian military voted unanimously in favour of Indonesian control of their former Dutch colony.

Two years ago the United Liberation Movement of West Papua (ULMWP) was formed to step up the international diplomatic effort for Papuan self-determination and independence. However, at the same time armed resistance has grown and Indonesia has responded with a massive build up of more than 20,000 troops in the two Melanesian provinces of Papua and West Papua and an exponential increase on human rights violations and draconian measures by the Jakarta authorities.

As 2021 ended, interim West Papuan president-in-exile Benny Wenda distributed a Christmas message thanking the widespread international support – “our solidarity groups, the International Parliamentarians for West Papua, the International Lawyers for West Papua, all those across the world who continue to tirelessly support us.

“Religious leaders, NGOs, politicians, diplomats, individuals, everyone who has helped us in the Pacific, Caribbean, Africa, America, Europe, UK: thank you.”

Wenda sounded an optimistic note in his message: “Our goal is getting closer. Please help us keep up the momentum in 2022 with your prayers, your actions and your solidarity.
You are making history through your support, which will help us achieve independence.”

But Wenda was also frank about the grave situation facing West Papua, which was “getting worse and worse”.

“We continue to demand that the Indonesian government release the eight students arrested on December 1 for peacefully calling for their right to self-determination. We also demand that the military operations, which continue in Intan Jaya, Puncak, Nduga and elsewhere, cease,” he said, adding condemnation of Jakarta for using the covid-19 pandemic as an excuse to prevent the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights visiting West Papua.

New covid-19 wave hits Fiji
Fiji, which had already suffered earlier in 2021 along with Guam and French Polynesia as one of the worst hit Pacific countries hit by the covid-19 pandemic, is now in the grip of a third wave of infection with 780 active cases.

Fiji’s Health Ministry has reported one death and 309 new cases of covid-19 in the community since Christmas Day — 194 of them confirmed in the 24 hours just prior to New Year’s Eve. This is another blow to the tourism industry just at a time when it was seeking to rebuild.

Health Secretary Dr James Fong is yet to confirm whether these cases were of the delta variant or the more highly contagious omicron mutant. It may just be a resurgence of the endemic delta variant, says Dr Fong, “however we are also working on the assumption that the omicron variant is already here, and is being transmitted within the community.

“We expect that genomic sequencing results of covid-19 positive samples sent overseas will confirm this in due course.”

A DevPolicy blog article at Australian National University earlier in 2021 warned against applying Western notions of public health to the Pacific country. Communal living is widespread across squatter settlements, urban villages, and other residential areas in the Lami-Suva-Nausori containment zone.

“Household sizes are generally bigger than in Western countries, and households often include three generations. This means elderly people are more at risk as they cannot easily isolate. At the same time, identifying a ‘household’ and determining who should be in a ‘bubble’ is difficult.

“‘Stay home’ is equally difficult to define, because the concept of ‘home’ has a broader meaning in the Fijian context compared to Western societies.”

While covid pandemic crises are continuing to wreak havoc in some Pacific communities into 2022, the urgency of climate change still remains the critical issue facing the region. After the lacklustre COP26 global climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, in November, Pacific leaders — who were mostly unable to attend due to the covid lockdowns — have stepped up their global advocacy.

End of ’empty promises’ on climate
Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown appealed in a powerful article that it was time for the major nations producing global warming emissions to shelve their “empty promises” and finally deliver on climate financing.

‘As custodians of these islands, we have a moral duty to protect [them] — for today and the unborn generations of our Pacific anau. Sadly, we are unable to do that because of things beyond our control …

“Sea level rise is alarming. Our food security is at risk, and our way of life that we have known for generations is slowly disappearing. What were ‘once in a lifetime’ extreme events like category 5 cyclones, marine heatwaves and the like are becoming more severe.

“Despite our negligible contribution to global emissions, this is the price we pay. We are talking about homes, lands and precious lives; many are being displaced as we speak.”

Perhaps the most perceptive reflections of the year came from a young Kanak pro-independence and climate change student activist, Marylou Mahé. Saying that as a “decolonial feminist” she wished to put an end to “injustice and humiliation of my people”, Mahé added a message familiar to many Pacific Islanders:

“As a young Kanak woman, my voice is often silenced, but I want to remind the world that we are here, we are standing, and we are acting for our future. The state’s spoken word may die tomorrow, but our right to recognition and self-determination never will.”

A Frontline investigative journalism article on the politics behind the decade-long Bougainville war leading up to the overwhelming vote for independence is among articles in the latest Pacific Journalism Review.

The report, by investigative journalist and former academic Professor Wendy Bacon and Nicole Gooch, poses questions about the “silence” in Australia over the controversial Bougainville documentary Ophir that has won several international film awards in other countries.

Published this week, the journal also features a ground-breaking research special report by academics Shailendra Singh and Folker Hanusch on the current state of journalism across the Pacific – the first such region-wide study in almost three decades.

• READ MORE: Pacific Journalism Review – the articles

Griffith University’s journalism coordinator Kasun Ubayasiri has produced a stunning photo essay, “Manus to Meanjin”, critiquing Australian “imperialist” policies and the plight of refugees in the Pacific.

The main theme of the double edition focuses on a series of articles and commentaries about the major “Pacific crises” — covid-19, climate emergency (including New Zealand aid) and West Papua.

Unthemed topics include journalism and democracy, the journalists’ global digital toolbox, cellphones and Pacific communication, a PNG local community mediascape, and hate speech in Indonesia.

This is the first edition of PJR published since it became independent of AUT University last year after previously being published at the University of Papua New Guinea – where it was launched in 1994 – and the University of the South Pacific.

Lockdowns challenge
“Publishing our current double edition in the face of continued covid-driven lockdowns and restrictions around the world has not been easy, but we made it,” says editor Dr Philip Cass.

“From films to photoessays, from digital democracy to dingoes and disease, the multi-disciplinary, multi-national diversity of our coverage remains a strength in an age when too many journals look the same and have the same type of content.”

“We promise this journal will have a strong focus on Asian media, communication and journalism, as well as our normal focus on the Pacific.”

Founding editor Dr David Robie is quoted in the editorial as saying the journal is at a “critical crossroads for the future” and he contrasts PJR with the “oppressively bland” nature of many journalism publications.

“I believe we have a distinctively different sort of journalism and communication research journal – eclectic and refreshing,” he said.

The next edition of PJR will be linked to the “Change, Adaptation and Culture: Media and Communication in Pandemic Times” online conference of the Asian Congress for Media and Communication (ACMC) being hosted at AUT on November 25-27.

• Pacific Crises: Covid, climate emergency and West Papua, Pacific Journalism Review, edited by Philip Cass and David Robie, September 2021

The governments of Papua New Guinea and Bougainville have agreed on new terms for the transfer of powers.

Under the Bougainville Peace Agreement, the autonomous government expected a steady drawing down of powers, but this never eventuated.

However, there were delays because Port Moresby deemed Bougainville lacked the capacity to undertake them.

• READ MORE: Bougainville president-elect Ishmael Toroama – rebel, peacemaker, farmer

Now agreement has been reached to remove certain steps.

In what is called the Sharp Agreement, both the PNG Prime Minister, James Marape, and Bougainville President, Ishmael Toroama, have decided the autonomous region will no longer have to prove they have the capacity to take on certain powers, and funding issues will not be raised.

A 12-month wait after a request for any powers sought, will no longer be required.

Both governments, though, will continue to consult over the transition which they wanted clarified before the formal consultations on the independence referendum get underway later this month.

In the 2019 non-binding referendum, 97.7 percent of Bougainvilleans voted for independence from Papua New Guinea.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare, former prime minister of Papua New Guinea and a giant of Pacific politics, has died from pancreatic cancer. He was 84.

Known as “Mike” to some and “the chief” to others, Somare in more recent years became widely referred to as “the grand chief” – the highest position in his nation’s honours system.

In his long career, Somare dominated PNG and Pacific politics.

• READ MORE: Crisis? What crisis? A new prime minister in PNG might not signal meaningful change for its citizens
• PNG marks 40 years of independence, still feeling the effects of Australian colonialism
  

He was regarded as the “father of the nation” for his role in moving PNG from colonial dependency of Australia to a fully fledged independent state. He helped build a nation that sits at the meeting point between the Pacific and dynamic East Asia with all the strategic, economic and cultural issues that brings.

Somare was the colossus of PNG’s political landscape: chief minister from 1972 to 1975 while the country was still an Australian-administered territory, its first prime minister (1975-1980), as well as its third (1982-85) and 12th (2002-2011, although some consider that his term concluded in 2012).

In fact, for 17 of PNG’s 45 years since gaining independence – more than a third of the period – Somare was its leader. When not in this role, he was very much the power behind the scenes, kingmaker, sometimes troublemaker and – often – peacemaker.

In 1967, Somare joined with other young nationalists, discontented and angered by the slow progress towards independence from Australia, to form one of PNG’s first political parties, the PANGU Pati (Papua and New Guinea United Party). Their criticism of the worst kind of Australian paternalism brought them attention from the colonial authorities, which Somare wrote about using a pseudonym.

PANGU’s mild politics
In truth, PANGU’s politics were of the mildest variety. When anti-colonial movements in other places were pursuing armed revolution, Somare and his fellows – always a small group of educated (and thus, elite) Papua New Guineans – forecast merely:

[…] if the present system of colonial or territory government continues, with all its inevitable master-servant overtones, serious tensions will develop.

They then made modest calls for self-government by 1968.

When Somare and other PANGU members were elected to PNG’s territorial House of Assembly in 1968, they formed an unofficial opposition to the administration. In April 1972 – before the election of the Whitlam Labor government in Australia – PANGU, with Somare as leader, was able to form a coalition that took the territory to independence in 1975.

In that year, Somare – amazingly – found the time to write his autobiography, Sana, which records his journey from his village in the Murik Lakes area of the Sepik River to becoming the nation’s first prime minister on the eve of PNG’s independence. The book provides a first-hand account of PNG’s path to self-government and nationhood, importantly from the perspective of the colonised.

Always a strong communicator, Somare used the book to foster pride among Papua New Guineans in their own nation, which gained its independence in a way that was both constitutional and peaceful. As its first governor-general, Sir John Guise, famously pronounced on September 16 1975, PNG Independence Day:

[…] we are lowering the flag of our colonisers […] not tearing it down.

The way PNG gained its independence owes a great deal to Somare’s careful devotion to the spirit of sana: a word from his people’s language that denotes taking a peaceful, consensual approach to resolving disputes.

In the face of a colonial system that was often stubborn and narrow-minded, and amid an expatriate population – overwhelmingly Australian – who were too often discriminatory and racist, he could have chosen a path of violent resistance. Instead, he chose the way of peace, of toktok (Tok Pisin for discussion) and of consensus.

‘Radical, red-ragger’
Even as a young leader, described in British government confidential notes as “a radical and red-ragger”, he believed in words over guns. It was a quality that was demonstrated in his handling of the separatist movement in Bougainville, which threatened to divide PNG even before it gained independence.

As well as drawing on the principle of sana to keep the nascent state together and prevent secession, Somare’s greatest achievement was bringing a reluctant people to embrace the creation of their nation.

Aided by a body of capable and committed PNG leaders in the Constitutional Planning Committee (CPC) that he established soon after becoming chief minister in 1972, Somare set out on a mission to develop a constitution that was, in his words “home-grown”.

The CPC was given the task of consulting widely with Papua New Guineans in their highlands and islands, to ensure they felt their wishes and beliefs would be fully reflected in the new nation’s foundational document. By the time of independence in 1975, it is reasonable to say this goal had been achieved.

The recently retired secretary-general of the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), Papua New Guinean Dame Meg Taylor, recalled of that time:

It is perhaps presumptuous for me to say that I was a constitution‐maker, but in some respects we all were. Anybody who went to a CPC meeting […] was a constitution-maker.

In following the principles of sana – consensus, discussion, inclusion and peaceful resolution of conflict – Somare was adhering to a way of dealing with others that is shared across the Pacific region. It is appropriate that Taylor, who learned about sana from working closely with Somare, should have held to these principles in her role as PIF secretary-general.

Shared identity across Pacific
With her retirement from this role, and even more so with the death of Somare, there is a pressing need for some sana to be deployed, to hold this important Pacific regional organisation together. Toktok, talanoa, or just conversation that recognises a shared identity across the Pacific from West Papua to Rapa Nui (Easter Island), is needed.

It is a tragedy that perhaps the greatest exponent of this – Michael Somare – has left us. His life spanned the modern history of PNG and now, more than 45 years after his nation gained independence, his influence remains profound.

He will be remembered as a quiet but persistent champion of his people. In a region that is dominated by superpower rivalry and challenged by climate change, perhaps we would all do well to learn from his example and practise more sana.

Dr Jonathan Ritchie, senior lecturer in history, Deakin University. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons licence. Read the original article.

A journalist who sailed on board the bombed environmental ship Rainbow Warrior, was arrested at gunpoint in New Caledonia while investigating French military garrisons in pro-independence Kanak villages, and reported on social justice issues across the Pacific has stepped down as founding director of the Pacific Media Centre.

Professor David Robie, 75, an author, academic, independent journalist and journalism professor at Auckland University of Technology, retired this week after more than 18 years at the institution.

He has been working as a journalist for more than 46 years and as an academic for more than 27 years.

• READ MORE: Pacific journalism, media and diversity researchers tackle challenges ahead
• Gallery: PMC celebrates Pacific ‘reset’ vision and farewells founding director

As well as playing a role in critical moments of history as a journalist in the region, his students have also covered landmark events that helped shape some Pacific nations, especially in Melanesia – such as the 1997 Sandline mercenary crisis in Papua New Guinea and the George Speight attempted coup in Fiji in May 2000.

Gallery: #PMC celebrates #Pacific ‘reset’ vision and farewells founding director @DavidRobie #cartoons #education #JournalismMatters #independentjournalism #MediaFreedom @RSF_en @AUTuni @ShailendraBSing @USPWansolwara https://t.co/56DNxlLOa8 pic.twitter.com/fQ6RKIYDDu

— Pacific Media Centre (@pacmedcentre) December 5, 2020

But a journalism or academic career were not always clearcut pathways for Dr Robie. During his studies in high school, he was heavily involved in outdoor pursuits and he became a Queen’s Scout.

At the time he was thinking of becoming a professional forester and he was recruited by the NZ Forest Service at 17 in 1963 as a forester cadet with a view to studying for a BSc and then forestry science.

But the same year he was selected to represent New Zealand at a World Jamboree at Marathon Bay, Greece – the site of a famous battle between the Athenians and the Persians in 490 BC.

Future options
This brought his future options to a head.

“At school I was interested in three things – writing, art and mapping/outdoors. So, that’s why I initially wanted to become a forester,” he says.

But going to Greece changed everything. He started his science degree course while working part time at the NZ Forest Service publications division at its headquarters in Wellington. He then realised he was more interested in writing.

“I realised that I didn’t want to spend my life talking with trees, even though I love trees,” he says.

At the end of the year, he became a cadet journalist at The Dominion (now the Dominion Post). Shortly after he became the youngest subeditor at the newspaper.

He later went to Auckland to work as assistant editor on Auto Age magazine, had a short stint on The New Zealand Herald as a subeditor before moving to Australia to join the Melbourne Herald.

While working there in 1968, he was strongly influenced by the student riots in Paris and took a serious interest in politics over the student protests against Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War.

Youngest editor
At 24, he became the youngest editor of a national Sunday newspaper, the Sunday Observer, which campaigned strongly against the Vietnam War.

In his mid-20s, Dr Robie migrated to Johannesburg, South Africa, and was appointed chief subeditor of the Rand Daily Mail, the country’s leading newspaper crusading against the apartheid regime.

Even though Dr Robie’s social justice views as a journalist became shaped while he was working at the Sunday Observer in Melbourne, this was not risky as in South Africa.

“In South Africa, we were really pushed hard. I probably learned most of what I have learned in my career as a journalist in South Africa.

“Mainly because of the threats and experiences. I worked with a number of ‘banned’ and inspirational people, like photojournalist Peter Magubane.

“I was threatened many times and on one occasion I drove Winnie Mandela’s two daughters from their home in Soweto to a multiracial school in Swaziland because Winnie, being banned, could not travel.

“I drove the girls 360 km through roadblocks to take the children to school,” Dr Robie recalls.

Threats against journalists
The late Winnie Mandela was the wife of imprisoned anti-apartheid revolutionary Nelson Mandela who became President of South Africa 1994-1999 and died in 2013. The two daughters are Zindziswa Mandela and Zenani Mandela-Diamini.

While working in South Africa, Dr Robie learned a lot of things he had never experienced in New Zealand – the vital need to campaign for social justice, threats against journalists and jailings, and the role of human rights journalism.

Subsequently, he travelled overland as a freelancer across Africa and ended up in Nairobi, Kenya. There, he worked as group features editor of the Aga Khan’s Daily Nation for a year before travelling to West Africa, Nigeria and across the Sahara Desert to Algeria and France.

In Paris, he camped in the Bois de Boulogne forest until he found a garret to live in a refurbished 17th century building in Rue St Sauveur in the heart of the city.

He worked for Agence France-Presse global news agency for three years and covered the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games when there was a black African walkout in protest about New Zealand playing rugby against white South Africa.

While working for AFP, he gained familiarity with French foreign post-colonial policies, and especially the nuclear testing issue in the South Pacific.

He says it was ironic that it took travelling to France for him to “wake up” to the Pacific right on New Zealand’s doorstep.

Foreign editor
Dr Robie returned to New Zealand in 1979 and became foreign editor on the Auckland Star. He started doing trips to the Cook Islands, New Caledonia, Tahiti, Vanuatu and elsewhere as a freelance in his holidays. He thought he might as well go fulltime freelance to do the stories he was interested in.

In 1984, he set up the Asia Pacific Network which he ran for 10 years from his home in Grey Lynn.

He became a chief correspondent for Fiji-based Islands Business news magazine covering investigative and environmental stories and decolonisation issues. He also reported for the Global South news agency Gemini, The Australian, the New Zealand Times, RNZ International and other media.

In 1985, he sailed on board the Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior for 11 weeks and took part in the evacuation of islanders from Rongelap Atoll.

French secret agents bombed the Rainbow Warrior on 10 July 1985 and he wrote the book Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior – the first of 10 books.

In early 1987, he was arrested at gunpoint near Canala, New Caledonia, for taking photographs of “nomadisation” style military camps design to intimidate Kanak villagers seeking independence.

In 1993, Dr Robie was appointed as a lecturer and head of journalism at the University of Papua New Guinea. His students published the award-winning fortnightly newspaper Uni Tavur and they covered the 1997 Sandline crisis when the military commander arrested foreign mercenaries hired by the PNG government to wage war against rebels on Bougainville in a “coup that wasn’t a coup”.

PJR launched
While at UPNG, Dr Robie launched Pacific Journalism Review, the only specialised research journal to investigate media issues in the South Pacific, Asia-Pacific, Australia, and New Zealand.

As a journalist and journalism educator, he raises concern that “most media organisations send someone to cover a particular event – they go in and they come out. Quickly. It is parachute journalism. Unfortunately, it is not a good way to cover things.

“Often journalists who work on a parachute basis don’t have enough background. They don’t have enough information or the sources to get a deeper understanding of the complex nuances,” he says.

After serving Papua New Guinea as a journalism educator for more than five years, he shifted to the University of South Pacific in Fiji.

In 1998, Dr Robie began his new journey as head of USP’s journalism department. He was teaching while actively writing news articles, academic journal articles, and books.

“One of the lessons I learned as a journalism educator is that a journalism project is the best way to learn,” he says.

He cites the George Speight attempted coup in Fiji in May 2000 when his students covered downtown riots in Suva, the seizure of the elected government in Parliament at gunpoint by Speight’s renegade soldiers, and a protracted siege as an example.

The PMC Project – A short documentary by Alistar Kata. Video: PMC

Crisis website updates
The students updated their website Pacific Journalism Online several times daily at a time when the mainstream newspapers did not have websites and they produced the Wansolwara newspaper that the university tried to confiscate.

“What we were doing was contributing to empowerment. To me, empowerment is really important. It isn’t just about writing a good story, and things like that. But empowering giving people the information that they need to make decisions in a democracy,” he says.

Dr Robie also gained his PhD in history/politics from the University of the South Pacific. After serving the country for five years, he moved back to New Zealand.

Since 2002, Dr Robie has worked at AUT and became director of the Pacific Media Centre in 2007 and remained editor of Pacific Journalism Review.

End of an era … @PacificMediaCentre Annual Review 2020. #newsmedia #journalism #journalismeducation https://t.co/WB8N2wsL3c pic.twitter.com/CNPmAE6Pe0

— David Robie (@DavidRobie) December 21, 2020

He became an associate professor in 2005 and a professor in 2012. During his academic career, Professor Robie gained a number of awards nationally and internationally, including the 2015 AMIC Asia Communication Award in Dubai, Vice-Chancellor’s Teaching Excellence Award in 2011, the PIMA Special Award for Contribution to Pacific journalism in 2011 and the PIMA Pacific Media Freedom award in 2005.

Dr Robie was also an Australian Press Council fellow in 1999, and has been on the editorial boards of Asia-Pacific Media Educator, Australian Journalism Review, Fijian Studies, Global Media Journal and Pacific Ecologist.

He is currently the New Zealand representative of the Asian Media, Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) and a life member. He is also editor and publisher of Asia Pacific Report, and his books are listed at NZ Pen.

One thing can be sure. Social justice will remain high on his ongoing agenda.

Laurens Ikinia is a Papuan Masters in Communication Studies student at Auckland University of Technology who has been studying journalism. He is on an internship with AUT’s Pacific Media Centre.

Full independence will be top of the agenda pledges Ishmael Toroama, the newly elected president for the Autonomous Region of Bougainville.

Straight after his declaration yesterday at Hutjena in Bougainville, President-elect Toroama, a former rebel commander during the Bougainville civil war of the late 1980s, said he was looking forward to consulting with the PNG government to drive home the will of Bougainvilleans for independence.

But immediately after the return of writs for all seats, he said he would roll out a 100-day plan following the forming of his cabinet.

• READ MORE: ougainville president-elect Ishmael Toroama – rebel, peacemaker, farmer
• Father, daughter team win seats in Bougainville general election

“After the return of the writs, I will then see and fully understand who the people have voted in and start allocating ministries,” he said.

“This goes to the members who have retained their seats. I will screen and check them out whether they have participated well in their previous ministries or not in order to give them ministries.”

President-elect Toroama also highlighted that he would like to rearrange the public service within the first 100 days to put in place strategies to help the people of Bougainville.

He said this election, which had been held just after the independence referendum, was about the same issue – independence – which he said had been going on for quite a while now.

Independence the right of the people
“In fact, in this election independence has been the right of the people, for them to be democratically free … the vote has just been spelled out to bring us to some kind of numbers but consultation with the national government is still around.”

He said he was sizing up and looking at his government to play that vital role in embracing the people’s will to talk about independence.

“It gives us a good opportunity to select those who have voted us into Parliament so that we can pursue and strengthen the development happening in Bougainville through consultation.”

Toroama has also extended an “olive oil branch” to rival candidates if they wanted to work with him to create a peaceful Bougainville.

“They are most welcome,” he said. “They are leaders on their own rights and it is something for us to sit down and discuss and see what we can come up with and fit those people who’ve run the race with me.”

‘Corruption-free’ administration
The National’s Miriam Zarriga reports that President-elect Ishmael Toroama is expected to be sworn in tomorrow in Buka before he forms a caretaker government and sets in motion his plans for a “corruption-free” administration.

The 51-year-old former Bougainville Revolutionary Army commander was declared the winner on 51,317 votes after the 23rd elimination on Tuesday night, beating former Central Bougainville MP Simon Dumarinu who had 33,088 votes.

“I am honoured to get this seat. I salute our good Lord for making things happen,” he told The National from Buka yesterday.

“It is my great honour to serve my people of Bougainville,”

The writs of the 2020 Bougainville election are expected to be returned to the Speaker Simon Pentanu in the House of Representatives today, marking the end of the election, and the end of the previous administration.

Toroama will then pick a male and a female elected member to be part of his caretaker government.

They will be sworn in by Justice Sir Kina Bona, the resident judge in Buka tomorrow.

Victory dedicated to Francis Ona
In an early interview with the PNG Post-Courier yesterday morning, Toroama battled tears as he remembered the late Francis Ona and Joseph Kabui’s dream for Bougainville as he was preparing to be declared president-elect.

President Toroama, in the company of his three children, said he would honour the late Ona’s dream which he held on to – and this was independence and restricting the use of alcohol.

Toroama said as he was closely associated with Ona and two things he always talked about were alcohol and independence.

“One of the two things the late Francis Ona always talked about with me and my team was alcohol drinking,” he said.

“It was something I said [that I would] do if I take the seat and that would be to make sure that alcohol will be served only in hotels, that’s one thing mi laik mekim long behalf blong em taim mi kisim seat.

“I will use my powers to stop this! And the other one [Ona talked about] is independence. I want to say that we are still struggling along the way but every struggle we make, there is a victory, every fight that we fight there is always a victory, without a fight, there is no victory!

“So I must say, what we struggled for, there is hope for achievement now, and this will be high on agenda when we start consulting with the national government forward.”

Toroama paid tribute to the late reclusive leader Francis Ona and said he could now implement Ona’s dream which was independence for Bougainville.

He also paid tribute to the late Joseph Kabui, whom he also served.

Congratulations from Marape
The Post-Courier reports that Prime Minister James Marape had congratulated Ishmael Toroama on his success.

“Congratulations of the highest order to Ishmael Toroama. Your win was conclusive and I offer my support to work with you to deliver on my commitments to Bougainville,” Marape said.

“Let me appreciate also the hard efforts of outgoing President Dr John Momis for his undying and untiring efforts for people empowerment both in Bougainville and greater PNG. Your legacies and ideologies will live on.”

This composite article is drawn from reports from The National and PNG Post-Courier with permission.

Ishmael Toroama built his reputation as a bold fighter and later a commander in the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) in its struggle to close the Panguna copper and gold mine and gain independence for Bougainville from Papua New Guinea in the 10-year civil war of the 1990s.

Later, in 2001, he became a signatory of the Bougainville Peace Agreement under the auspices of which last year’s referendum on Bougainville independence recorded a huge vote in favour of the province’s separation from PNG.

But in more recent years, Toroama, from Central Bougainville, returned to what his family has done for generations – peacefully grow cocoa.

• READ MORE: Ishmael Toroama declared president-elect of Bougainville

In this capacity he once told a journalist that he had a dream: “One day I’d like to be able to buy a bar of Amataa chocolate – with a focus on the flavour.”

And now he stands on the threshold of becoming the next president of Bougainville. A Bougainville which itself may be standing on the threshold of independence.

Bougainville Presidential Count Update
21st Elimination – Tuesday afternoon
47,145 – Ishmael Toroama
29,896 – Simon Duraminu
20,953 – Peter Tsiamalili
20,107 – Thomas Raivet

Toroama, whose body bears the scars of many hard fought battles, joined the BRA in its early days and according to one story was the first BRA guerrilla to obtain an automatic weapon from the Papua New Guinea Defence Force (PNGDF).

In a journal article ‘The Gangs of Bougainville’ by Stan Starygin, Toroama was portrayed as a ‘Rambo’ . He came to wider attention in the documentary film, The Coconut Revolution, which sought to portray the BRA as a band of convivial guerrillas in pursuit of self-reliance and a return to a traditional lifestyle.

Field commander
Toroama did not take long to become a prominent ‘field commander’ in the BRA and later succeeded the BRA’s first ‘chief of defence’, Sam Kauona, who happens to be an eliminated candidate in the current election.

As journalist Dominic Rotheroe wrote in an article in The Independent (The Green Guerrillas, 13 September 1998) Toroama is nothing if not a very strong and intimidating man:

“Ten minutes further into this training patrol, a mock ambush is launched and Ishmael Toroama hurtles into the bush, M-16 blazing, while his soldiers blast the jungle with a mix of captured M-l6s, rejuvenated Second World World War guns, and home-made rifles. This may be to keep the ‘boys’, as everyone calls the BRA, on their toes. But the tear gas is purely for us, a short sharp dose of Bougainville reality.

“Ishmael is fond of dishing out such medicine. Later, as he accelerates his battered 4×4 Hi-lux truck along a track more hole than road, he admits that on these training exercises he attacks his men with live ammunition.

“‘Ever hit any?’ I ask. ‘Oh yes.’ ‘How many?’ ‘Twelve.’ ‘Twelve! Seriously injured?’ ‘Er, one yes, very.’ It is training like this that has turned the BRA into such an effective fighting force. There are no half-measures here.”

But Jesus was to come into Toroama’s life when, during a skirmish with PNG government forces in 1997, he was critically wounded by a rocket-propelled grenade.

Rotheroe wrote:

“Jesus has come into Ishmael’s life in a big way. The big man is ‘no longer proud to be a fighter’. Inside his house a picture of Rambo is now dwarfed by a flock of evangelical posters. He tells us how Jesus appeared to him after he was wounded. ‘He said to me, you are an inch from death now. Follow me, because I am the Lord.’ And this he did; when the war ends, he says, he would like to become a preacher.”

Peace agreement
Well, this did not happen. First Toroama helped negotiate the peace agreement, then took the lead in subsequent reconciliations, next benefited greatly from selling scrap mine equipment from Panguna and later returned to the family tradition of cocoa farming.

During this post-war period, Toroama and his group not only expanded their activities by dismantling and selling scrap metal from Panguna but by offering ‘protection services’ to local businesses and visitors.

Starygin writes that during the disarmament process endorsed by the peace agreement, “Toroama presented himself as an agent of peace”.

Toroama’s role was accepted by the international peace brokers who worked with him on the disarmament process and he acquired status by tapping the largesse they brought to Bougainville, becoming the virtual master of ceremonies at peace and reconciliation events.

This role, Starygin says, “went beyond the use of his celebrity to bring disputants together and grew to include event management by Toroama’s gang and those businesses in which Toroama ‘had an interest’ which, in turn, became the main conduits for AusAid and UNDP’s reconciliation dollars.”

Starygin writes:

“Toroama’s BRA-days notoriety, his role in the peace process, the magnitude of his post-crisis ‘economic activity’ and the possession of weapons and loyalty of the men who carry them have made Toroama a viable political force in Central Bougainville. Toroama has not won an election yet but it is not for want of trying.

“He is no underdog and has come a solid second in the last two elections, although the voters each time preferred a civil servant with a record of service to Toroama. Encouraged by his numbers and undeterred by defeat Toroama has announced his candidacy for President of Bougainville for the 2015 election.”

Distant second
He finished a distant second to John Momis (who in that election received more than 51,000 votes to Toroama’s 18,466) but now, five years on, it seems that his political ambition is about to be fulfilled.

Ishmael Toroama – fighter, rebel leader, peace broker, scrap metal dealer, security boss and coca farmer – now seems likely to be fifth president of Bougainville.

We can only surmise from his background that he is well experienced and that he is a formidable man.

But we don’t yet know how this personal history will transition into how he will perform in the role of a significant Melanesian political leader.

What we do know is that Toroama has been an independence fighter, that a majority of the Bougainville people want independence, that the Papua New Guinea government has shown no support for this and that the epic question of Bougainville independence is one that is up for answering.

What we do suspect is that, although Ishmael Toroama has shown himself to be a shrewd operator, there is no proof of any illegality or corruption in his varied and volatile career.

That is an important consideration given that corruption in Bougainville, as it is in PNG, has been a problem of mounting concern.

We do indeed live in interesting times.

Keith Jackson is a retired educator, school publications editor and communications lecturer and consultant in Papua New Guinea who has managed radio stations in Rabaul and Bougainville and was head of policy and planning in the National Broadcasting Commission at independence in 1975. He has also worked in development and communication roles for UNESCO in Fiji, Indonesia, India, Maldives and the Philippines. He began his PNG Attitude blog in 2006. Pacific Media Centre articles are republished with permission.

• Former BRA leader Toroama increases his Bougainville poll lead over rivals

The trend is your friend, it is said, and the trend in counting votes for the next president of Bougainville remains firmly with former Bougaiville Revolutionary Army commander Ishmael Toroama, who continues to move ahead of the field.

With the elimination of the 14th presidential candidate late afternoon it became clear that only the two leaders among the 11 remaining contenders can come close to an absolute majority of 71,725 votes.

The release of updated figures this afternoon showed Ishmael Toroama consolidating his position as the likely winner as he moved out to a 10,500 vote lead over second-placed candidate Father Simon Dumarinu.

READ MORE: Earlier Bougainville vote stories

There were a few changes in the positions of the top 10 candidates during the day, the main one being Peter Tsiamalili moving into fourth place pushing Fidelis Semoso down to fifth.

But it seems that neither candidate can win from here.

Dumarinu remains about 7000 votes ahead of a bunch of three candidates – Thomas Raivet, Peter Tsiamalili and Fidelis Semoso – who all need the current preference trend to switch steeply their way to remain in the race.

Standings after the 14th count:
Ishmael Toroama – 33,007
Simon Dumarinu – 22,474
Thomas Raivet – 14,779
Peter Tsiamalili – 14,324
Fidelis Semoso – 14,038
Samuel Kauona – 9,240
Joe Lera – 9,325
James Tanis – 9,096
Wesma Piika – 5,159
Sione Paasia – 4,973

Keith Jackson is a retired educator, school publications editor and communications lecturer in Papua New Guinea who has managed radio stations in Rabaul and Bougainville and was head of policy and planning in the National Broadcasting Commission at independence in 1975. He has also worked in development and communication roles for UNESCO in Fiji, Indonesia, India, Maldives and the Philippines. He began his PNG Attitude blog in 2006. Pacific Media Centre articles are republished with permission.