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The Melanesian Way

Political Style in Modern Melanesia

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Abstract [5]

Source: http://press-files.anu.edu.au/

This chapter seeks to identify some of the elements of political style in modern Melanesia and to relate them to broader aspects of the region’s political culture.

The author does this by examining the following: the scale of politics and the politics of scale; the diversities of culture and language; the ‘Bigman Model’, or the men of influence; the colonial experience; and politics, economics and bisnis.

While the chapter conveys only a little of the spirit of Melanesian political style and does nothing to distinguish differential styles, it does confirm a particular Melanesian political style which is rooted in Melanesian political culture.

In recent writing about contemporary politics in Melanesia one frequently comes across the term style. The suggestion seems to be that there is, if not a unique, at least a distinctive Melanesian style (or styles) of politics. Hegarty, for example, speaks of an ‘essentially accommodative political and governmental style’ in Papua New Guinea (1979c:110) and Quiros (1979) speaks similarly of a ‘conciliatory style of political leadership’ in that country. (Also see Standish 1978:29 and Herlihy 1982:575.) Melanesian political leaders themselves frequently talk about doing things ‘in the Melanesian Way’ (for example, see Lini 1980).

This paper seeks to identify some of the elements of political style in modern Melanesia and to relate them to broader aspects of the region’s political culture.

I begin by accepting that there is such a thing as political style; I will not, however, attempt to define the term, except to say that it has something to do with the way in which nations’ leaders (and by extension nations themselves) behave within a framework set by formal constitutions and realpolitik. The suggestion that one can distinguish a national or regional political style implies the existence of an identifiable political culture,[6] though it does not deny the importance of individual personality in political style. By way of crude illustration, from outside Melanesia: I think one might reasonably argue that, say, the Ayatollah Khomeini, Emperor Bokassa, Ferdinand Marcos, and Bob Hawke display a variety of political styles which reflects differences in the respective political cultures from which they have emerged, and which could not be easily transferred from one political culture to another, and that the spectacle of the United States presidential elections reflects a style of politics which varies from that of even such other predominantly Anglo-Saxon Western democracies as the United Kingdom and Australia.

The literature of political science has little to say about political style at an aggregative level, except perhaps in the field of international relations where several authors have referred to national styles as an important factor in determining patterns of international negotiations (for example, see Druckman 1977 and references cited therein; Spanier 1978: chapter 12). There is, on the other hand, a substantial literature on personality and politics (much of it contributed by psychologists), which has a lot to say about individual styles and has occasionally attempted to make the leap from the individual to the group or nation, mostly however in the context of ‘developed’ societies.[7] The anthropological literature on leadership in Melanesia is also of obvious relevance to the question of style in modern politics, but except for the work of Standish on Simbu politics (especially Standish 1983, 1992) and perhaps that of Finney (1973) on bigmen and bisnis – both of which are about Papua New Guinea highlands societies – there appears to have been little interest in the relationship between traditional and modern political styles.

In approaching the question of political style in modern Melanesia one possible method would be to compile a series of political biographies and attempt to generalise national characteristics from these. Entertaining though such an exercise might be, the prospect of deriving some stylistic equivalent of a ‘modal personality’ from profiles of political leaders as personally disparate as, say, Walter Lini, Iambakey Okuk, Marten Tabu, John Kasaipwalova, Jimmy Stevens and Ratu Mara seems sufficiently daunting to suggest an alternative approach (a reaction which recent personality-and-politics studies would seem to support).

By way of alternative, it might be argued that if there is a distinctive Melanesian style of politics (or if there are distinctive styles) one might expect to locate its essence in a specifically Melanesian political culture (or cultures). Constraints of time and space prevent me from attempting to draw a comprehensive picture of Melanesian political culture. Instead I will suggest that there is a number of respects in which the culture(s) and the recent political history of Melanesia are, if not unique, at least unusual. Some of these are examined briefly in the following paragraphs.

The scale of politics and the politics of scale

Ward (1982) has touched on the question of the relative smallness and isolation of Melanesian societies and the impact this has had on their politics. This relationship is examined in greater detail in Benedict (1967) and in May and Tupouniua (1980). To quote from the latter:

The relationships between individuals in a small scale society thus tend to be more intense and social transactions to be dominated by personal relationships reflecting, amongst other things, kinship, village ties and ascriptive status. At the same time, the members of a small scale society tend to be more dependent upon one another’s actions than do those of a larger society. Typically, political and economic relations are dominated by series of recipro-cal obligations (between equals and between patrons and clients) but it is common, also, for small-scale societies to employ social pressures to ensure individual conformity to the values and objectives of the group. It is often suggested that smallness of scale promotes social cohesion, however there is little evidence for this; indeed as Benedict (1967:49) rightly points out, “intense factionalism” is a common feature of small communities. [May and Tupouniua 1980:423]

Diversity and (a little bit) beyond

Melanesia’s diversity is legendary. Linguists have commented on the region’s extraordinary linguistic diversity – and have made the interesting suggestion (Laycock 1982:33-38) that this diversity is not a function of isolation but that language has been used deliberately as a means of differentiating one group from another. Prehistorians and anthropologists, while reminding us of the extent of traditional exchange networks, have described a situation in which social units were typically small and in which intergroup relations were limited both in physical range and content.[8] It may be that we are sometimes inclined to overemphasise the extent of isolationism in pre-contact Melanesia; nevertheless the fact remains that even compared with tribal Asia and Africa, pre-contact Melanesia was fragmented to an unusually high degree and that to a substantial extent this fragmentation has survived the colonial period.

Related to this is a provocative suggestion made by Barnes (1962/71:9):

A characteristic of highland cultures, and perhaps of Melanesia as a whole, is the high value placed on violence … In these circumstances we might expect to find a less developed system of alliances and ‘counterveiling’ forces, and less developed arrangements for maintaining peace, than we would have in a polity directed to peace and prosperity.

Bigmen and all that

A substantial body of recent writing on leadership and social stratification in Melanesia seeks to distinguish between a stereotype of the typical Melanesian traditional society as egalitarian and communalistic, with leadership determined by competition between men of influence (what Standish 1978 refers to as the ‘Bigman Model’), and the reality of socially hierarchical, status-conscious societies in which heredity frequently played an important part in the selection of leaders. Without wishing to detract from this recent emphasis on social stratification (except occasionally to query the source of the stereotype), I think it is important that we not lose sight of the essential elements of truth in the stereotype: namely, that relative to Polynesia and most parts of Africa (not to mention traditional societies in Europe and Asia) social stratification in Melanesian traditional societies was not particularly formalised and that traditional institutions such as sorcery and warfare, as well as social attitudes to wealth, were frequently used as a means of preventing forceful individuals or groups from rising too far above the common herd (cf. Moulik 1973:123-127).

The exception in this respect, it would seem, is Fiji. There, traditional societies appear to have been more formally stratified and the status ordering, having been consolidated by colonial rule, has so far proved enduring (see Nayacakalou 1975; Nation 1978).

Whatever the situation may have been, there is now a well entrenched (if not universally accepted) belief that egalitarianism and communalism prevailed in pre-contact Melanesia, and that these values are integral to ‘the Melanesian Way’:

… our peoples are communalistic and communalism is the basis for our traditional way of life. Our values therefore must be communalistic. [Gris 1975:137]

The colonial experience

With respect to the impact of colonial rule on Melanesia’s political culture, I offer four comments.

The first is the unremarkable observation that the impact of colonialism has itself been diverse. Not only have the colonial masta exhibited a variety of political styles reflecting their indigenous political cultures (see papers by Nelson, Firth, Hastings, Scarr and Latham in May and Nelson 1982, and Ward and Ballard 1976) but the timing of the colonial impact has been responsible for major differences in the attitudes of colonisers to colonised, and particular circumstances of physical environment and historical events (notably the Second World War) have affected the Melanesian societies in different ways. For example, Australian colonialism in the New Guinea highlands in the 1950s was a very different thing from German colonialism in coastal New Guinea at the end of the nineteenth century, partly because of differences in the political cultures of the two colonisers and partly because of differences in the circumstances of contact, but primarily because prevailing attitudes towards colonialism in the late nineteenth century were rather different from the attitudes prevailing in the mid twentieth century (except, perhaps, amongst French colons). Similarly, the impact of the French on New Caledonia might have been very different if that territory had had no nickel.

Second, beyond this diversity colonialism has had a universal impact in breaking down traditional isolationism, facilitating the movement of people, goods and ideas, and fostering a national consciousness within the (largely arbitrary) geographical boundaries of the colonial system. Further, the colonial powers sought to develop this wider consciousness within the framework of institutions and norms imported, for the most part, from outside. (Consider, for example, the comments of Waddell 1973 on the appropriateness of the Westminster model to Papua New Guinea.) At the two extremes of this generalisation: in Fiji the British administration actively sought to ‘preserve’ elements of the traditional polity; in Irian Jaya Indonesian policy has been overtly assimilationist and the Melanesian political culture has been suppressed by direct political action and by heavy immigration. As in other parts of the world, however, the attempt to modernise Melanesian societies and to create national polities in the colonialist’s image has been only partially successful. For one thing, like colonised people elsewhere, Melanesians have already shown a remarkable capacity for adapting modernity to tradition and tradition to modernity and for maintaining, side by side with occasional overlapping, the forms and institutions of traditional politics with those of the introduced system. For another, in Papua New Guinea, the Solomons and Vanuatu separatist and what elsewhere (May 1975, 1982) I have called ‘micronationalist’ movements have emerged to contest, actively or passively, the political boundaries of the modern states. [See chapter 3.]

Third, and more controversially, it might be argued that while colonialism is very seldom a pleasant experience for the colonised and although Melanesia suffered its share of forced labour, punitive expeditions and the rest, for most Melanesians the colonial impact, judged against the broad sweep of world history, was relatively benign (Irian Jaya being the notable exception). Without wishing to press the point too far – and recognising that in some respects this is a condemnation of Australian colonial rule: there have been few countries in which, as in Papua New Guinea, the indigenous government, elected on a nationalist platform, has sought to postpone the granting of independence. This observation and the implications of it have been elaborated by the African Mazrui (1970:56).

Until the recent interest in large scale mining enterprise, Australian indifference denied New Guineans even the advantage of a shared anti-colonial resentment. The British [in Africa], by being exploitative, were also involved in fostering cultural homogenisa-tion, some economic interaction, some constructions of institutions for conflict resolution, and above all the beginnings of national consciousness. By the sin of indifference, however, Australia has denied her dependency such an infrastructure for nationhood. And she has denied her own participation in modern imperialism its ultimate legitimation – the legitimation of having laid the foundations of modern statehood.

Finally, in three Melanesian territories a major impact of colonialism (and I include Irian Jaya as a colony) has been the importation of non-Melanesian people. In Fiji and New Caledonia Melanesians are now in a minority of the population; in Irian Jaya non-Melanesians probably account for around 10 per cent of the population (Pacific Islands Yearbook 1978:223), but they are concentrated in the administrative and commercial centres and the proportion is probably rising. Obviously this makes for a different style of national politics.

Politics, economics and bisnis

In 1971 R. Kent Wilson wrote:

When the economic history of Papua New Guinea comes to be written by an indigenous scholar, it is possible that it will be seen in part as the search for a key, a search indulged in by both indigene and expatriate, by both tribes and Administration. Exotic religion, roads, schools, co-operatives, savings societies, information services, business advice and so on, have all been interpreted in some contexts by one or both parties to the dual economy as the key to economic advancement. When frustration or imagination took over, the search was diverted to cargoism, a cult which in broad terms has not been the preserve of the indigene. [Wilson 1971:525]

Nine years later the record of Melanesian business enterprises is little better than it was when Wilson carried out his survey of village industries (Wilson and Garnaut 1968). Equally remarkable is the general failure of the numerous locally-based devel-opment movements which emerged in Papua New Guinea in the early 1970s. And although various explanations have been offered (e.g. Nadkarni 1970; Wilson 1971; Andrews 1975; also see Jackman 1977) the questions which plagued business development officers and development bank officials in the 1960s remain largely unanswered. Yet individual and group businesses are still seen – perhaps increasingly – as a road to development and to the acquisition of social and political status, and in Papua New Guinea provincial governments are in the process of setting up business arms, already with some unfortunate results.

Peter Lawrence (1982) has suggested a distinction, in traditional societies, between ‘secular or empirical knowledge’ and ‘sacred or “true” knowledge’ and referred to the continued strength – in the face of education and material advancement – of magico-religious thinking as an obstacle to people’s understanding of the operation of the modern world. Certainly what Lawrence would refer to as cargoistic thinking, and what might be more generally described as inadequate understanding and unrealistic expectations about business, provides part of an explanation for the failure, in Western terms, of some business ventures; but it is also clear that Melanesians have not always seen the demise of businesses (or, indeed, their raison d’être) in the same terms as outsiders (just as Papua New Guinean lawyer, philosopher and consultant to his country’s Constitutional Planning Committee, Bernard Narokobi opposed the constitutional provision for an auditor-general on the grounds that such an office was unMelanesian).

The relationship between politics and bisnis in modern Melanesia is a complex one, especially as in Papua New Guinea, where a government leadership code seeks to restrict the business activities of national leaders, many of whom argue (with Iambakey Okuk) that the accumulation of wealth is an essential element of political status.

At the national level, also, there is in much of Melanesia an element of unreality in the ideological commitment of self-suf-ficiency and the fact that Melanesia is, per capita, probably the most heavily aid-assisted region of the world. Commenting on this in 1970 (from the viewpoint of a political party organiser) Michael Somare (1970:490) said: ‘our people are so accustomed to getting things for nothing … that they do not see why they should organise as political groups to express these demands.’

What sort of a picture does this leave us with and what sort of political style is suggested by these aspects of political culture?

The first generalisation I would offer – which follows on from the comments about scale and about fragmentation – is that politics in modern Melanesia, even at the national level, is essentially personal and group politics. In the absence of basic social divisions cutting across the Melanesian polities (to the obvious frustration of some Marxist analysts) the bases for political support in Melanesia are typically local or personal. With the exception of Fiji, and the qualified exception of New Caledonia (where French colonial attitudes and policies have produced the sort of anti-colonial nationalist solidarity whose absence in Papua New Guinea was noted by Mazrui), the Melanesian political culture has not proved to be a fertile ground for the growth of political parties. Even in Papua New Guinea, where in the early 1970s there appeared to be a well established incipient party system, political parties have not developed as the proponents of the Westminster model assumed they would; indeed in late 1980 the Pangu Pati machinery in both Morobe and East Sepik – probably the strongest examples of political party development in Melanesia outside Fiji – appeared to be in a state of total disarray. In provincial elections in Papua New Guinea during 1979-80 several provinces (including the East Sepik and Western Highlands) decided that they ‘would not have’ political parties because parties were ‘disruptive’. Moreover where incipient party structures have emerged they have tended to display a pronounced regional bias. Even within the West Papuan liberation movement, personal and regional/ethnic divisions have cut across the common cause of Irianese against Indonesian rule.

In the absence of Western-style parties political loyalties have tended to revolve around clan, local or ethnic divisions. This appears to have two major implications. On the one hand it makes for parochial, pork-barrel politics; on the other it ensures the interplay of traditional and modern politics, with the implications this has for the accumulation and distribution of wealth and influence for political purposes, the manipulation of kastom to political ends, and occasionally the use of violence (cf. Standish 1983). A corollary of this is the growing incidence of nepotism (in Papua New Guinea, wantokism; in Vanuata, ‘family government’). As several people (Melanesian and non Melanesian) have argued, there are strengths in a wantok system, but when the impact of wantokism is to entrench the position of those who for historical or other reasons have gained an initial advantage in the political-administrative system, wantokism has a great potential for exacerbating ethnic and regional tensions (cf. McKillop and Standish in May 1982).

A second observation, which derives from the comments about the fragmentation of traditional society, relates again to the importance of regionalism. Apart from the tendency for regionalism to manifest itself as a basis of political organisation within national politics, Melanesian societies have shown a marked propensity towards decentralisation, separatism and micro-nationalist withdrawal. Aside from such separatist tendencies as evidenced by the North Solomons, Papua Besena, Nagriamel and the Western Islands Movement in the Solomons, the formal decentralisation of political power which has taken place in Papua New Guinea and has been mooted in the Solomons is highly unusual in the experience of new states.

A third generalisation concerns the inconsistency between the ideology of ‘the Melanesian Way’, with its emphasis on equality, communalism, self-sufficiency and consensus, and its respect for tradition,[9]and the reality of political and social change in Melanesia which so often is characterised by social stratification, individualism, dependence and conflict (Standish 1980 uses the term ‘jugular politics’), and is so frequently anxious to embrace modern, capitalist development. In part, perhaps, this is evidence of a variety of Melanesian political cultures. In part it is a reflection of the gap between political myth and political reality which exists in all political systems. But it also has something to do with the use of ideologies rooted in a model of harmonious small societies to justify participation in a system imposed during colonial rule. And of course it should be said that ‘the Melanesian Way’ is not entirely myth. Melanesian politics often does reveal a concern for egalitarianism, a capacity for compromise, and (except perhaps for Fiji) a lack of respect for authority which places it apart from new states in Asia, Africa or America.

In a similar way the emphasis given to kastom or kalsa in Melanesia is in part evidence of genuine respect for tradition, but it is also a symbol manipulated by politicians (especially young politicians) to legitimate their participation in the modern system and as such, as Tonkinson (1980) has pointed out, can be used both as a force for national unity and a force for ethnic division.

I am aware that this paper does little to capture the spirit of Melanesian political style. And it does nothing to distinguish differential (for example, highlands as opposed to coastal) Melanesian styles. But I hope it does suggest that one might be able to talk about a Melanesian political style, rooted in Melanesian political culture, and that in interpreting contemporary political developments in independent Melanesia non-Melanesian observers should be aware that in part what they are observing is the assertion of that Melanesian style (cf. Quiros 1979 in reviewing Standish 1979).

[5] This paper was presented at a seminar at the ANU in 1980 and published in R.J. May and Hank Nelson (eds), Melanesia Beyond Diversity (1982).

[6] On the concept of political culture see Almond and Verba (1963), Pye and Verba (1965), Almond and Powell (1966:chapter 3), Kavanagh (1972). This writing might be compared with the earlier literature on ‘national character’, of which there is an extensive review in Inkeles and Levinson (1969).

[7] The personality-and-politics literature is well reviewed in Greenstein (1969, 1975). There is also an extensive bibliography in Hermann (1977). For specific comments on aggregative analyses of personality and politics see Greenstein (1969:120-140; 1975:60-68). Probably the best known study of personality and politics in ‘transitional societies’, is that of Pye (1962); there is also some interesting material in Legge (1973).

[8] See papers in May and Nelson (1982 vol 1).

[9] The closest to a coherent statement of ‘the Melanesian Way’ which I have been able to locate is a piece by Bernard Narokobi in Post-Courier 22 October 1974 but there is constant reference to it in papers in May (1973) and Lawrence (1975) has written about it. A similar philosophy is expounded in The Pacific Way (Tupouniua et al. 1975). The Melanesian Way philosophy is, of course, embodied in the Papua New Guinea government’s Eight Aims and in the preamble to its constitution. [After this paper was written a volume on the Melanesian Way, by Narokobi, was published by the Institute of Papuan New Guinea Studies, Port Moresby (Narokobi 1980).]

The Melanesian Way

NEC Approves Revitalized Village Courts Strategy

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Approved for Release:

Friday, 27th November, 2020

The National Executive Council has recently approved the Crime Prevention through Revitalized Village Courts System Strategy 2020-2030.

This was announced recently by Prime Minister, Hon. James Marape, MP, saying the transformation and revitalization of this first level of judiciary system by approving this strategy will allow Village Court officials and Land Mediators to deal with issues in a more formal setting.

Prime Minister Marape said this will give prominence to the Village Courts system as the forefront of the government’s justice service mechanism in all communities of both urban and rural settings of the country.

“It will formally recognize the Village Court officials as equal and active members of the PNG Law & Justice Sector, performing their mandated roles and responsibilities to achieve the sector’s common goals and objectives.

“The Village Courts system has been facilitating the settlement of disputes in communities of both urban and rural settings throughout Papua New Guinea for decades before and since independence, through the use of good customary conflict resolution techniques plus new legislations, and has proven to be very effective,” Prime Minister Marape said.

He said this will also allow empowerment and capacity building of Village Court officials to perform to their utmost potential as judicial officials; boosting their moral and enhancing performance.

Hence, realizing the purpose of this Village Courts system in maintaining peace in our communities.

“This strategy also aims to mobilize the village courts and non-state actors to implement crime prevention initiatives within our communities.

“It will further enable good management and safe keeping of court records,” Prime Minister Marape said.

The Prime Minister also said Cabinet has approved an appropriation of K7.2 million annually for the next 10 years for the successful implementation of the Crime Prevention through Revitalized Village Courts System Strategy.

Ends.

Nature Care

The burning scar: Inside the destruction of Asia’s last rainforests

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Petrus Kinggo walks through the thick lowland rainforest in the Boven Digoel Regency.

“This is our mini market,” he says, smiling. “But unlike in the city, here food and medicine are free.”

The rich rainforest in Papua, among the most biodiverse places on earth, is threatened by deforestation
The rich rainforest in Papua, among the most biodiverse places on earth, is threatened by deforestation

Mr Kinggo is an elder in the Mandobo tribe. His ancestors have lived off these forests in Papua, Indonesia for centuries. Along with fishing and hunting, the sago starch extracted from palms growing wild here provided the community with their staple food. Their home is among the most biodiverse places on earth, and the rainforest is sacred and essential to the indigenous tribes.

Six years ago, Mr Kinggo was approached by South Korean palm oil giant Korindo, which asked him to help persuade his tribe and 10 other clans to accept just 100,000 rupiah ($8; £6) per hectare in compensation for their land. The company arrived with permits from the government and wanted a “quick transaction” with indigenous landholders, according to Mr Kinggo. And the promise of development was coupled with subtle intimidation, he said.

“The military and police came to my house, saying I had to meet with the company. They said they didn’t know what would happen to me if I didn’t.”

When he did, they made him personal promises as well, he said. As a co-ordinator, he would receive a new house with clean water and a generator, and have his children’s school fees paid.

His decision would change his community forever.

Petrus Kinggo struck a deal with Korindo to sell part of the land his tribe had lived off for generations
Petrus Kinggo struck a deal with Korindo to sell part of the land his tribe had lived off for generations

Indonesia is the world’s largest exporter of palm oil, and Papua is its newest frontier. The archipelago has experienced one of the fastest rates of deforestation in the world – vast areas of forest have been cleared to make way for row upon row of oil palm tree, growing a product found in everything from shampoo to biscuits. Indonesia’s palm oil exports were worth about $19bn (£14bn) last year, according to data from Gapki, the nation’s palm oil association.

The rich forests in the remote province of Papua had until recently escaped relatively untouched, but the government is now rapidly opening the area to investors, vowing to bring prosperity to one of the poorest regions in the country. Korindo controls more land in Papua than any other conglomerate. The company has cleared nearly 60,000 hectares of forests inside its government-granted concessions – an area the size of Chicago or Seoul – and the company’s vast plantation there is protected by state security forces.

Companies like Korindo have to clear the land in these concessions to allow them to replant new palms. Using fire to do that – the so-called “slash and burn” technique – is illegal in Indonesia due to the air pollution it causes and the high risk blazes will get out of control.

Korindo denies setting fires, saying it follows the law. A 2018 report by the leading global green timber certification body – the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), of which Korindo is a certificate holder – concluded there was no evidence that illegal and deliberate fires were set by the company.

But according to a new investigation by the Forensic Architecture group at Goldsmiths University in London and Greenpeace International, published in conjunction with the BBC, there is evidence that indicates deliberate burning on the land during the land-clearing period. The investigation found evidence of fires on one of Korindo’s concessions over a period of years in patterns consistent with deliberate use.

Forensic Architecture uses spatial and architectural analysis and advanced modelling and research techniques to investigate human rights violations and environmental destruction. “This is a robust technique that can with a high level of certainty determine if a fire is intentional or not,” said senior researcher Samaneh Moafi. “This allows us to hold the large corporations – who have been setting fires systematically for years now – liable in the court,” she said.

The group used satellite imagery to study the pattern of land clearing inside a Korindo concession called PT Dongin Prabhawa. They used the imagery to study the so-called “normalised burn ratio”, comparing it to hotspot data in the same area – intense heat sources picked up by Nasa satellites, and put the two datasets together over the same period of time, 2011 to 2016.

“We found that the pattern, the direction and the speed with which fires had moved matched perfectly with the pattern, the speed, direction with which land clearing happened. This suggests that the fires were set intentionally,” Samaneh Moafi said.

“If the fires were set from outside the concession or due to weather conditions, they would have moved with a different directionality. But in the cases that we were looking at there was a very clear directionality,” she said.BBC

Watch how the Forensic Architecture Group established what was happening in Papua
Video captionWatch how the Forensic Architecture Group established what was happening in Papua
BBC

Korindo turned down several BBC interview requests, but the company said in a statement that all land clearing was carried out with heavy machinery rather than fires.

It said there were many natural fires in the region due to extreme dryness, and claimed that any fires in its concessions had been started by “villagers hunting giant wild rats hiding under stacks of wood”.

But locals near the concession in Papua told the BBC the company had set fires on the concessions over a period of years, during a timeframe which matched the findings of the visual investigation.

Sefnat Mahuze, a local farmer, said he saw Korindo employees collecting leftover wood, “the worthless stuff”.

“They piled up long rows, maybe 100-200 metres long, and then they poured petrol over it and then lit them,” he said.

Another villager, Esau Kamuyen, said the smoke from the fires “closed the world around them, shutting off the sky”.

According to Greenpeace International, companies are rarely held to account for slash and burn – a practice that almost every year creates a smoky haze in Indonesia which can end up blanketing the entire South East Asian region, causing airports and schools to close.

A Harvard University study estimated that the worst fires in decades in 2015 were linked to more than 90,000 early deaths. The fires that year are also believed to have produced more carbon emissions in just a few months than the entire United States economy.BBC

Papua is home to the largest rainforests in Indonesia
Papua is home to the largest rainforests in Indonesia

Many of the tribal allegations against Korindo were investigated for two years by the Forest Stewardship Council. The regulator’s tree logo – found on paper products throughout the UK and Europe – is meant to tell consumers the product is sourced from ethnically and sustainable companies. The FSC report into allegations against Korindo was never published, after legal threats from the company, but the BBC obtained a copy.

The report found “evidence beyond reasonable doubt” that Korindo’s palm oil operation destroyed 30,000 hectares of high conservation forest in breach of FSC regulations; that Korindo was, “on the balance of probability … supporting the violation of traditional and human rights for its own benefit”; and was “directly benefitting from the military presence to gain an unfair economic advantage” by “providing unfair compensation rates to communities”.

“There was no doubt that Korindo had been in violation of our rules. That was very clear,” Kim Carstensen, the FSC’s executive director, told the BBC at the group’s headquarters in Germany.

The report recommended unequivocally that Korindo be expelled from the body. But the recommendation was rejected by the FSC board – a move environmental groups say undermined the credibility of the organisation. A letter sent to the FSC board in August, signed by 19 local environmental groups, said the groups could no long rely on the body “to be a useful certification tool to promote forest conservation and respect for community rights and livelihoods”.

Mr Carstensen, the executive director, defended the decision to allow Korindo to stay. “These things have happened, right? Is the best thing to do to say they were in breach of our values so we’re not going to have anything to do with you anymore?” he said.

“The logic of the board has been, ‘We want to see the improvements happen’.”

Korindo strongly denied that the company was involved in any human rights violations but acknowledged there was room for improvements and said it was implementing new grievance procedures.

It said it had paid fair compensation to tribes and that it had paid an additional $8 per hectare for the loss of trees – a sum decided by the Indonesian government, which granted them the concession. The BBC tried to confirm the figure with the Indonesian government, but officials declined to comment on Korindo.

Workers on one of Korindo's palm oil plantations, picking up the palm oil fruit
Workers on one of Korindo’s palm oil plantations, picking up the palm oil fruit

The Indonesian government maintains generally that Papua is an integral part of the nation, recognised by the international community. The province, which is half of the island of New Guinea (the other half belongs to the country of Papua New Guinea), became part of Indonesia after a controversial referendum overseen by the UN in 1969, in which just 1,063 tribal elders were selected to vote.

Since then, control over Papua’s rich natural resources has become a flashpoint in a long-running, low-level separatist conflict. Papuan activists call the 1969 referendum the “act of no choice”.

The Indonesian military has been accused by activist groups of gross human rights abuses in its attempts to suppress dissent in Papua and protect business interests there. Foreign observers are rarely granted access, “because there is something that the state wants to hide”, according to Andreas Harsono, an Indonesian researcher with the US-based Human Rights Watch.

“They are hiding human rights abuses, environmental degradation, deforestation,” he said. “And the marginalisation of indigenous people – economically, socially and politically.”

In an attempt to ease tensions, Papua was granted greater autonomy in 2001, and there has been a significant increase in government funds for the region, with Jakarta vowing to bring prosperity to the people of Papua and saying it is committed to resolving past rights abuses.

"The company didn’t bring prosperity," said Elisabeth Ndiwaen. "What they did was create conflict."
“The company didn’t bring prosperity,” said Elisabeth Ndiwaen. “What they did was create conflict.”

Derek Ndiwaen was one of those in the Mandobo tribe who, like Petrus Kinggo, took money from Korindo for their land. Derek’s sister Elisabeth was away at the time, working in the city, and she didn’t find out about the deal until she returned home. According to Elisabeth, Derek became embroiled in conflict with other tribes over the land deals. She believes the stress played a role in his death.

“My brother would never have sold his pride or forest before,” she said, through tears. “The company didn’t bring prosperity. What they did was create conflict, and my brother was the victim.”

Elisabeth said that her brother was also made promises of free schooling for his children and health care for the family – promises she said were never realised.

“The forest is gone and we are living in poverty,” she said. “After our forest has been sold you would think we would be living a good life. But here in 2020 we are not.”

According to Elisabeth, Korindo told the community it would build good roads and provide clean water.

But residents in her village of Nakias, in the Ngguti district say life hadn’t changed the way they hoped. There’s no clean running water or electricity in the village. Those that can afford it use generators but fuel costs four times as much as in the capital Jakarta.BBC

Environmental activists fear for the Papua rainforest - among the most biodiverse places in the world
Environmental activists fear for the Papua rainforest – among the most biodiverse places in the world

Korindo said that the company directly employs more than 10,000 people and has put $14m (£11m) into social projects in Papua, including food programmes for malnourished children and scholarships.

The company has stopped all further clearing until an assessment of high conservation and high carbon stock forests inside their concessions is carried out.

“The bigger question of what to do with the sins of the past will take a bit of time,” said Kim Carstensen, the FSC chairman. “Whether it’s two years, three years – that I don’t know.”

Elisabeth fears that nothing will make up for the destruction of the rainforest.

“When I see that our ancestral forest is all cleared, chopped down, it’s heart-breaking,” she said. “It should have been passed on to the next generation.”

“I walk through the plantation crying, and ask myself, where are our ancestors’ spirits now that our forest has been completely destroyed. And it happened under my watch.”BBC

Petrus Kinggo's nephew and his generation will inherit a scarred landscape in Papua
Petrus Kinggo’s nephew and his generation will inherit a scarred landscape in PapuaBBC

Petrus Kinggo did receive money from Korindo, he said – about $42,000 (£32,000), equal to 17 years’ pay on the provincial monthly minimum wage. And the company paid for one of his eight children’s school fees until 2017. He said he did not receive a house or a generator, and the money is all gone.

“I have nothing left,” he said. “Uncles, nephews, in-laws, grandchildren, brothers, sisters all took some. And then I spent what was left on my own children’s education.”

Thousands of hectares of the Mandobo tribe’s once vast rainforest has been logged and replaced with neat rows of oil palm trees. A further 19,000 hectares now inside a Korindo concession is earmarked for clearing.

Mr Kinggo is fighting to save some of what’s left. He fears future generations will have to “live off money” rather than the forest. He blames the government for not consulting with the villagers before giving the concession to Korindo and “sending them here to pressure us”.

But when he walks through the forest now, he looks inside, and the money he took weighs on him.

“According to God I have sinned, I deceived 10 tribes,” he said.

“The company said, ‘Thank you Petrus for looking after us so well’. But in my heart I knew I had done wrong.”

BBC

You can watch a film version of this story, The Burning Scar, in the UK on the BBC News Channel on the 21/22 November 2020 at 21:30 GMT and at various times this weekend on BBC World News.

You can also listen to the radio documentary on the BBC World Service here .

Source: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/

Nature Care

Indonesian police charge indigenous men in dispute over nutmeg plantation

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  • Police in Indonesia have charged two indigenous men with vandalizing heavy equipment after a confrontation with a company accused of illegally logging their ancestral land.
  • The company, CV Sumber Berkat Makmur, has a concession to cultivate nutmeg trees in East Seram district, Maluku province, but it’s unclear whether the ancestral land of the Sabuai indigenous community falls within the concession.
  • Activists and local lawmakers have called for a halt to the company’s activities while the uncertainty about its permit is cleared up.
  • The case is just the latest in Indonesia in which local authorities have opted to pursue criminal charges against communities mired in land disputes with companies.

AMBON, Indonesia — Activists in Indonesia have called on police to drop criminal charges against two indigenous men who took part in a confrontation against a company accused of illegally logging their ancestral forest.

Police in East Seram district, in the province of Maluku, have charged Stefanus Ahwalam and Khaleb Yamarua, of the Sabuai indigenous community, with causing damage to the property of plantation company CV Sumber Berkat Makmur.

They were among 26 indigenous people arrested by the police on Feb. 17 following a confrontation over the company’s logging activities in forested area deemed sacred by the community. The 24 others were released without charge on the complaint filed by the company, while Stefanus and Khaleb face a possible prosecution that could see them jailed for more than two and a half years.

“This can’t be tolerated. This is an environmental crime that must be resolved,” Usman Bugis, director of the environmental group Nanaku Maluku, told local media. “After damaging our customary forest, [the company] is now persecuting our people.”.

A map of the Maluku Islands province, in red, in eastern Indonesia. Image by TUBS via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0).

The case is the latest in a long list of disputes between forest communities and the companies laying claim to the land. As with most of those other cases, the authorities appear to have prioritized the company’s grievances over those of the community, according to the Sabuai.

The community says it had previously consented to CV Sumber Berkat Makmur, which has a permit to cultivate nutmeg trees, operating in three other locations in the area, but not in the ancestral forest on Mount Ahwale, where the Sabuai bury their dead. On the morning of Feb. 17, a group of Sabuai men observed workers from the company loading up a truck with logs at the site in question. They demanded the workers stop and leave the area, but the workers refused.

A scuffle broke out, during which the indigenous men reportedly vandalized the heavy equipment on site and confiscated the keys. The company subsequently reported the incident to police, leading to the arrests. But the community says it plans to fight back, and has secured a March 12 court date for a pretrial motion to get the charges against Stefanus and Khaleb thrown out.

“How dare the company encroach into a location that’s prohibited by the community?” Niko Ahwalam, the Sabuai chief, said in a statement received by Mongabay on Feb. 22.

“Our action is solely to defend our rights on the forest and mountain that the company has grabbed. The forest is highly sacred. There lie the graves of our ancestors, and the site itself was the old village of the Sabuai people.”

Sabuai men at the disputed site amid logging equipment belonging to CV Sumber Berkat Makmur. Image courtesy of the Sabuai indigenous community.

A key question in the case, and one obscured by the opaque permitting process in Indonesia, is whether the Sabuai ancestral forest falls within the concession awarded to CV Sumber Berkat Makmur in 2018. Mongabay has been unable to access the company’s plantation maps as of the time of this writing.

Imanuel Darusman, a director at CV Sumber Berkat Makmur, told reporters that the company had all the required permits to operate in the forest, including to clear trees ahead of planting and sell the timber. He said the company had also fulfilled all its promises to the Sabuai community as agreed on by both sides, including employing 70 community members. Imanuel said this was the first dispute to arise between the two sides since CV Sumber Berkat Makmur began operating there, and suggested other parties were to blame for inciting opposition to his company’s operations.

Here, as in much of Indonesia, the driving factor behind the dispute over indigenous land is the lack of formal title. Prior to a landmark 2013 court ruling, all indigenous lands across the country were considered state land, and were parceled out accordingly by the authorities for plantations, logging concessions, mines and more. The court ruling relinquished the state’s control over the land, but notably did not order it handed back to the respective communities. Instead, the government has had to do that on a case-by-case basis, and progress has been slow.

In the case of the Sabuai, the local government must first formally recognize that the Sabuai are an indigenous community, said Leny Patty, head of the Maluku provincial chapter of the Indigenous People’s Alliance of the Archipelago (AMAN). This recognition, issued in the form of a bylaw, can then be used by the Sabuai to apply to the central government for formal indigenous land rights and a title to their forest.

“If we have this indigenous rights bylaw, companies won’t be able to just come in and grab the rights of the Maluku people,” she said. “All of the forests in Maluku are customary forests.”

Police release most of the Sabuai men arrested after the Feb. 17 confrontation with workers from CV Sumber Berkat Makmur. Image courtesy of the East Seram Police.
Police release most of the Sabuai men arrested after the Feb. 17 confrontation with workers from CV Sumber Berkat Makmur. Image courtesy of the East Seram Police.

With the case shrouded in uncertainty, pressure is growing for a freeze on CV Sumber Berkat Makmur’s operations to investigate the complaints by the Sabuai.

The Sabuai Student Alliance has filed a police report against the company, alleging illegal forest clearing without the requisite permit. It says the community was left out of the process of carrying out an environmental impact analysis for the plantation, and thus any permit issued to the company on the basis of that analysis cannot be valid.

Abraham Tulalessy, an environmental law expert at Pattimura University in Ambon, the provincial capital, has backed the calls for a police probe into the permit issue.

“The company must be investigated,” he said, adding the Sabuai community was the victim in the dispute.

The provincial legislature has also called on the company to temporarily halt its forest-clearing activity on the disputed land. It says the provincial forestry department should evaluate the company’s operations.

“The conclusion is that we must visit the site to cross-check the claims by NGOs and by officials from Sumber Berkat Makmur,” Richard Rahakbauw, a provincial legislator, said on Feb. 23.

This story was first reported by Mongabay’s Indonesia team and published here on our Indonesian site on Feb. 28, 2020.

by Nurdin Tubaka on 12 March 2020 | Adapted by Basten Gokkon, Soure: MONGABAY

Nature Speaks

Water Crisis in North Tanna

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Communities in north Tanna are suffering from water and food shortages due to a long period of dry weather.
Communities in north Tanna are suffering from water and food shortages due to a long period of dry weather.

Communities in north Tanna are suffering from water and food shortages due to a long period of dry weather.

Over 700 villagers from Louital, Laos and Lounabaiu had to travel to the coast to get water because their water sources have dried up, Daniel Ben Talap, a resident and owner of the Blue Cave Tour conveyed.

“There hasn’t been any rain for several months,” he said.

“It’s normal for the area to experience low rainfall that can last for a long time but this year is the worst.

“The low rainfall has resulted in withered crops. A lot of cattle are also dying.

“People have to go fishing so that they can sell their fish at the market and buy food and water.

“I have been transporting villagers to nearby rivers to wash their clothes and to the coast to search for water coming out from the rocks.”

Mr Talap is appealing to the government and any humanitarian organisation to assist the people in north Tanna with food and water.

According to the Climatologist from the Vanuatu Meteorologist and Geo-Hazards Department (VMGD), Kalo Abel, the whole island of Tanna is currently experiencing what is known as meteorological drought.

“This can affect pastures and livestock. The rainfall predicted for the next coming months will be low in the southern part of the country.

“Villagers are encouraged to report issues associated with the meteorological drought such as water shortage for authorities to address them,” he added.

The National Disaster Management Office (NDMO) said it did not receive any report about the water and food scarcity in north Tanna.

NDMO conveyed that it has received reports about water shortages only from communities in Aneityum and Efate.

Source: https://dailypost.vu/

The Melanesian Way

Bougainville’s ‘Melanesian way’ beyond the referendum

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Source: https://www.aspistrategist.org.au

Bougainville knows far better than Britain that a referendum vote to go or to stay is only the first mountain. Then the second mountain must be climbed—the negotiation to turn the outcome into a reality.

For decades, Bougainville has been trekking towards the first summit that’s now in view—the vote on independence or greater autonomy, to be held from 23 November to 7 December.

The referendum question reads:

Do you agree for Bougainville to have:
1. Greater Autonomy; or
2. Independence

In Bougainville, 200,000 people are enrolled to vote; 12,000 registered voters are in Papua New Guinea, and a further 200 are in Solomon Islands, Cairns and Brisbane.

The Lowy Institute prediction is that 75% of voters will choose independence, driven by separate ethnic identity, residual animosity from the war years, and the failure of the current model of autonomy.

PNG’s and Bougainville’s leaders have always known about the second mountain that lies beyond the referendum. That’s because both peaks were established by the Bougainville Peace Agreement, signed in 2001.

The peace was a ‘complex agreement, produced by a succession of compromises made during more than two years of often intense negotiations (June 1999 to August 2001)’. The deal ended a conflict that ran from 1988 to 1997, with an estimated death toll ranging from 3,000 up to 20,000.

The referendum result isn’t binding on PNG. The second mountain climb calls for consultation on the outcome between the PNG and Bougainville governments. And even if that process produces an agreement, there’s a further stage. The final say on any deal, based on the referendum, rests with the PNG parliament, which can accept or reject.

Constitutional lawyer Anthony Regan, an adviser to Bougainville parties in the peace process since 1994, has just published a study of the vote, The Bougainville referendum: law, administration and politics. He says the vote could produce one of three outcomes: ‘a “yes” vote in favour of greater autonomy, which the national government endorses; a “yes” vote for independence, which the national government endorses; or a “yes” vote to independence, which the national government opposes’.

Regan says either greater autonomy or independence will need extended transition periods:

A ‘yes’ to independence, in particular, would require significant new institutions to be established. These could be expected to include a judiciary, a public prosecutor and a public solicitor, an auditor-general, a taxation collection agency, a foreign affairs agency and so on. The experience of the ABG [Autonomous Bougainville Government] in establishing new agencies where none existed is that it takes time and resources.

Regan’s book was launched last Thursday at an Australian National University symposiumon the referendum.

The optimism about what’s possible was well expressed by two of the speakers, Rose Pihei, of the Bougainville Integrated Community Learning Centre, and Barbara Tanne, of the Bougainville Women’s Federation, who is also a representative of the churches of Bougainville.

Pihei said ‘excitement is flooding Bougainville’, and Tanne said the referendum is ‘a window of opportunity for Bougainvilleans to realise their dreams’.

Expressing confidence that there’ll be a strong vote in favour of independence, two former independence fighters, James Tanis (‘the moment has arrived’) and Dennis Kuiai, put much of their focus on what’ll happen after the vote.

Kuiai is now acting secretary of the Department of Peace Agreement Implementation in the ABG, while Tanis is the peace envoy of Bougainville’s president and an adviser to the PNG government.

Kuiai said there’s ‘more confidence and trust in how PNG supports the process’. Tanis said PNG and Bougainville owned both referendum questions and paid tribute to PNG’s approach: ‘This is not a decision between a coloniser and the colonised. This is a decision taken by citizens, a decision between ourselves, to find a new relationship between ourselves.’

Both speakers invoked the ‘Melanesian way’ (consultation, conversation and consensus) as the key to how the two governments will deal with the referendum result. Kuiai said:

Using the Melanesian way of doing things, we know for sure we will finally get there. And this outcome we will agree on will be something good for PNG in terms of the sovereignty of PNG and in responding to the aspirations of the Bougainvilleans. The post-referendum has a lot of challenges.

One Melanesian-way analogy offered is that Bougainville is the daughter ready for marriage, and that PNG is the father who’s obliged to prepare for that marriage.

Bougainville is signalling the need for independent mediators to push along the Melanesian way—one PNG mediator and one international. The international mediator could come from New Zealand, based on its crucial role in securing the peace agreement; names mentioned are former prime minister Helen Clark and former foreign minister and secretary-general of the Commonwealth Don McKinnon.

With the vote in sight, Bougainville can embrace PNG to prepare for the next tough climb.

The departure of Peter O’Neill as PNG’s prime minister is an unspoken element in the warm sentiments. He didn’t give much time or cash to Bougainville, always putting the stress on a united PNG. In Melanesian-way fashion, O’Neill did keep the process going, even while abhorring where it could lead and pushing it off as much as possible. The Melanesian way can be about delay as much as about discussion or decision.

PNG now faces the cost of not having put in the resources to make a clear success of Bougainville’s autonomous government, which has been in operation since 2005.

Regan’s judgement is that two decades of peace created ‘more robust relationships’ between Bougainville and PNG. That history will matter, he says, ‘because it’s very unclear what will happen from the consultations after the vote’.

Graeme Dobell is ASPI’s journalist fellow. Image: Antman!/Flickr.

The Melanesian Way

Peter Donigi and Indigenous Land Rights in PNG

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By John Endemongo Kua

Peter Donigi
Peter Donigi

All good things come to an end, and as such, the life of an outstanding scholar and gentleman, had come to pass yesterday morning, here in Port Moresby.

The late Donigi and myself, did not see eye to eye on many national issues of importance to the nation not because of the principles behind the issues, and nor did we allow each other the opportunity to discuss or debate issues of importance to the state or international concerns, simply because he was a Sepik and I a Chimbu, and we were rallying, behind the powerful men of post independence politics, with him standing stoically behind Somare as a kinsman and myself behind Okuk.

For the better or worse, most political cadres were consumed in this shallow and empty game of cloak and dagger political manoeuvres, that destabilised the national progress in many respects to the detriment of this nation state.

Despite the hostile environment of ethnic and regional divide, reason prevailed in men of valour, such as Peter Donigi, who was an astute scholar in law and sociology, and was the chief advisor to the longest serving prime minister, in Sir Michael Somare.

I found a deeply, rooted alliance, with him, where in, he was able to premise the greatest legal blunder, crafted by the Caucasian race of European, who had frolicked the vast oceans for new lands and territories, which they annexed with force of their own self serving inequitable laws that nullified the interests of the indigenous people who were natives of the land.

Donigis arguments, on indigenous land rights, had received international attention, peaking with the United Nations General Assembly, which had passed a resolution, declaring that the indigenous people of any nation state, possessed an inalienable claim to land upon occupation and usage.

Unfortunately his intellectual ability to logical reasoning could not find anchor the political masters of our nation, including the dinosaurs of PNG politics, particularly his own Sepik Kukurai, where he had difficulty in convincing that the land actually belonged to the indigenous inhabitants, including its other properties such as the vegetation and it’s subsoil elements.

In 2005, I called into his office at the UPNG, where he was tutoring in law, and probed him on the possibility of introducing amendments to the existing legislation particularly in relation to inorganic resources in minerals and hydrocarbons. He may have had a bad day, or his mind was engaged or something else was happening, but he reluctantly dismissed my notion of an amendment by pronouncing, his motion in court applying S. 19 of the constitution to interpret the relevant mining and petroleum laws in accordance with S. 53 to include the rights of indigenous customary land right holders.

There was nothing I could do as a non lawyer, but to take my fight at the legislative front to rest my case, and to prove to Donigi that people power can be harnessed to change the legal framework for the better and faster route to restoring equitable rights.

Luck struck, on the 18 July, 2008, when I stumbled over Boka Kondra, the member for North Fly, who had presented a grievance debate on the misgivings of the gigantic Ok Tedi mine in the Star Mountains, which had little or no benefit for the indigenous land owners.

I approached him, that day, and convinced him that, he had the privilege to move a private members bill to amend the Mining Act, to remove the state, and restore the indigenous land owners as the legitimate proprietors.

Kondra accepted my proposal and gave me a blanket power of attorney to co ordinate the drafting of the amendments on the 03 of February, 2009.

I fired the instructions, to Pakgne Lawyers, to draft out the amendments to the Mining Act of 1992 and the Oil and gas Act of 1998.

The private members bills were sent to the parliamentary legal counsel for recourse, and had subsequently put on the notice paper for debate by the clerk of parliament.

For presentation and elaboration, I could think of nobody, better than Donigi, and therefore rang him and invited him to the presentation at the state function room, where he authoritatively convinced those present that, such was the law.

We endured a long campaign with him finally, drafting a master piece legislation, which Somare had shunned, and now O’Neill likewise.

Boka Kondra got caught in the maze of self glorification and aborted the proposed amendments, in exchange for a cabinet post.

With the death of the great champion of indigenous peoples land rights, I now declare war the puppets of foreign investors.

Nature Care

Pacific leaders, Australia agree to disagree about action on climate change

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BY FOREIGN AFFAIRS REPORTER MELISSA CLARKE IN TUVALUUPDATED FRI AT 1:36PM

Australia has stymied efforts by small island states to get Pacific-wide consensus on their declaration for stronger action on climate change.

Key points:

  • Australia expressed reservations about emissions reduction, coal use and the Green Climate Fund
  • Scott Morrison said he understood sensitivities in the Pacific region but ultimately he was “accountable to the Australian people”
  • Tuvalu’s Prime Minister was disappointed with the outcome, saying leaders “should have done more work for our people”

Regional leaders, including Australia and New Zealand, held 12-hour talks in the tiny Pacific nation of Tuvalu for this year’s Pacific Islands Forum (PIF), eventually reaching an agreement on a statement on climate change and a communique early this morning.

They could not reach agreement on the Tuvalu Declaration made by smaller Pacific countries, instead drafting a separate Kainaki II Declaration, with different terms on coal use and emissions reduction.

The finished communique comes with a qualification that means the leaders do not support all of the declaration from the smaller nations.

Scott Morrison in Tuvalu

Earlier in the week, the Smaller Island States (SIS) group agreed to the Tuvalu Declaration, which acknowledges a climate change crisis, encourages countries to revise the emissions reductions targets and calls for a rapid phase out of coal use.

They had hoped the leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum, which includes Australia and New Zealand, would endorse it.

But Australia expressed reservations about the sections on emissions reduction, coal use and funding for the UN’s Green Climate Fund, while New Zealand also had reservations about the section on the Green Climate Fund.

Introducing Tuvalu

Prime Minister Scott Morrison will arrive in Tuvalu, one of the smallest and least-visited nations on Earth, for the annual gathering of Pacific leaders, who have named climate change as their top issue.

That means that the final communique endorses the Smaller Island States declaration “with qualifications”, and no country has fully committed to endorsing the Tuvalu Declaration.

Speaking after the marathon leaders meeting, Mr Morrison said he wanted the SIS group to be able to express its views “freely” but that its statement was not binding on the rest of the forum.

“The Pacific Island Forum has its leaders meeting and it agrees to the things that it agrees. And then the Small Island States have their own forum that sit within that,” he said.

“And it’s not incumbent on the leaders’ forum to have to run a ruler over that.”

‘The Prime Minister of Tonga actually cried’

Tuvalu’s PM said tears were shed during Pacific Island Forum.ABC NEWS

That disappointed the PIF chair, Tuvalu’s Prime Minister Enele Sopoaga, who said as he left the meeting: “We tried our best”.

Mr Sopoaga had invested significant time and energy in making climate change the central focus of the meeting, and pushed for the Tuvalu Declaration to be adopted by Australia, but was resigned to the alternative outcome.

Negotiations were heated, particularly between Mr Sopoaga and Mr Morrison.

Pacific pivot undermined

Australia’s return to its Pacific neighbours after years of neglect could risk being undermined by the Government’s intransigence on the region’s main threat: climate change.

“We expressed very strongly during our exchange, between me and Scott [Morrison], I said: ‘You are concerned about saving your economy in Australia … I am concerned about saving my people in Tuvalu,'” Mr Sopoaga said.

“That was the tone of the discussion. Please don’t expect that we come and bow down … we were exchanging flaring language — not swearing — but of course expressing the concerns of leaders.”

Mr Morrison said he understood the sensitivities in the region and showed his respect during negotiations, but ultimately he was “accountable to the Australian people”.

“I am accountable to the Australian people, that’s who I’m accountable for,” Mr Morrison said.

“I understand the deep sensitivities. It’s not a theoretical issue, it’s not a dinner party conversation here in the Pacific.

“It’s not just about Australia’s economy. It’s about how Australia can continue to provide the support that we do across the Pacific region.”

Mr Sopoaga said Tonga’s Prime Minister Akilisi Pohiva had been reduced to tears as climate change activists delivered a presentation to the leaders earlier in the week.

“The Prime Minister of Tonga actually cried in the meeting … shed tears in front of the leaders, such is the passion.”

Tongan PM Akilisi Pohiva and Morrison
Tongan PM Akilisi Pohiva and Morrison

The outcome falls short of what Mr Sopoaga and some other Pacific leaders had hoped.

“It was a negotiated outcome, I think it still contains some references to the (UN) secretary-general’s message to accelerate actions against climate change and it’s a way forward,” he said.

“I think we can say we should’ve done more work for our people.”

How do the declarations differ on key issues?

Abbot Point coal terminal in north Queensland

Emissions reductions:

Tuvalu Declaration:

“Encourage all countries to revise their nationally determined contributions so as to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”

Kainaki II Declaration

“Call for … all parties to the Paris Agreement to meet or exceed their nationally determined contributions.”

Climate change and the ADF

 
Australia’s Defence Department has spelled out clearly to a Senate inquiry that climate change will create “concurrency pressures” for the Defence Force as a rise in disaster relief operations continues.

Coal use:

Tuvalu Declaration:

“We re-affirm the UN secretary-general’s call for an immediate global ban on the construction of new coal-fired power plants and coal mines and … [call on them to] rapidly phase out their use of coal in the power sector.”

Kainaki II Declaration:

“Invite all parties to the Paris Agreement to reflect” on the UN secretary-general’s remarks on “fossil fuel subsidies and just transition from fossil fuels”.

“[Call on] the members of the G7 and G20 to rapidly implement their commitment to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies.”

Green Climate Fund:

Tuvalu Declaration:

“We call for a prompt, ambitious and successful replenishment of the Green Climate Fund.”

Kainaki II Declaration:

The international community “continues efforts towards” meeting international funding commitments, “including the replenishment of the Green Climate Fund.”


Nature Care

Fijian PM accused Scott Morrison of being ‘very insulting and condescending’

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Fiji’s leader has hit out at his Australian counterpart, questioning their personal relationship following the Pacific Island Forum.

Fiji Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama has launched a scathing attack on Scott Morrison and his deputy prime minister over their attitude towards their Pacific island neighbours.

But the Australian prime minister insists his government still has a deep commitment to its regional neighbours after a tetchy week at the Pacific Island Forum which tried to turn the heat on Australia over climate change.

In an interview with Guardian Australia on Saturday, Mr Bainimarama accused Mr Morrison of being “very insulting and condescending” during a leaders retreat.READ MORE

Deputy prime minister Michael McCormack.

Deputy PM says Pacific Islands will survive climate change because they ‘pick our fruit’

“I thought Morrison was a good friend of mine, apparently not,” he said.

Asked if Mr Morrison’s approach might cause some Pacific leaders to look to China, Mr Bainimarama said: “After what we went through with Morrison, nothing can be worse than him.”

“China never insults the Pacific.”

Labor’s climate change spokesman Mark Butler weighed in saying the long-standing relationship with Pacific countries has been damaged by Mr Morrison’s heavy-handedness.

When combatting climate change, it’s good to have an ally like New Zealand in your corner. Together, we can save Tuvalu, the Pacific, and the world. Vinaka vakalevu for the passion you bring to this fight, @jacindaardern.

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“It just adds insult to injury to have the deputy prime minister of the country then say if you lose your home through sea level rise you’ll be fine because you’ll be able to access some job opportunities in Australia.”

Pacific island leaders used the forum to urge Australia to lift its game on climate change to protect low-lying countries like Tuvalu by curbing fossil fuel emissions.

Nationals Leader Michael McCormack, who was acting prime minister while Mr Morrison was attending the forum in Tuvalu this week, said on Friday he gets annoyed when Pacific countries point their finger at Australia and say it should be shutting down its resources sector.

“They’ll continue to survive because many of their workers come here and pick our fruit, pick our fruit grown with hard Australian enterprise and endeavour and we welcome them and we always will,” Mr McCormack is reported as saying.

Mr Bainimarama said the comments were insulting and disrespectful.

“But I get the impression that that’s the sentiment brought across by the prime minister,” he said.

Labor frontbencher Jason Clare also had a crack at Mr McCormack, saying it’s hard to have credibility in this debate when emissions are going up and members of the government are cracking jokes.READ MORE

Back on home soil in Adelaide on Saturday, Mr Morrison said Australia has the deepest engagement and biggest commitment in the world to the Pacific,

“We’re there for the difficult conversations, we’re there for every type of conversation with our Pacific family, just like any family that comes around the table,” he told reporters after addressing a South Australian Liberals conference.

“We will always be there and regardless of whatever issues we have to work through at the time.”

Even so, Pacific island leaders are taking their call for action on climate change to the United Nations at a climate meeting in New York in September.

This week’s forum ended with a statement calling on major economies to “rapidly implement their commitment to phase out inefficient fossil fuel subsidies”.

Many of the forum members wanted to single out coal-fired power for its impact on the climate, but the language was rejected in the final document.SOURCE AAP – SBS

Source: ABS Com. AU

Nature Care

Healthy oceans vital to prosperity of Pacific communities

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The Map of Melanesia
The Map of Melanesia

The intensifying pressure on the ocean is a challenge for Pacific Islanders, so it is vital that ‘climate issues’ are prioritised.

Under the topic ‘healthy oceans’ the biggest fear remains unseen as the ocean ecosystem and communities are being threatened.

“Certainly, the oceans are in trouble, for many years now they’ve been looking after us,” says Mr. Kininmonth, Head of Marine Studies at USP.

“They’ve absorb a lot of excess from climate change, they’ve absorb large amount of pollution and yet we’ve taken many fishes as we possibly can as if there’s no tomorrow.

“We continue to treat the ocean in a way which is lacking respect and the oceans are now showing signs of really being in a large quiet amount of trouble.”

Women face unprecedented crises given the role they play to gather food especially those within the coastal.

“When we talk about climate crises, issues such as what is happening with our ocean, the catastrophe of this nature exacerbates in social inequalities,” says Zakiyyah Ali, member of Project Survival Pacific.

Healthy oceans are vital to the prosperity of Pacific communities and the global ecosystem, yet are facing an unprecedented crisis with issues of over-fishing, marine pollution and coastal erosion exacerbated by climate change.

Maureen Penjueli, from Pacific Network on Globalization (PNG) highlighted activities of seabed mining in Papua New Guinea (PNG) as destruction to their lifeline.

The message on healthy ocean will likely be heard at the United Nations this year when Mr. Justin Hunter attends to present at the Blue Pledge climate week.

The topic ‘Healthy Oceans’ was the first of its kind co-hosted by the University of the South Pacific (USP), the World Bank and its sister organization the International Finance Corporation, Future Pasifika.

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Source: Vanuatu Daily Post