Cover Story
PNG On The Brink?
How a damning report is rocking the country and stirring uproar in parliament
Mike Manning is a naturalised citizen of Papua New Guinea. He has a Papua New Guinea wife and children. He’s lived for 28 years in by far the largest and resource-enriched island member of the Pacific Islands Forum.
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Independent from Australia since 1975, Papua New Guinea’s 5 million people could have been expected by now to be enjoying the fruits of the development of their vast (462,243 square kilometres) country’s natural endowments of gold, copper, tropical forests, rich fisheries, oil, gas and enormous scope for agriculture and tourism.
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Instead, they suffered the consequences of years of deteriorating standards of government, political and social upheavals, and the tightening bite of corruption that Papua New Guinea’s former prime minister, Sir Mekere Morauta, said could destroy the country.
As director of Papua New Guinea’s Institute of National Affairs, a highly regarded private research centre, funded by 85 of the country’s business corporations, Manning has considerable insight of his adopted country’s condition, the causes of its trouble, and its potential.
But in March he soared to the top of the hit list of many of Papua New Guinea’s 109 elected Members of Parliament (MPs).
During a bout of uproar in the parliamentary chamber, MPs called for his head, or if not quite that then his deportation.
The cause of the uproar was an ‘Issue Analysis’, published in March and written jointly by Manning and Susan Windybank, of the Australian Centre for Independent Studies. It was published with the title: “Papua New Guinea on the Brink.”
“Papua New Guinea,” the document’s executive summary begins, “shows every sign of following its Melanesian neighbour, the Solomon Islands, down the path to economic paralysis, government collapse and social despair.”
For most Papua New Guineans, living conditions have “barely improved” since independence, the analysis comments.
“Windfall mining revenues and generous levels of aid have subsidised a small political elite at the expense of investments in roads, education and health.
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“Deficit financing and government borrowings for unproductive spending have left little money for key state institutions such as the police, legal system and armed forces.
“Violent crime rates are soaring, law and order broken down, and PNG cannot effectively monitor its land and sea borders.”
The blunt indictment went on: “Democracy has been hijacked by those responsible for and benefitting from the ‘systemic and systematic’ corruption of public institutions. Some exemplary prosecutions for corruption would restore legitimacy to government. But the legal system seems incapable of bringing either small or large crooks to justice.
“Population growth is high but economic growth is negligible so that the country is going backwards. Job creation is totally inadequate.
“The build-up of unemployed young people, particularly in urban areas, leads to demoralisation, social breakdown, escalating crime and growing civil unrest.
“The extent of lawlessness scares off investors and tourists, reinforcing a downward spiral where no jobs are created and law and order gets worse.
“This decline is accelerating. In the past, PNG has always muddled through despite grim economic conditions and dire prognoses because people could fall back on subsistence farming and local markets to survive.
“But this social safety net now appears to be disintegrating under the impact of crime, which has spread to villages. The resulting hardship is taking its toll on traditional village life, fuelling urban drift.
“The central government’s weakness makes a fight for the spoils of secession more attractive to resource-rich regions.
“Protracted internal conflict, like the devastating war in Bougainville, threatens what remains of national cohesion.
“The government appears to have lost control of parts of the oil-rich Southern Highlands, which are contested by strongmen and criminals. This chaos is spreading to other parts of the country.”
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This grim, near merciless portrait of Papua New Guinea was fallen upon with eagerness by many Australian newspapers, which in Papua New Guinea are viewed as vultures that like nothing more than picking at the carcass of the country’s reputation while rarely, if ever, presenting some balanced positive portrayals of the country’s affairs.
Perhaps this is why foreign journalists have difficulty securing visas for working visits to Papua New Guinea, which in turn is why the good news promotions craved for by its national tourism office and investment promotion agencies so rarely feature in the Australian media.
The flare of publicity in Australia stoked up anger in Parliament House in Port Moresby, where with the exception of a smattering of MPs who said Papua New Guinea had to be prepared to look at the image of itself reflected in the mirror, politicians denounced Manning as being virtually a traitor.
Sir Michael Somare, Papua New Guinea’s first and now present Prime Minister, in February went to Brisbane to assure the PNG/Australia Business Council that the country “may be down, but not out. We are rebounding to a better future.”
Another former prime minister, Bill Skate, now Speaker of the House of Representatives, urged MPs to refer Manning to the parliamentary privileges committee.
Another prominent Papua New Guinean, Noel Levi, as Pacific Islands Forum Secretary-General, weighed in against the analysis by expressing “serious concerns” about “negative perceptions” presented in recent studies by the Centre for Independent Studies on the internal security of Pacific islands countries.
“So-called think tanks” should be more objective and not driven to producing findings to appease their financial sponsors,” Levi sniped.
“Whilst I respect and understand the value in independent academic thinking, recent studies done by Australian strategic institutes and centres are doing more damage to the image of Melanesian countries than is necessary and in fact revealing ‘facts’ that are further from the truth.
“Biased, poorly balanced studies damage nation building and stifle confidence in governments that are doing their best with limited resources. I encourage those who carry out sensitive strategic studies which are revealed to the public, to take into consideration the special and specific circumstances of these countries that are barely 25 years old.”
The furore and antagonism surprised Manning, along with the prospect of being summoned to explain himself to a hostile parliamentary committee.
There was nothing in the analysis to justify such an intervention by Parliament, he told Islands Business.
“There is nothing in it (report) that is not already on the public record. There has been some suggestion that it is detrimental to foreign investment and affected the shares of companies like Oil Search, but I doubt it.”
