Message of challenge and hope in this 40th Independence
Happy 40th Independence.
Man has lived on this planet for 360 million years or so. 300 million years or so, man have become nocturnal mammals. After 65 million years ago, man came out of the closet of the darkness to explore the ends of the earth. From a nomadic lifestyle, agriculture paved the way for the birth of clans, tribes, ethnicity, cultures, great kingdoms, civilizations, religions and attached to the biodiversity of environments where man set foot on. For control and normalcy, all forms of government were born.
With time through centuries, million of lives were lost through wars, conflicts, territorial land grabbings, diseases, natural disasters and famines. Continents were conquered, colonised and ruled. Trillions of dollars were also extracted by the colonisers and brought back to their kingdoms to enhance their prosperity.
Intellectual ability of man grew with the experiences of time. This brought peace and good order as well as the evolution of modernism. Colonisers gave away land to its original inhabitants after much bloodshed to become independent nations of their own. Some of these countries today are using their colonisers language as their official languages. Only a few handful of places on the face of this planet are still colonised.
Today, global hunger and despair will absorb the minds of men and they will fight against each to claim presumably what is deservedly theirs, and poverty will drive that. The world is at this threshold now. A mentor of mine has repeated told me and also to this day and I quote, "if a millionaire is born today, and because of that, a million beggars will also be born...because of the birth of that one millionaire". This has some justification by the distance.
PNG is placed on the fringes of time and at ends of earth where the beginning of civilization still exist, and the down pour of modernism has done us...."to catch it before it is too late".
Blessed we are of our very unique biodiversity, 1000-2000 tribes, 860-1000 languages, 1000 ethnic groupings, 600 plus islands plus the big island, and richly covered with renewable and non-renewable resources, and bonded together by our Melanesian Principles of togetherness, forgiving, sharing and kinship, PNG has come this far and the farther it will go for this uniquely blessed nation. No nation in the world is as diverse as we are.
Looking back 40 years ago, we must thank Sir Grand Chief Somare and his lowly educated leaders who were filled with grace and wisdom to get us through independence peacefully. These are the particular people, PNG will remember as it stands as a national on this planet.
As we progress past our 40th Birthday as a nation, there are few pressing issues that stand in our way. If we ignore them, what is happening in the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe will come to our doorstep. These are;
1. All forms of corruption at all levels must stop. Leaders must and at the fore, set the example to really trash corruption.
2. Leadership is an art. Those at the helm of leadership at all levels in their own specific job description must perform credibly and honestly whereby the task performed are credibly accepted by the group and individuals in that setting. Holding office and at the same, accumulating person wealth through the influence of leadership is not true leadership. Wealth accumulation must not be done through the chair one holds but can be done far away from the chair (outside the box) where a concrete partition does exist and done honestly. In the beginning of time and civilization, leaders were remembered for what they did during their time for the people at the reign, and not remembered for their selfish and corrupt process of self-wealth accumulation. So in history, leaders were measured and remembered for what they did for the people.
3. All forms of violence at all levels must stop. Tribal Fights has cost millions of kinas in loss of properties, and as well as lost of lives. There are better alternative resolution methods that exist than trying to get each other's life and getting properties burnt down.
4. Gender equal participation in job and leadership opportunities while respecting cultural values. It is interesting to see our women folks being elected to parliament, in leadership positions, doing jobs that we once thought were for men only. This trend will continue to yield good results therefore, PNG must avoiding creating special seats for women in Parliament and other places. If done, this will continue to create inferiority and partition amongst the sexes.
5. All forms of discrimination must stop. All choices must be merit based.
6. Land must not be sold to foreigners. All government lands must be leased to PNGean. Foreign businesses will then have to partner with landowners and lease holders to do business in PNG. For investment, landowners must now develop their land through ILGs. When all resources are harvested, the only asset remaining will be the land.
7. To stop urban migration; social, economic and political development must take place at all levels. Urban slums, settlements, street beggars, prostitution, HIV/STI, crimes, conmen, cult movements and practices, and etc will begin to slow down when the rural areas are developed. This is where the majority of the population live.
8. Wantok system has a place in the villages but not at the workplace. Wantok system practiced at a workplace will only bring poor outcome because of output, and ultimately increasing and promoting corruption such as inflating costs and sharing the windfall (white collar crime). PNG must do away with wanton system at a workplace where jobs are achieved through merits. This will produce good outcomes.
9. Foreign mining companies given the leasing right and extracting wealth and giving back to the government less than 30% or through tax is not taking ownership of the wealth that is deservedly for the landowners and state. So far, foreign companies have owned resources through arial and territorial leases. This must stop. Landowner picking up a peanut percent as loyalty payment is indeed a real joke. A major policy paper must be done to change all this wrongs of today and the past. Otherwise, PNG will continue to lose what is deservedly its than theirs. Any resource development that takes place in a resource landowners territory, the landowners must automatically have a 30% ownership stake, and the state, developer and provincial government must share the 70%. Develop guidelines whereby the 30% share for resource owners must be used to develop their own backyard. Right now, landowners today cannot show case development done to their region from what they have been given as royalties. The term royalties must stop and 30% automatic ownership of the resource harvested is the way to go now.
10. A techno-education system should be introduced and make education compulsory up to grade 12. It must be now compulsory for all children in PNG to complete education up to year 12. High schools and secondary schools must now aggressively teach practical skills as a core subject. Skills acquired at this level can find them jobs easily when a student fails to find a place in any tertiary institution.
12. Strongly enform the SME. It is the major contributor of the economy. In many successful countries that have embarrassed SME, their economies have jumped to the point where countries like Malaysia has now become a first world. PNG is embarking on this at a snail's pace, and it is still being overpowered by Asians in PNG. It also challenges PNG to change our mindsets. Let us start small and the big picture will take care of itself.
13. Non-communicable diseases, AIDS/HIV, TB, Malaria, infant and maternal health and cancer (cervical, breast and oral cavity cancers) will be major challenge for the country. The drive to arrest the worsening statistics must at the forefront done by the government at the helm. All NGOs and development partners must support the government. The government must take ownership of this at the frontline.
14. Increase the number of tertiary institutions. There is a vast need to built tertiary institutions. The ratio of tertiary institutions to secondary school is very small. Old institutions must also be reinvigorated with rehabilitation and developments. A literate but an unskilled population is a waste of financial resources to educate the mass.
15. A small percentage of the population pays income tax. This must be reviewed with the steps taken to reduce the tax. 97% of the population pays GST.
16. With the procession of time, economies around the world radiates and the pendulum can shift. PNG is stilling at this period of time where our economy will jump beyond the skyscrapers and this will have a time span. We must not jump to that music but take necessary steps to avoid a fall when a recession occurs. Moreover, the very core down turn in this blossoming economy will be corruption at all sectors involving the public and public sector where a few will benefit and the majority to continue to relive "Charles Darwin's theory".
17. The core recognition of a nation is embodied in its constitution and decorated with its cultures. Religion of all forms is universal. This planet is the only planet in the universe known to date that worships the only God as the creator of every life and creations. Our Constitution must dictate how we live as a nation and resonated by our cultures. Decision makers must be guided by moral principles entwined in our cultures and religious beliefs but not over powered by both as our constitution is the supreme rule for us as a nation. The bible or any other holy books is/are not our constitution. Pastors, Priest and deeply converted holy people who become members of parliament must not use their beliefs to meddle with the constitution. Any holy books must not change our constitution.
18. PNG since independence has made changes to the constitution many times than USA, Australia and England combined. As corruption indexes shows that PNG is one of the top corrupt countries in the world, the question here is, have the changes to constitution done to protect and propagate corruption that is so rampant today. It is about time PNG revisit the changes made to the constitution since 1975 and see if these changes were indeed necessary.
19. Singular syndrome. In medicine, a collection of symptoms gives rise to a syndrome that points to a disease entity. The 'singular syndrome' here reflects the governments especially at the district and local level governments. Single projects are built alone and overtime, these projects fall apart. The rural government services should come as a package if services brought are to remain and to endure time, meaning; all service available at a rural setting
must have all these together: schools, health services, banking services, local level government services, roads, sea transport, airstrips, post offices, business activities (markets, stores, stationery, supermarkets, etc), courts services, police posts, water and power supply, etc. This concept will truly develop the rural majority.
20. PNG must be careful on our forest, flora and fauna. PNG has enough stones and rocks to build houses and the nation. Deforestation will bring us disasters. Why are foreign logging companies creating mini deserts and shavana areas in our forests?
19. Undersea/seabed mining. The core of our planet is liquid red hot and PNG is sitting in the line of the rings of fire, and the plates are frequently shifting and moving. The 'tossing of the champagne' is a disaster in the making. Be careful PNG!
21. We have come this far as an independent nation in the last 40 years. However, we have lived on this part of the planet for 50,000-60,000 years. The outside world (explorers) went past our shore in the 1500s and finally set foot on our land in the 1800s. We were the first people in the world to go into agriculture however, we were late to come as a nation because of our complexities.
Our destiny in the next 40 years will be dependent on us. Our worst enemy will be ourselves!
Happy 40th Independence-PNG!
