A snapshot of PNG in Gordon’s Market

This brilliant post by Gary Juffa succinctly puts into perspective the order of the day at Gordon’s Market.

By Gary Juffa

I spent an hour at Gorden’s Market today, a burning hot April Saturday, in Port Moresby, National Capital District. I parked right opposite the Gorden’s Police Stations and waited for a friend, around midday. As is usual with appointments in Papua New Guinea, one must be prepared to wait anywhere between 10 minutes and an entire hour. It was an hour I spent fascinated.

The population of people walking, talking and carrying on in the humid, steaming, muddy and filthy so called market were captivating. Teeming with energy and abuzz with all manner of activity, there were traders and vendors, hawkers and street sellers, betel nut connoisseurs and buyers. Scam artists and con artists and petty criminals also were active and everyone was a potential victim. A boom box belts out loud noise. There was no sign of authority of any sort. The order was disorder.

This is dry filth of Gordon’s Market on a better day. Photo by Malum Nalu

Across the road, a Chinese store thrived with people streaming in and out like ants to and from a nest walking in empty handed and carrying out all manner of goods or, more correctly, junk for resale. Business is booming for the Chinese traders thanks to increased liberalization of trade, relaxing of regulatory laws to protect consumers and the introduction of an unregulated, unpoliced informal sector. The sector was supposedly intended to benefit Papua New Guineans involved in the cottage industry, selling their handicraft, arts and incubating their small entrepreneurial efforts. But the real winners are the mainland Chinese traders who import container loads of cheap household products from numerous factories proliferating throughout mainland China to resale in developing nations such as Papua New Guinea.

In Papua New Guinea, the Chinese traders target settlements and rural townships stretching their tentacles throughout the length and breadth of this Pacific island economy like a giant octopus leech sucking everything and anything out and transmitting the profits offshore to fund investments in Asia, Australia and New Zealand. Other octopi are busy throughout the region and indeed the world as China shifts into gear in its drive for world dominance. They are taking advantage of a weakening West which is in pivotal transition, changing from a defined set of geographic nations to becoming a globalized Corporatedom, the new Manor of the rich, overseeing a global population of serfs.

Back in Gordon’s Market, raw sewerage and waste stream through the market in drains carrying dirty used plastic bags, and writhing naked playing children happily splashing under the baking Port Moresby sun as parents wearily gamble, play cards and turn their heads occasionally to scream at their offspring or to spit streaming betelnut juice anywhere, everywhere. A drunkard stumbles through the market, miraculously weaving his way through the human traffic, a beer bottle lovingly cradled against his bare bony chest, inch long globules of mucous and blood trailing off his moustache, humming Elton John’s Yellow Brick Road. Swarms of flies and other insects form small clouds around a dead dog recently run over by a Public Motor Vehicle in the middle of the main street, its putrid juices running off towards the drain. A man lies, in a drunken stupor, snoring under a rain tree, devoid of his shoes, belt, all clothes accept his dirty, ragged jeans. Bored betelnut vendors play games on their mobile phones and bicker with each other.

My appointment arrives. He is sweating and is sucking on an iceblock. I open they car door and he climbs in. “Yesterday I was here buying some stuff. I went to the phone booth at the Police Station and called you to make today’s appointment. After that I went into the Police Station to see an uncle of mine. He was not there. There was no one at the station. Not a single person was there when I went in, except some small guy reporting a crime apparently an armed robbery of his tucker box at Erima. I was bored so I decided to watch what was happening. He was furious this small guy. Swearing and sweating. Finally someone came. I had to look carefully to realize it was a Policeman, he was so scruffy. The complainant approached him but he said he was busy and said he had to drop off his wife and told him to wait. He waited. I waited. The small guy told me that this morning when he opened his tucker box, a man pointed a shotgun at him and took all his money. Money he had been saving up to send his son attending University of Technology in Lae for his ticket to come home for holidays. He said he didn’t want to give the money but another man punched him in the face and placed a knife under his chin and he thought of his children and wife and gave in and gave his money. Finally a police car came in. The man approached the Policeman and told him about his problem. The Policeman said the car had no fuel. Was he prepared to buy fuel? He said to the Policeman “It’s your job!” The Policeman warned him not to tell him what to do, that the government does not give the station enough to buy fuel or even paper to record complaints and went in with some of his wantoks following him into the Station. The man was so upset and said he knew who did it and would find him and kill him himself and walked out. No one heard him from the Police Station. No one cared.”

We drove out of Gordon’s Market into the main road to turn towards the Stadium. The road was crawling with cars of all types, mainly dilapidated PMV buses and taxis and used cars from Japan. It seems everyone from betelnut seller to babysitters have cars in Port Moresby. The city, built to cater for a population of less than 100,000 but accommodating somewhere in the vicinity of 600,000, is reeling from population growth caused by urban drift and growing squatter settlements, lack of family planning and people flowing into the capital searching for better services or just curious about the bright lights and what it has to offer.

After almost an hour in traffic and several near death accidents thanks to the city’s infamous taxi drivers, we made it to Koke Market towards town. At the main crossing, a CRV Honda, the carjackers preferred vehicle, was being held up and three youths with knives and a screwdriver had somehow stopped the female driver and her passenger and were attempting a carjacking, menacing the driver and trying to open the doors. I stopped my car behind her and my friend and I prepared to help, other vehicles too stopped and the youths saw us and suddenly stopped and casually walked off. Too hard, car was locked, too many motorists, some of them armed. People outside n the market watched but no one did anything. The youths merely walked over to a betelnut stand, grabbed some nuts and turned around to observe. The distraught woman drove off hurriedly. Fortunately she had her car doors locked, but her courtesy to give way at a pedestrian crossing almost ending badly for her.

I came to see Gordon’s market as symbolic of PNG politics – the filth, the chaos, the lack of order, the dirty and the erratic manner in which the actors behave reflects the nation’s state of politics. Gordon’s market is merely another example of what is happening throughout the entire nation where entire townships, urban and rural, villages and communities, are crumbling and decaying rapidly. The Gordon’s Police Station is symbolic of the public service which no longer cares and which is indifferent and poorly equipped or resourced to serve the people.
While politicians purchase properties offshore and invest the nation’s wealth in foreign economies, Papua New Guinea crumbles into a state of anarchy, its people making do with what little they can, their values and morals diminishing with each regressive step, their ability to care and act for one another reduced to crude tactics for survival with the ever increasing lawlessness.

Gordon’s Market offers a snapshot of Papua New Guinea in motion. Take a trip to Gordon’s Market, park in front of the Police Station for an hour and take a look into our bleak future.

A note on the current situation in #PNG

This is a note posted by Jaive Smare on the current political standoff in PNG.

These are the facts and verified, you can confirm with relevant authorities and churches. Please repost. This information is important for national safety.

… 1) police action to secure strategic sites was done by police themselves to preserve law and order, and not at behest of either side. Police are united and focusing on maintaining law and order in Port Moresby, whilst waiting for politicians to get their act together.
…
2) Police action to disband the Armed Robbery Unit this morning was done peacefully – command made a request to the ARU personnel to turn in their arms and vehicle, which they did voluntarily.

3) Army remains confined to barracks and will not move out into the street. They appear cognizant of their role, and that they can only be called out by instrument signed by GG and to support police in response to breakdown in public order. Those conditions do not yet exist.

Credit needs to be given to the command of both police and army in terms of how they have managed their responses to this issue and maintained the interests of the nation at the forefront of their decision making.

I note comments from many people about what responses the public should take to deal with this political crisis. Please be comforted that there are many people, outside the two political groups, who are working behind the scenes to resolve this mess in a manner that maintains our rule of law and preserves the institutions of government and democracy that our enshrined in our constitution.

When there is a requirement for the public to make some public action, you will hear through public and social media including facebook. Please carry on your lives and daily activities as normal as possible, and respect the police in the actions they take to preserve order.

AS

Also Marat and Amet will be meeting to secure a way forward peacefully, so please support them.

Do not put much relevance in media reports as their reports seem to be only worsening the situation. They are not getting their facts right. At some point, the news editors must get behind the leaders who want to talk and the churches and forge away forward.

…

Port Moresby wired for change

This has to be one of the most interesting observations about today’s Port Moresby and where it is headed. The hustle and bustle of this city is never lost on the reader as Rowan Callick paints in detail the current socioeconomic trend in light of the economic boom powered by the extractive resource industry.

Although set against a political backdrop that is enmeshed in corruption, Callick focuses the spotlight more on the champions who are standing up for the people.

Without further ado, read on…

Port Moresby wired for change

By Rowan Callick, March 26, 2011, The Australian

PAPUA New Guinea’s founding father and Prime Minister Michael Somare, aged 75 next month, was found guilty last Monday of 13 charges of misconduct and on Thursday was suspended from office for 14 days.

Until recently, this would have caused a sensation that would have virtually stopped the nation.

That it hasn’t demonstrates how rapidly PNG has changed. It is awash with cash, and corruption. It is wired everywhere, mobiles hanging off every ear, in a way unthinkable under the old government telecommunications corporation. And it is heading to overtake Australia’s population this century.

The leadership tribunal, chaired by Australian judge Roger Gyles, found Somare guilty of filing incomplete or late returns on his assets and business dealings to the Ombudsman Commission annually as required.

It is Somare’s skills as a leader and a player for 42 years in the PNG political game, which is at once ornate and brutal, that have held together his ruling coalition for almost 10 years.

But this long-anticipated court case has become more a coda to the passing of the old independence era than a decisive central movement of a fresh symphony.

For regardless of Somare’s personal fate, PNG is on the cusp of an extraordinary economic, social and political transition, one the country has not seen since gaining independence from Australia in 1975.

Where this change will take it remains utterly uncertain. But that it is undergoing a convulsion is clear.

A new generation is on the move, born since independence and unburdened by sentiment towards the past.

The election due mid next year, for which the manoeuvring is well under way, will indicate who is likely to win or lose from this transition. Usually, more than half the MPs lose their seats, and this time Somare has said he may decide to stand down at last, clearing the way for generational change.

Within 30 years, PNG’s population may start to overtake that of Australia as it stands today. Its capital Port Moresby is already approaching one million and appears set to be bigger than Brisbane before long.

Its economy is likely to grow faster than China’s this year, more than 8 per cent. Almost every leading resource company in the world is scrabbling over prospects there. Rio Tinto is back after the Bougainville civil war. BHP Billiton is back after the debacle of its withdrawal from Ok Tedi. The first liquefied natural gas project, costing $16.5 billion, is just beginning four frenetic years of construction in the Southern Highlands and along a pipeline route down to the liquefaction plant in Port Moresby. Massive mines are being developed elsewhere.

Port Moresby’s burgeoning backstreet lodges are bursting with landowners from gas fields and mine sites desperately seeking their fortunes from government and corporations, from anyone who may be persuaded to compensate them amply for their lost lands.

And life is being transformed especially rapidly by the wild rush into the mobile phone era.

Irish-based company Digicel, which specialises in telecommunications for developing countries, has launched a remarkably cheap service and backed it up by building towers all over PNG, giving its signals a nationwide reach despite its mountainous interior and myriad islands.

Streetside betel nut sellers and people offering single cigarettes for 25c now also sell SIM cards.

In bustling Tabari Place in Boroko in the capital, traders have set up booths where they sell mobiles and all the associated paraphernalia, the deals usually being conducted entirely in Tok Pisin, while in the background young preachers try to attract the attention of the milling crowds.

Downtown outside the US embassy, where security guards hold dogs on leashes and parking is restricted to diplomatic staff, people wander the pavements selling China-pirated DVDs of American movies for $4 a time, as well as memory cards and flash drives.

Papua New Guineans are able to contact relatives back in their villages by phone for the first time. The arrival of 3G has enabled people to go online throughout the country, accelerating the attractions of Facebook, which has already attracted 35,000 users.

Groups of young social and environmental activists — such as Act Now, Patriots, and The Voice, are building their numbers rapidly via such new technology, and also propelled by a growing rejection of the old politics of PNG: the parliamentary numbers game and the domination of money politics.

A “consultancy” firm run by one lobbyist from Enga province in the Highlands, the populous, high-energy but sometimes unruly region that is coming to dominate much of the country’s business and politics, is named, with breathtaking frankness, Money Talks Ltd.

A massive hoarding at the start of the road to the parliament carries the unadorned biblical text of Proverbs 29:2: “When the righteous are in authority the people rejoice. But when the wicked rule, the people suffer.”

Chronox Manek is among those sufferers. By rapid evasive action with his car, he only narrowly escaped an assassination attempt 15 months ago by gunmen outside his home but still requires treatment for his left arm where one of the bullets hit home.

He is the Chief Ombudsman, whose most contentious role is to police the leadership code that is the prime tool for combating corruption in PNG.

The foyer to the Ombudsman Commission’s office displays posters with cartoons. One shows a sleek politician urging a group of peers: “All those in favour of the construction of this hotel, say aye.” A thought bubble is emerging from his head at the same time: “On my block of land!”

Another has an Asian figure saying to an official: “I know you can’t accept a bribe. It’s illegal. But this is just a loan. Pay me back whenever you can.”

The stakes have never been higher in PNG, and thus the institutions established at independence by Australia have never been under such siege, especially the legal system.

Manek, who for many years was the top public prosecutor and has been the leading public defender, and has a master’s in law from the University of Melbourne, only pursues a limited number of targets at a time.

It is thus all the more extraordinary that the police have failed to make any charges over this assassination attempt on one of the country’s top constitutional office holders.

Manek tells Inquirer: “I’m left without information about what’s going on” over the case. “But it’s happened, and I’m moving on.”

He believes corruption began its insidious undermining of the country’s governance in the early 1980s, when PNG opened up to the logging industry.

“Our world was no longer an Australian-focused one but a much bigger world”, in this case, that of Asian timber corporations.

Manek’s favourite motto is “no sweat, no get”.

He believes that has been undermined by a growing culture of taking short cuts to getting rich. And he is keen to educate the public that it is its right to insist that governments deliver citizens the services they are paying for.

“I want to educate the leadership that the public is right,” Manek says.

Another figure who is urging on this shift to a new form of leadership in PNG is Powes Parkop, a young former journalist and human rights lawyer who is the Governor of Port Moresby.

He has gained a reputation for cleaning up the city and beautifying it, for new fountains, for Christmas lights, for his organising of family events in the evenings to “reclaim the night” from the rascal gangs,, with some positive indications: young hoodlums being chased away from evening big-screen relaying of rugby league games.

“We need to change the political culture and quickly,” Parkop says. “It has gone bad in PNG and we must alter that so that many other changes can happen, too. Too many people have effectively been disenfranchised, socially and economically.

“People have migrated here to Moresby looking for the land of milk and honey, and have found instead a place that is not so rosy.”

Sam Basil is another new-generation MP, a young businessman from Bulolo in Morobe province, scene of an early gold rush 80 years ago and where top global mining houses are building or planning to build world-sized mines.

Basil uses Facebook extensively in communicating his views, with his supporters and others.

He says he is concentrating much of his efforts on helping give the public accounts committee of the parliament the teeth it needs.

Paul Barker, executive director of the private-sector-funded Institute of National Affairs, says it’s crucial that the government ensures that benefits flow broadly from the new resource projects, especially from the ExxonMobil led gas deal.

“If the government doesn’t get its act together and leaders cream off the profits, then PNG will get only the downside, not the upside, from such projects,” he says. “As in the Arab world today, the people in their 30s are the talking generation. But the younger generation below them have no special respect for what’s happened before.”

Australia’s role as PNG enters this difficult transition remains substantially shaped by its aid program, which comprises about 14 per cent of the national budget. It is becoming more focused and more practical, advice giving way to implementation.

Last year AusAID built 400 classrooms, provided 500,000 textbooks and trained 9000 teachers. The aim is to raise this to 800,000 textbooks next year. They will be delivered via an international procurement agency, which is also being deployed for the health project that is following these education successes, aiming to distribute much-needed basic medicines to every aid post and clinic, however remote.

Alternative paths towards PNG’s development are reflected in the Port Moresby landscape.

Structures new at independence in 1975, such as the “pineapple building” where prime ministers once had their offices and the former main government building nearby, have been abandoned for sheer want of maintenance, today decaying skeletons.

Nearby, Malaysian logging giant Rimbunan Hijau — “forever green” — has built a massive mall, the Vision Centre. It is still largely untenanted but is likely to fill steadily, including with a new cinema complex that will be Port Moresby’s first since its old cinemas were shut as crime soared.

There is an intensity in the humid air, a gathering pace of change, as individuals and the nation as a whole dices for the prosperous future that has so far evaded them.

*spotter: Scott Waide
original article: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/features/port-moresby-wired-for-change/story-e6frg6z6-1226027895290