KEITH JACKSON'S PNG ATTITUDE

Gridneff wins second global journalism award

On Friday, AAP’ s PNG correspondent, Ilya Gridneff, pictured here in full bilas, will receive his second international award for journalism in as many months.

He has won the bronze award in the new Prince Albert Foundation/UNCA global prize for news coverage of climate change.

The United Nations Correspondents Association (UNCA) was founded in 1948 when the UN began to meet regularly in New York.

Its over 200 members come from more than 50 countries and the purpose of the awards is to recognise and encourage excellence in reporting on the UN’s worldwide activities.

The award will be presented by UN secretary-general Ban Ki-Moon, however Mr Gridneff is not be able to be in New York for the ceremony.

The awards were open to journalists anywhere in the world for their work in print, Internet, radio or TV.

Last month Mr Gridneff won the 2009 Asia-Pacific award for environmental journalism.

Baby Kevin latest: linked to his namesake for life

BY MARK BINNS

I was recently back up in the highlands of PNG and spent some time in Lufa with little Kevinrudd and his family.

Kevinrudd is a delightful little boy, cheerful and easy and not at all afraid of white skin (most children his age are).

The novelty and interest has waned a little, but nobody in the area is in any doubt where his name came from. He remains a relatively famous child in the community, though he himself is oblivious to it all.

His family hold and value the mementoes of the famous association, the presents from the prime minister’s staff, copies of Reconciliation News and his portrait, but for all that he is just another young life full of promise and much loved by those around him.

It is in the adult community that the ‘namesaking’ is still having a lingering and confusing effect. The prime minister didn’t ask to have the child named after him and probably had no way to refuse it.

In highland PNG, though, this ‘namesaking’ has strings attached and culturally it links the two people for life.

A bank account had been opened to hold any money coming L’le Kev’s way to perhaps provide his education with a kick start, but I expect the whole thing to wind down to becoming an interesting and slightly unbelievable story to be told around the fire in the future.

Source: Reconciliation News, the newsletter of Reconciliation Australia, November 2009, www.reconciliation.org.au

Ex AusAID chief is appointed our man in Ireland

BY DONALD HOOK

Five months after he left his job as director-general of AusAID, Bruce Davis AM has been appointed Australia’s ambassador to Ireland. He will take up the diplomatic posting in Dublin next month.

Davis, 56, joined the Australian Development Assistance Agency (ADAB) – the forerunner to AusAID - 34 years ago.  He was born and educated in Queensland, gaining a Bachelor of Arts degree in history and political science from the University of Queensland.

In June this year, Davis became a Member of the Order of Australia for services to international relations through leadership of AusAID for 10 years, and the development and reform of Australia’s overseas aid programs.

He retired in early July at a time when there was specific criticism of AusAID including allegations that it serviced Australian commercial interests through its procurement policies, and had misused aid to support foreign policy initiatives such as the so-called Pacific Solution for processing asylum seekers.

AusAID also was being criticised from the right wing, particularly by Helen Hughes, of the Centre for Independent Studies, who’d argued that “aid has failed PNG and the Pacific” – a criticism of the broad policy of AusAID. 

A senior DFAT officer, Peter Baxter, has been acting Director General of AusAID since Davis retired.

Canberra farewells Duncan Kerr the renewer

BY DONALD HOOK

Outgoing Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs, Duncan Kerr, was farewelled in style by more than 100 guests at a dinner in Canberra last night.

During the past two years, Kerr has played a major role in strengthening Australia’s presence in the Pacific.

Aged 57, he retires this weekend as Parliamentary Secretary but will continue in politics until the next election. A successor has not yet been named.

Kerr, who was Dean of the Law Faculty at the University of PNG from the late 1970s to the mid eighties, plans to resume a career in law in Tasmania.

“I have reached the age when, if I’m going to make a change, I must do it now. My natural ambition has been to have a law base,” he said.

PNG High Commissioner Charles Lepani, who hosted the dinner in the Haus Kamasan, spoke of Duncan Kerr’s many initiatives and refreshing approaches to issues affecting the Pacific island countries.

“PNG appreciates tremendously – in spirit and in deed - the revitalisation and renewal of our official bilateral relations since the Rudd Government came to power.’’

He said this was reflective of Kerr’s personal history of involvement in PNG, and the enthusiastic and energetic manner in which he’d set about rebuilding bilateral ties after the Howard years.

Kerr, who was obviously surprised at the size of the farewell dinner – he’d been told it would a small gathering – said he was immensely honoured by the occasion.

The dinner was attended by the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, High Commissioners and Ambassadors from Pacific Island countries, senior officials from the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Pacific academics and academic friends of PNG, senior members of the PNG community and students.

Grand Chief Hawkie makes light of Logohu award

Bob Hawke was considered one of Australia’s more larrikin prime ministers, and now he’s uttered a couple of one liners at the expense of PNG’s highest honour, Chief of the Grand Commander of the Order of Logohu.

In his chiefly role, he joins luminaries such as the Queen, Princess Ann, Prince Philip, Prince Charles, Gough Whitlam, Andrew Peacock, Bill Clinton and former Governor-General Michael Jeffery.

Mr Hawke received the award for services to PNG before and after independence because of his involvement in the establishment of trade unions.

He is very pleased about the title ‘chief’. "I want deeper bows thank you. Much obeisance," he said.

He says the Order of Logohu is one of a number of honours he’s received since leaving politics. "I've got one from Thailand… That was the Order of the White Elephant…”

The ABC reports that Mr Hawke was one of dozens of people to be conferred honours during an investiture ceremony at Government House in Port Moresby today.

Photo: Bust of Robert James Lee Hawke, Chief of the Grand Commander of the Order of Logohu

Gridneff, death threats & the Rudd government

AAP correspondent and PNG Attitude contributor Ilya Gridneff has won a major international award for excellence in environmental journalism.

And, in exposing information that blew apart the PNG phony carbon trading issue, he encountered a Rudd government that tried to ignore it: repeatedly refusing to discuss with him its relationship with PNG around forest protection.

Gridneff's citation states how he published a series of reports about PNG’s forest carbon market and other vital environmental issues. He uncovered Australian ‘carbon cowboys' taking advantage of PNG landowners, investigative work that led to abuse, intimidation and death threats.

Dharman Wickremaratne, director of the Asia Pacific Forum of Environmental Journalists, says Gridneff is a “a courageous journalist who has investigated environmental problems, sometimes at considerable personal risk.”

"We salute all environmental journalists in Asia and elsewhere who fight silent battles everyday on behalf of the planet," Mr Wickremaratne said. "We must defend journalists who expose attacks on the environment."

Gridneff's stories of corruption and mismanagement in the emerging carbon trading market also led to the sacking of climate change director, Theo Yasause.

His reports undermined PNG’s claims to be a world leader in forest carbon and, at an international level, highlighted problems of trying to enable carbon trading in countries with poor levels of accountability and transparency.

He also highlighted the lack of direction by the Australian government that repeatedly refused to discuss with him its forest protection plans with PNG.

But most important, says Gridneff, “it prevented dubious characters talking hold of PNG's natural resources for their own profit”.

The award will be presented on Monday at a ceremony during the 18th APFEJ world congress of environmental journalists in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Read these stories by Ilya Gridneff on PNG’s environment track record:

PM's nephew

Carbon Planet

Yasause suspended

Logging by stealth

Reg Renagi 1: colonel, captain, community leader

Retired former PNG Defence Force Colonel (a Naval Captain), Reginald Renagi ('Reg' to friends), has been a recent informative and fertile correspondent to PNG Attitude. I emailed him yesterday to welcome him to our club and to find out more about him.

As readers know, this is a club with no membership fee other than a tolerant attitude, and no barrier to entry for anyone interested in the future of PNG and its relationship with Australia.

Reg is an interesting bloke: a well regarded figure and a prolific contributor to the media in PNG, writing social commentary for the Post Courier, Weekend Courier, The National and the Sunday Chronicle.

“I write about certain key strategic issues our government needs to address in PNG’s national interest,” he says. “They don’t … so concerned citizens have to keep reminding them. I also get invited to go on NBC talkback programs or give radio interviews on controversial issues in the public interest.”

Since March, Reg has been director of training at the newly established, private Pacific Maritime Training College. “Some of my former navy pros help me teach classes in seamanship training and, when I’m not in front of a group of eager seaman trainees, I go back to the job behind the desk.”

Reg retired from the PNG Defence Force with the rank of Senior Colonel. He’d been a senior defence executive, his appointments including director of maritime operations, director of manpower, director of planning and force development, director of personnel services, chief of operations and chief of staff, including a two year secondment to the Department of Defence within the policy and planning division.

He underwent initial naval training as a midshipman in the Royal Australian Navy and was commanding officer of the attack-class patrol boat HMAS Lae. He commanded two shore establishments: the PNGDF landing craft base in Moresby and the PNGDF patrol boat base on Manus Island. During is career, he attended staff colleges in Australia and executive programs in the US.

“I retired in September 2004 after 34 years of dedicated service to God, Queen and Country,” he says. “It was a nice sea change and a breath of fresh air from working for so long as a state agent.”

Since then he’s tried “a sprinkling of anything that got my interest: freelance security consulting, small business advice, mail order and information marketing, a small family PMV business, occasional freelance writing, studying the futures market as a hobby and, as a self-developed “critical thinker”, being a voracious reader of just about “anything under the sun”.

For a short time before the 2007 national elections, Reg worked for former Opposition Leader, Peter O’Neil MP, as chief of staff. After the elections, he decided to do his own thing and found himself mostly homebound - helping his wife Lulu look after their second daughter, Jeannie, who had been very sick for seven years, since the time he was in the military.

Next: Personal tragedy and Papuan autonomy

Reg Renagi 2: Sowing seeds of Papuan autonomy

“Eventually our beautiful daughter Jeannie failed to respond to the long term regime of medicinal drugs, special diet, family love and support, and left us to meet her maker in September 2007,” says Reg.

“It was such a gut-wrenching experience for an anguished father and a desperate family - watching our beautiful daughter’s life slip away daily in the terminal stages of her illness.

“I miss my daughter terribly and still mourn for her in my quiet moments and say a short prayer for her before I start my day and before I go to sleep each day. The healing will take some time as she was my favourite girl since she was a baby.”

“But we have weathered the storm,” he says. “I praised our Lord for giving us the strength to provide the best for our little girl, with what little resources I had at the time on a small military pension, to make her final moments a little comforting.”

Reg is thinking of writing Jeannie’s story one day. But right now he’s writing a book about former army mate, Bruce Copeland. The book looks at HIV/AIDS as a serious national issue that the government is not seriously addressing despite the political rhetoric. “It’s based around the work done in the last ten years by Bruce and a small band of courageous people,” says reg

In recent times, a group of concerned Papua New Guineans convinced Reg to be involved in community advocacy to help others in need of professional support. He has given his time freely, mainly ex-servicemen with no government support, who could not afford the high fees of “those who charge an arm and a leg for advice”.

Reg is also deputy chairman of the Papua Focus Group which is in the process of launching the first Papuan newspaper, Papua Gadona (Voice of Papua).

“I am encouraging Papuans to contribute anything of interest to raise our people’s awareness of what being a Papuan is like today in PNG,” he says.

“There is a growing groundswell of Papuans who desire autonomy in future,” says Reg. “The majority of Papuans feel PNG is not really a united country and they feel marginalised and failed by the present political system.

“The system is corrupt to its core and politicians have let us down since self-government. We want to see Papua on its own as an autonomous region to develop a secure and peaceful society for the next generation of smart Papuans.

“This sentiment is sowing the seeds of a future autonomy push by Papuans as they think of the good old days under the Australian administration. Life then was good, secure and safe – but not now under the present political leadership where insecurity and the threat from primitive non-Papuan groups have increased over the years.”

Welcome aboard, Captain Reg. Controversy and all, we look forward to hearing a lot more from you.

Duncan Kerr goes to prison – just visiting

Outgoing parliamentary secretary for Pacific island Affairs, Duncan Kerr, whose new beard is flourishing in the warmer weather, has made one of his last official visits to PNG.

While in Port Moresby he visited the Corrections Service headquarters where officers formed a guard of honour to welcome him.

Mr Kerr urged officers to be proud of their job and to take their responsibilities seriously.

“You have a difficult task of making sure that you enforce discipline and respect,” he said, “but at the same time you can be the eyes of the people you’re working with,” he said.

He said every officer had the opportunity to play a part in the history of PNG.

“It’s in your hands whether this country grows stronger and prosperous,” he said. “It’s worth working for and worth striving for.”

A story with the power to just keep on giving

A boychild was born in Goroka Hospital in the Eastern Highlands just five minutes after a visiting dignitary happened by in March 2008.

So impressed were the parents, Esau and Lina Kitgi from isolated Degi village, they named the baby in honour of the visitor … Australian prime minister, Kevin Rudd.

And from time to time since, with the help of AAP correspondent Ilya Gridneff, we have kept track of Baby Kevin’s progress.

Well he’s reached another milestone in his short life – first words have been uttered.

“He’s growing up so quickly, talking now too,” says proud Dad, Esau.

Well, sort of. The 18-month old has managed “mum” and “dad” but, as Gridneff points out, “he struggles with his namesake’s favourite phrase ‘programmatic specificity’.”

Baby Kevin is now quite a tourist attraction. Not yet Kokoda Track status, but five Australians this month made the pilgrimage to Degi, where Esau proudly held the toddler aloft in front of cheering villagers.

“I just had to see him for myself and my parents wanted to see him too,” enthused Matt Carr, a renewable energy expert, who brought his visiting parents Elizabeth and John from Toowoomba. “He looked like an Eastern Highlands Jesus – naked with local finery.”

Well, that should get the tourists in – especially if a nappy’s discovered stained with a saintly image.

And now he’s learning to talk, Baby Kevin must surely be poised for rapid escalation as a global marketing phenomenon.

A lively interview with Kerry O’Brien about vertical fiscal integration can't be far off, and this will appear like toddler talk when Baby Kevin really hits his straps.

There’s much more of this story still to come.

I’ll be urging Gridneff to seek solid evidence that Baby Kevin is emulating in some tangible way his better known (but 'less tanned' as Silvio Berlusconi might put it) counterpart.

Is he about to adopt his first pair of round spectacles?

Does he have the ability to dummy spit at tardy air stewards.

Will he potty-mouth senators wanting more postage stamp money?

And how soon will he be able to distinguish between the G20, the G8 and the g-spot?

I, for one, can hardly wait.

Official portrait of Baby Kevin - Ilya Gridneff (AAP). Official portrait of Big Kevin - Unknown

Could this senator be the next Pacific secretary?

With Duncan Kerr due to stand down from his Pacific Island Affairs portfolio at year’s end ahead of quitting politics at the next election, speculation turns to who might replace him.

One dark horse is South Australian Senator Anne McEwen, who has been rising steadily through the political ranks since she taking her place in the house with the comfortable red seats in 2004.

Senator McEwen, 55, has a passion for PNG. “In 2004, I was privileged to be able to walk where my father had been 62 years before with South Australia’s 27^nd Battalion.

"I joined other South Australians to walk the Kokoda Track in Papua New Guinea,” she said in her maiden speech. (I know, they’re now called ‘first speeches’ but I prefer the traditional terminology.)

“It was shortly after walking the track that I found I was preselected for the Senate. Some would say I left one jungle and found myself in another.”

In all, Senator McEwen has made six visits to PNG. And that jungle experience has not hindered her political career. She is presently deputy government whip in the Senate and chair of the Senate standing committee given the tricky task of examining the national broadband network legislation which seems to have pinned Telstra’s shoulders to the mat.

But, when I met her at the recent PNG Independence day function in Canberra, the senator was more at ease discussing PNG affairs.

“There is a monument at a battle site called Isurava along the Kokoda Track,” she says. “It is, thankfully, maintained by local villagers with Australian government funding and it comprises four granite pillars upon which are etched the words Courage, Endurance, Mateship and Sacrifice.

“It is a moving place. Many Australian and Japanese soldiers died there. I looked at those pillars - hewn, I believe, from granite mined at Mannum in my own state - and wondered if as a nation we still honour those quintessential Australian qualities that young people died defending more than 60 years ago.

“When we say ‘Lest we forget’, let us remember not just the soldiers who died but also the values they were fighting for.”

Before entering Parliament, after taking a BA at the Adelaide University, Senator McEwen became a clerk and administrator before beign elected a union organiser in 1993. She was secretary of the Australian Services Union (SA and NT) from 2002-05 and has been President of the ALP in South Australia. In 2003 she was awarded a Centenary Medal.

Sir Paulias, PNG’s grand old man, turns 78

Sir Paulias Matane, PNG’s Governor-General, turned 78 today – a grand age in any society but especially in Australia’s nearest neighbour, where the average life expectancy for males is 54.

After a distinguished career in the public service, Sir Paulias has been a widely respected figure and a nationally stabilising influence as PNG’s vice-regal representative.

“I got a very big surprise in my life this afternoon after 2.30 pm,” Sir Paulias told PNG ATTITUDE.

“Professor Winston Jacob and staff of Government House prepared a big birthday party at the State House for my 78th birthday this afternoon.

“The speech Prof Jacob made caused tears to drop from my wife's and my eyes. His message was moving about what he felt I had done for the benefit of the people, not only in PNG but also abroad. I did not expect such nice words.

“We have just finished and I am back in the office to catch up with more work.”

Grand Chief the Right Honourable Sir Paulias Nguna Matane, a Tolai, was elected to his office by Parliament in 2004. For many years Sir Paulias wrote a column in The National, containing the advice of an elder to the younger generation.

He has written 44 books focusing on his own overseas travel and nation-building subjects, saying that Papua New Guineans should understand that books are a useful source of information and that they should not regard them as something only for foreigners.

Duncan Kerr to step down from parliament

Duncan Kerr, 57, Australia’s parliamentary secretary for Pacific Island Affairs, is to retire from politics at the next Federal election and will relinquish his ministerial duties at the end of October.

His PNG service as an academic and lawyer made him the best qualified person to occupy the portfolio overseeing Australia’s relationships with the Pacific, and especially PNG.

Mr Kerr certainly displayed tremendous forbearance when, speaking at last year’s Christmas lunch of the PNG Association, he found himself heckled and slow hand-clapped by some members of the audience who seemed to have had one glass too many and had built up enough Dutch courage to be disrespectful.

His retort that the recalcitrants should “listen and you might learn something worthwhile” was cliched but a neat piece of repartee in the circumstances.

Mr Kerr is a former minister for justice and attorney-general in the Keating Government and has held the seat of Denison in Tasmania since 1987.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said Mr Kerr had made an outstanding contribution both as a minister and in opposition where he held portfolios including immigration, environment, justice and the arts.

As parliamentary secretary since late 2007, Mr Kerr has played a key role in strengthening Australia's presence in the Pacific and its relationships with PNG after the disastrous Howard years.

Mr Kerr, who will resume his career in law, said he will leave parliament feeling a "great sense of achievement" after 22 years in politics.

Albert Asbury receives top journalism honour

The eminent ABC journalist Albert Asbury, who died in April aged 69, has been honoured posthumously at this year's Queensland Media Awards.

Mr Asbury worked for the national broadcaster for 50 years in Queensland and Papua New Guinea, mostly in senior positions and for many years as TV news chief of staff, received the award for the most outstanding contribution to journalism.

Mr Asbury died from cancer in Brisbane earlier this year.

At the time Queensland Premier Anna Bligh paid tribute to him, saying: “"Mr Asbury will be remembered as a remarkable journalist and as someone who played a lengthy and pivotal role in television's daily reporting of Queensland's current affairs".

"He was a man of integrity who enjoyed the widespread respect of those he worked with in the ABC family and those who knew him from the wider media corps."

Now his colleagues have paid him the greatest honour in their kit bag.

Thanks to Don Hook for spotting this story

Kavieng Hospital PCs: Amazing reader response

Yesterday morning I emailed PNG Attitude readers asking for help to transport six sets of computer equipment to Kavieng Hospital.

The equipment had been assembled over a number of months by Dr Alan Lawford, a general practitioner in the southern Sydney suburb of Arncliffe.

He was responding to a request for assistance from a colleague at Kavieng Hospital.

Remarkably, nearly 50 readers provided advice on how this equipment could be transported free or at minimal cost from Sydney to Kavieng.

“I am gobsmacked by the plethora of great suggestions from your friends who are in turn friends of PNG,” says Dr Lawford.

“It is overwhelming that this could generate so much interest in these well wishers of PNG.”

Dr Lawford is now deciding which of the many suggestions to pursue – with Rotary International, the Defence Department and the Office of Sir Julius Chan MP top of the list.

But I thought readers would be interested in some of the feedback PNG Attitude received.

Perhaps the most innovative suggestion came from the organisation Oceans Watch that put a notice on its website requesting yacht owners, sailing from Australia to PNG with room on board, to help out.

Judy Middlebrook, who works in Parliament House in Canberra and who used to be secretary of the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade, contacted the Defence Minister’s office on our behalf and received an encouraging response.

PNG Governor-General Sir Paulias Matane lent his weight to the cause and sent a copy of the email to the Governor of New Ireland Province seeking his assistance.

Sharon Onsa-Pople, public relations officer with Ramu Agri Industries, asked the Managing Director of City Pharmacy Limited, which has a pharmacy in Kavieng, if CPL could take the computers as part of their cargo from Sydney.

David Ketepa from Detroit, Michigan, made some suggestions and wrote: “This is a great effort and good news from Dr Lawford to help the folks in Kavieng.”

Rob Dehaan on the cruising yacht Arita and a number of other readers suggested using the good offices of Lihir Gold, which operates in New Ireland.

Mari Ellingson at the Commonwealth Secretariat in London said: “This is a very kind and generous gesture by Dr Lawford. I am not able to help from here but have a suggestion.”

Paul Oates came up with a number of useful ideas, as well as tips for using computers in locations such as New Ireland, and said: “Maybe an ongoing 'underground railway' could be initiated in a semi formalised way for the future and have things like school books etc delivered to those who need them.” A useful suggestion worth exploring.

Thanks to the many, many other people who deluged me with emails yesterday, including journalist Noel Pascoe from the Post-Courier, who also offered to write a piece about it. I’m taking him up on that.

DFAT boss planned independence ceremonies

Don Hook

The newly appointed Secretary of Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade, Dennis Richardson AO, helped plan PNG’s independence ceremonies in 1975.

At the time he was a political officer at the Australian diplomatic mission in Port Moresby. He was awarded the PNG Independence Medal for his service.

Mr Richardson, 62, has been Australia’s Ambassador in Washington for the past four years and prior to that was Director General of ASIO – the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. 

As a career diplomat he served in Africa, Indonesia and Thailand. In addition, he held senior positions in the Department of Immigration, Department of Prime Minister & Cabinet, and was principal personal adviser to Prime Minister Bob Hawke.

Mr Richardson will take up his new position later this year.

Sr Francois tells it straight & clear: Just do it!

Loch Blatchford

With all the doom and gloom coming out of PNG one should not lose sight of the fact that there are many people doing what they can to improve the lot of Papua New Guineans. Sister Francois is one of them.

Sr Francois has lived and worked in PNG for 54 years in and around the township of Aitape. She has dedicated her life to the health, education and spiritual needs of the local community.

Sr Francois recently returned to Aitape after a short stay in Australia for back surgery. During that time she was able to attend the inaugural Birds of Paradise fundraising ball at Sorrento. The event raised $20,000 for the Sister Francios Foundation.

Felix Aimingel was the first recipient of foundation funds. Felix lost both of his arms in an accident several years ago. Felix was brought to Melbourne in May to have a prosthetic arm fitted by the Prosthetic Department at Caulfield Hospital. Felix will shortly be returning to PNG with his new arm.

Mitshie is seven years old and has a congenital heart abnormality known as Fallots teratology. The foundation provided the funds to transport Mitshie and her family from Wewak to Port Moresby. She was recently operated on by a visiting Australian medical team and is currently recovering in hospital. She will require a number of trips to Moresby over the next few years which will be paid for by the Foundation.

There are many people like Sr Francois. Expatriates return to help rebuild schools and aid stations. Medical and educational supplies are collected and sent to the country. Doctors and others provide free services. Many of you may consider yourselves past the age of contribution. This is not so. Each of us has specific interests and areas of expertise that can be of mutual benefit.

Retired schoolie Bob Jenkins is returning to PNG later this year to help rebuild his old school. Barbara Short has just published Tuum Est, a history of Keravat National High School. Eric Johns has written books for PNG schools on the history of PNG. Keith Jackson has provided and maintains PNG Attitude. Dave Keating is involved with PNG athletics. The PNGAA and its organising committee undertake valuable work and lobbying to improve the lot of PNG. And these are just a few contributions.

If you get the opportunity to contribute in an area that interests you, why not say ‘Why not’. We might not be able to change the world but we may be able to improve the bit around us.

If you are interested in assisting the work of Sr Francois you can send a donation to ‘Sister Francois Foundation, 505 Grasslands Road, Boneo Vic 3939’. Cheques should be made payable to: The Franciscan Missionary Union – Aitape PNG Development Fund.

Photos: Sr Francois does the rounds. Felix Aimingel has his arm fitted by Dr David Wilson Brown

A magic blog from a magical London PNGn

Mari Ellingson is from PNG and lives and works in London.

Mari is a singer, songwriter, poet and playwright and, just recently, a blogger. Her blog is called My Magic Moments, and subtitled ‘A PNG expatriate in the UK’. I’ve linked to it below.

"The idea of blogging is absolutely mind blowing and mind boggling!" says Mari. "Mind blowing because of the possibilities and opportunities it represents. Mind boggling because it can be frustrating navigating on a website and at the same time trying to use a computer as effectively as you can.

"Sometimes it feels like driving on a highway without a map or a sat nav. Last year about this time, I did not know what a blog was or what twitter was all about. Well this year I’ve decided to participate in the 21st Century."

Mari is also a recording artist and her many other interests include music, photography, travel, food, reading, personal development, history, autobiographies, jewellery, paintings and other artistic creation.

Why don’t you pay a visit to My Magic Moments here. And say g’day.

A short farewell to a cool but short-lived blog

I had meant to note this before, but Ilya Gridneff’s Papua News Guinea blog is no more – banned from the ether by the Grand Poobahs at Australian Associated Press.

Ilya is the AAP correspondent in Port Moresby, from where he covers the affairs of PNG and the Solomon Islands.

Entitled Death by 1001 cuts (although it was the 1001st that provided the coup de grace), Ilya’s final contribution to the blog read: “Due to unpopular demand this is the last post.

“Sadly Papua News Guinea is to die a very premature death due to AAP concerns the 30 per day who daily read it are undermining the nature of their news service.

“That and they may be liable for some law suit due to the author's unchecked behaviour. It was but brief. Adieu all ye PNG fateful.”

The blog provided a breezy, sometimes irreverent and always informative look at PNG affairs. It’s now of strictly archival value, but for the moment you can still read it here.

As one regular reader commented: “I'd never have HEARD of AAP without your blog. I'll certainly remember it now.” But not for the right reasons, I presume.

QUT honours Brian Bell’s achievements

Josephine Pacey

Sir Brian Bell, an icon of the PNG business community, has been honoured with an award for professional excellence by the Queensland University of Technology.

The ceremony, held at the Brisbane Exhibition and Convention Centre, recognised past QUT graduates who have contributed exceptional community, professional, academic or research achievements.

Sir Brian was honoured with a Special Excellence Award to recognise his exceptional achievements since graduating in 1948 with a Diploma in Pharmacy from QUT’s predecessor Central Technical College.

He moved to Port Moresby in 1954 as pharmaceutical chemist in the Bulk Medical Store and soon after established PNG’s first electrical retail outlet. The business expanded into department stores, home centres, chemicals, cleaning products and industrial equipment.

Sir Brian is Chairman and managing director of the Brian Bell group of companies, the largest business of its kind in PNG, generating annual revenues of K253 million and employing 1,300 people.

The award also recognises Sir Brian’s generous philanthropy. He is a prominent benefactor of the Port Moresby General Hospital (of which he is chairman), the Salvation Army, the Red Cross and Port Moresby City Mission.

Sir Brian was knighted for his outstanding community service in PNG and has also been awarded high honours by Norway and Sweden for his service as their Honorary Consul General in PNG.

Josephine Pacey is Alumni Events Coordinator at the Queensland University of Technology

The comeuppance of the errant Private Kenna

Don Hook

Private Ted Kenna arrived at Heidelberg hospital in Melbourne in 1945 as part of a medical convoy. He’d been in Wewak. His face had been shattered by a Japanese bullet through the mouth.

The task of removing Ted Kenna’s bandages was given to Private Marjorie Rushberry, a young member of the Australian Army Medical Women’s Service who, years later, recalled the stench of unwrapping dressings applied in faraway battlefields.

Nurse Rushberry was involved in Kenna’s care from the days immediately after his admission to Heidelberg. At first, his recovery was far from certain as he lay in the one room reserved for the most serious case.

Gaining consciousness at long last, Kenna gazed at the caring face of his AAMWS nurse and said: “I’ll marry you”. And he did. And they stayed married until Kenna VC died this week.

His recovery involved many operations to reconstruct his jaw, and it was a year before he left hospital. During this time the romance with Marjorie blossomed (although they admitted later that canoodling was limited).

For a long time Kenna’s jaw was wired and a plaster frame from which spikes projected encircled his head.

But, as he recovered, Kenna frequently absented himself from his hospital ward, courting Private Rushberry. His fellow patients covered for him at roll call and inspections.

One day there was panic in the ward when a message on the PA system ordered Private Kenna to report immediately to the hospital commandant. Kenna, not unusually, was absent.

People scurried in all directions looking for him. He was found in the AAMWS quarters – an area strictly out of bounds for patients.

A sheepish Kenna, fearing the worst, presented at the commandant’s office. The door opened. The commandant saluted him. The Victoria Cross was pinned to his tunic.

And the celebrations began.

Don Hook adds: “I met Ted a few times and had the opportunity to talk quite a bit to him and Marjorie during the 1995 Australia Remembers pilgrimage to PNG. I also reviewed Gwynedd Hunter-Payne's book On the Duckboards on the history of Heidelberg Hospital - officially the 115th AGH - which opened in March 1941 in a sea of mud at Heidelberg, then on the outskirts of Melbourne.”

AusAID boss heads off into the bleak unknown

AusAID director-general Bruce Davis has left his job. It looks like a sudden departure. There is no permanent replacement and he is said to be off to fill an unknown overseas post.

Bruce is 56 and has retired after ten years in the job to “take up a diplomatic post later this year”. He joined the then Australian Development Assistance Agency (ADAB) 34 years ago at age 22. A career bureaucrat.

The Lowy Institute's Graham Dobell wrote in May, as rumours of an imminent departure circulated: "Davis has epitomised the AusAID contradiction: it controls billions but deploys little bureaucratic weight. AusAID’s distance from power is expressed by its comfortable headquarters in Civic, on the other side of the lake from Parliament and DFAT."

Specific criticisms of AusAID include allegations that it services Australian commercial interests through its procurement policies and has misused aid to support foreign policy initiatives such as the so-called Pacific Solution for processing asylum seekers.

AusAID has also been criticised from the right wing, particularly by Helen Hughes of the Centre for Independent Studies who has argued that "aid has failed PNG and the Pacific"  - a criticism of the broad policy of AusAID.

PNG Attitude has seen fit recently to take AusAID to task over its apparent 'hands off' policy in relation to PNG aid - leaving the on the ground decisions to multinational consultancies while it provides the funding.

This has led to a seeming disconnect between objective evidence of what is required at the grassroots and the large amount of money moving between AusAID and the PNG Government.

Questions Australians want answered about PNG

Former PNG-based teacher and journalist Keith Jackson is passionate about building closer relationships between the people of Australia and PNG, writes MALUM NALU

An increasing number of Papua New Guineans and Australians are now turning to the ground-breaking PNG Attitude website and newsletter, two outlets with growing influence in both countries for their candid commentary on Australia-PNG affairs.

Both are published by former PNG-based teacher and journalist, Keith Jackson, 64, who is chairman of the Sydney-based public relations firm Jackson Wells. He lived in PNG from age 18 to 31 and still feels a strong sense of commitment to the country and its people.

PNG Attitude offers a range of views on current Australia-PNG issues from contributors such as Paul Oakes, Gelab Piak, Ilya Gridneff, Bernard Narokobi, Don Hook and many guest writers.

Mr Jackson is passionate about using communications processes to build closer relationships between the people of Australia and PNG. He believes the political relationship has been neglected until recently, and that the civil relationship has a long way to go. “We’re like a family that’s drifted apart,” Mr Jackson says. “We need to do something about that, on both sides.”

He says he has some crucial questions he believes Australians want answered about PNG. “I asked Sir Michael most of them a couple of months ago through an intermediary, but they obviously didn’t get to him. They’re questions Australians interested in PNG worry about.”

And what are Keith Jackson’s worrying questions that Australians would like to ask?

“We’re concerned about corruption, about public money going wrongly into private hands. Is this a serious problem? And if it is, what’s the Government doing about it.

“We’re concerned about violence. How safe would we be visiting PNG as tourists? How safe would we be living in PNG?

“It seems the public service is not really delivering for PNG. Rural infrastructure – health, education, basic services - is in bad shape and the people are not getting what they need. What’s the Government doing to fix this?

“We don’t know whether Australian budgetary support - $400 million this year - is being well spent. Can we get some assurance about this?

“Our aid agency, AusAID, spends a lot of the money Australia gives to PNG on consultants. How come these consultants are not delivering the services that are needed at the PNG grass roots?

“We’re not sure about the next generation of PNG politicians. Are they likely to be nation builders - and friendly towards Australia?

“The recent anti-Asian riots indicate a big problem for PNG. They seem to show that Papua New Guineans are being excluded from commerce in their own country. What’s going on?”

You can read Malum Nalu's full article on the website of the PNG National here.

Val Murphy seriously ill after heart attack

There is grim news from Perth this morning as we learn that Val Murphy has had a heart attack and is in a serious condition.

“Sad news for you all,” writes his dear wife, Mary. “My beloved husband of 47 years, through thick and thin in PNG and resettlement in WA has had a heart attack and is fighting for his life in Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital.”

Mary asks that friends not contact the hospital, but ring her on 0418 952 498 or son Mark on 0428 520 146 for updates.

Earlier this year Val was awarded life membership of the Australian Secondary Schools Rugby League adding to his life membership of the WA Rugby League. He has been an outstanding advocate for rugby league in WA and, over many years, hasensured that players were given every opportunity to develop and play at the highest level.

Val was a cadet education officer at ASOPA [1961-62] and, while teaching in PNG, became prominent for his rugby league activities.

As Principal of Aranmore Catholic College in Perth, Val established the Rugby League Academy in 2001, offering new pathways for elite rugby league players in WA.

Our prayers and best wishes are with Val, Mary and their family at this time.

Harry West honoured in Queen’s Birthday awards

Former President of the Papua New Guinea Association of Australia, Harry West, has been awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for his service to the Association.

Until he retired from active office last year, Mr West had served as Secretary of the PNGAA for ten years and President for sixteen years. In April 2008 he was unanimously voted an honorary life member for outstanding and meritorious service to the Association, only the third such appointment in its 58-year history.

His humility and a gentle manner belie his underpinning achievements and leadership qualities as demonstrated in his handling of one of the most difficult assignments in pre-Independence PNG: his role of District Commissioner of East New Britain at a time of serious civil unrest.

Harry West enlisted in the Australian Army at Paddington in Sydney on 3 February 1942 and was discharged at Lae on 1 March 1946 as a Lieutenant in the Australian New Guinea Administrative Unit.

His PNG career effectively began in 1944 when the Army sought applicants for aspirant patrol officers to attend the School of Civil Affairs. He was interviewed by Colonel JK Murray, later the first Administrator of Papua New Guinea, Les Haylen MP and JR Halligan, Secretary of the Department of External Territories. With 40 other young men, he was sent to the School, based at Duntroon and, after five months, 16, including Mr West, were posted to PNG.

In October 1945, the Territories of Papua and New Guinea – administered separately under military rule – were returned to civil administration. This transition was to be formally effected by a treaty signed by Colonel Murray, representing the civil administration, and Lieutenant-General Sir Horace Robertson and Major-General Basil Morris, commanding the respective territories. Colonel Murray waited at Salamaua for Robertson and Morris, but transport difficulties intervened. So Lieutenants Harry West and Bert Wickham, the only ANGAU officers available, signed these important historical documents on the generals’ behalf.

Mr West took his Army discharge in Lae in March 1946 and was soon in the Highlands where, with Assistant District Officer Jack Costelloe and medical assistant Gray Hartley, he was responsible what is now the Simbu Province, at that time mostly classified as ‘uncontrolled’ and the scene of rampant tribal fighting.

In 1948-49, he undertook further training at ASOPA before being posted as Assistant District Officer at the remote outpost of Telefomin in the Sepik District. Here he led contact patrols to bring the rule of law to the fierce tribes in the Oksapmin and the May River areas, involving long and dangerous expeditions across mountainous terrain, out of radio contact and beyond airdrops.

Mr West was subsequently transferred to Aitape in 1951 and in 1952 to Kainantu in the Eastern Highlands District. Here he argued for the route – which remains to this day – for the vital road through the Kassam Pass linking the Highlands to the coast. He assessed that the route chosen by his predecessor was impractical and decided on an alternative. Thus the first motor track into the Highlands, now a highway, became a reality.

In 1956 Mr West, by then a District Officer in Goroka, assisted the Eastern Highlands District Commissioner, Bill Seale, inaugurate the now celebrated Goroka Show. In the following year he was promoted to Acting District Commissioner of the Southern Highlands. In 1958-59, he served as the first Australian liaison officer in Netherlands New Guinea, based in Hollandia at a time of serious conflict between the Indonesians and the Dutch, whose administration was collapsing.

Mr West was transferred to Rabaul as Deputy District Commissioner (later District Commissioner) in 1959. He remained there for over ten years, his period of office encompassing a time of tension over land that culminated in the Mataungan uprising, during which he was regarded as a cool and competent administrator in an extremely difficult period of civil unrest. His period in Rabaul was marked by his deep-seated understanding and sympathy for the problems being experienced by the Tolai people.

For two months in 1967, Mr West was assigned to United Nations headquarters in New York as Australia’s Special Representative at the Trusteeship Council’s 34th Session during the review of Australia’s administration of the Trust Territory.

Towards the end of his career in PNG Mr West was promoted to First Assistant Secretary for Native Affairs in the Department of the Administrator, later the Department of the Chief Minister, before leaving PNG in 1973.

Bob Hawke is made a, aaargh, PNG chief

As if he needed the ego boost, Bob Hawke has been made a Chief of the Grand Companion of the Order of Logohu.

The award was for his services to the development of Papua New Guinea before and since Independence through his involvement in the establishment of the trade union movement, fighting for wage justice for PNG workers and later as Australian Prime Minister, when he presided over a period of great harmony in Australia-PNG relations.

Mr Hawke joins an elite group of international statesmen – including Bill Clinton, Gough Whitlam and Andrew Peacock - who have been recognised with PNG’s highest award since the inception of the Order of Logohu in 2005.

Dr Howie doing too much to be a Doolittle

Australia’s answer to Dr Doolittle. That’s the wrap ASOPA graduate, ex chalkie, medical doctor and veterinarian Dr Howard Ralph received in today’s Sunday Telegraph after he was nominated for the newspaper’s Pride of Australia medal.

Howie has spent the last 30 years working with injured native wildlife and last year opened a refuge, Southern Cross Wildlife Care, at Braidwood in southern NSW. He regularly performs lengthy operations on wounded animals without charging for his services.

“For years and years he has gone over and above,” says Erica Martin of the International Fund for Animal Welfare.” “It has been an absolute privilege to work with Dr Ralph.”

Recently, Howie’s expertise in treating burns took him to Victoria for three weeks dealing with wildlife victims of the bushfires.

He has been nominated for a 2009 Pride of Australia medal in recognition of his devotion to saving native wildlife.

In addition to his veterinary duties, Howie also works as an anaesthetist at Canberra Hospital.

Source: ‘His animal magnetism’ by Liz Ackroyd, Sunday Telegraph, Sunday 5 April

Aussie Sarah joins Pacific Island office

Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Island Affairs, Duncan Kerr, has an acute eye for talent beyond politics when he recruits staff to his ministerial office.

Late last year, ‘Alopi Latukefu (aka ‘the Tongan Tonsils’) was appointed his chief of staff. ‘Alopi - the son of Dr Ruth Fink Latukefu, celebrated lecturer in Anthropology at ASOPA - is also leader of ‘Alopi Latukefu & Palermo Express’, a five-piece ACT jazz band, of which one critic wrote: “Latukefu’s oaken voice mines the soft sensuality of Pacific Romanticism with the rhythms, melodies and skat of the jazz world.”

I met with ‘Alopi and Sarah Bilney, recently appointed as an adviser to Mr Kerr, on my visit to Canberra this week. Sarah was just back from Bougainville and I was eager for a first-hand account of developments in PNG’s autonomous province.

It turns out that Sarah is not only very accomplished in her vocation (she has completed a masters in international relations at the London School of Economics) and has a wonderful political pedigree (daughter of amiable Hawke-Keating Minister Gordon Bilney, who served a spell as Minister for Development Cooperation and Pacific Island Affairs), but she is also Australia’s leading female poker player.

At the 2005 World Series of Poker in Las Vegas, Sarah won an impressive $200,000 and finished as the second-highest-ranked woman and the second-highest-ranked Australian, outlasting 5,600 other players. Reporters at the tournament dubbed her ‘Aussie Sarah’, a nickname that has stuck

“Ever since I was a kid we'd go on holidays and play cards around the dinner table,” she said. Sarah slotted in the Las Vegas tournament between university exams.

You need nerves of steel, an ability to bluff, a good dose of luck, and a sense of the maths of the game, she said. "One of the things I've been studying in my degree is game theory (which tries to predict how people will interact given particular pay-offs or punishments) and there's probably a link there to how I play."

Sarah’s father, Gordon, a gently humorous man, always gave me a good hearing during my Canberra forays representing the interests of the ABC in the 1980s.

There’s a great story about him. Shortly after losing his seat in the 1996 Federal election, Gordon wrote to a whining local official: "One of the great pleasures of private life is that I need no longer to be polite to nincompoops, bigots, curmudgeons and twerps who infest local government bodies and committees such as yours.” I understand the feeling.

The strange story of Bishop Ambo

Most of us who served in Port Moresby in the sixties and seventies would remember George Ambo, the bright and personable clergyman from the Northern District who never shied from admitting that his grandfather was a warrior who practised cannibalism.

With his brother, he was ordained a priest in 1958, two years later becoming the first Papuan bishop and a knight. In 1983, Sir George Ambo was appointed the first indigenous bishop of the South Pacific.

George retired in 1989 but, in a startling sequel to his distinguished clerical career, he was later excommunicated from the Church after shacking up with former Anglican mother superior, Sister Cora, and setting up a cargo cult.

The two of them founded the Puwo Gawe [‘come see’] Ministry after Cora claimed she saw spirits of dead relatives returning to their land with large quantities of goods. She believed a new better world was coming where inequality, suffering, and death would stop.

But now all is forgiven. “Ambo was a great man whose intentions were always to help," the Bishop of Popondota, Joseph Kopapa, has said. “He wanted to help Anglicans who had drifted away from the Church.”

George Ambo died in July last year aged 85, reconciled to his Creator and the Church and having apologised for his cargo cult involvement. “His name was cleared of any taints at the reconciliation process," said Bishop Kopapa.

Source: ‘Anglicans forgive PNG cargo cult leader’ by Ilya Gridneff, AAP, 30 January 2009

Holman investiture a first for Mido

 

Mido has stood at 144 Military Road, Neutral Bay, for 46 years – but had never witnessed a scene like this. The Chinese restaurant where Chappo is reputed to have flavoured up his sweet and sour pork with ketchup in 1963, the year its opened, staged its first investiture when Hal Holman [seen above with wife Jo] was invested into the Order of Logohu by Papua New Guinea High Commissioner, Charles Lepani.

Yesterday’s award ceremony was conducted before 25 friends and family and covered by PNG and Australian media. Making the award, Charles paid tribute to Hal’s association with PNG, which goes back for more than 65 years when he operated behind enemy lines in the Ramu Valley with his ‘Blue Devil’ commando unit and joined the US Marines for the landing that liberated Rabaul.

Charles said that Hal’s contribution to PNG through his design, sculpture and art extended to the present day. He offered a special accolade, and the gratitude of the people of PNG, for Hal’s design of the National Crest.

In response, Hal said “this is the greatest day of my life”. He said he had been honoured by his own country, but receiving one of PNG’s highest honours was even more special.

Hal Holman OL OAM: PNG honours a unique contributor to its iconography

This is a special week for Hal Holman. But first, let me recap his story.

After war service as a commando in New Guinea, which included operating behind Japanese lines on the mainland and being attached to the American marines who landed in Rabaul, Hal used his demobilisation grant to earn a Diploma of Art at East Sydney Tech.

Not long after he travelled to the sub-continent to spend three years as art director for the Advertising Corporation of India in Calcutta, Madras and Bombay.

Upon his return to Sydney, Hal spent the next six years designing for the film industry: producing sets and working as an animator on thirteen short films.

During these years he began portrait painting and also created a number of murals including four at the Shoal Bay Country Club Hotel in NSW – who, upon the old building being demolished recently, had him recerate the murals for the new hotel.

Hal moved to Port Moresby, initially working as an illustrator with the Department of Education, where he and I worked together for the first time – Hal designing and drawing, me writing and editing. He was then promoted to the position of Senior Artist for the PNG Government, in which role he designed the National Crest and was influential in the design of the National Flag.

Hal also designed and illustrated innumerable maps, posters, pamphlets and publications while continuing to produce numerous portraits and paintings of the bird of paradise. During this time he designed the uniforms for the PNG Constabulary Band.

After leaving PNG in the early 1970s he turned to sculpture, producing a one-tonne metal National Crest for the PNG Supreme Court building, bronzes of all six PNG Prime Ministers since Independence, a bust of Queen Elizabeth II and many examples of public sculpture around Sydney.

Now in his late eighties, Hal is still hard at work. His most recent sculpture, of the late General John Baker for the Australian Department of Defence, will soon be unveiled in Canberra. And more commissions continue to flow, including from PNG.

On Friday, surrounded by his family and his mates, Hal will be formally invested as an Officer of the Order of Logohu by the PNG High Commissioner to Australia, Charles Lepani. Strangely, but fittingly, the short ceremony will be conducted at the Mido Restaurant in Sydney – where Hal and his comrades meet from time to time to discuss the state of the world.

Hal received recognition for his work by the Australian Government five years ago when he received the Order of Australia medal, and now he is being honoured by his second country, PNG. It’s apt that Logohu is the Motuan word for bird of paradise, the beauty of which Hal has captured and shared with so many people and the grandeur of which he has highlighted in the PNG National Crest.

So very well done, dear friend, so very well done.

Artwork: [1] Self portrait. [2] Detail from bronze of Sir Michael Somare. [3] Pastel Warrior. [4] National Crest of PNG.

Howie: from ASOPA to Aussie wildlife vet

Josephine Asher, ninemsn

A peacock, duck, turtle and a koala joey are among the patients one volunteer vet has treated this week amid Victoria's bushfire-ravaged regions where a million animals are thought to have perished.

Dr Howard Ralph — a human doctor, vet and burns specialist — has taken time away from his vet surgery in Braidwood in southern NSW to treat the feathered and four-legged victims of the tragedy.

"In a bushfire such as this most creatures involved in it will end up dead. The ones that do survive — whilst they're injured they are treatable," he told ninemsn.

"Most of these creatures will do well. But for some it could be many weeks before their burns are healed and they can go back to the wild."

Dr Ralph — a volunteer with the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) — estimates he has treated about 40 animals including horses, dogs, dingoes, goats, koalas, a peacock, turtle and a duck since arriving in Whittlesea four days ago.

Most were being treated for burns and injuries sustained while frantically trying to escape the fire.

"When they're caught up in the melee of the fire they often end up with puncture wounds, eye injuries and head injuries," Dr Ralph said.

A woman who lost her house but survived with her dog thought her beloved pet peacock had perished. That was until she saw it at Dr Ralph's temporary clinic on television on Tuesday night.

"Someone found it and brought it to one of the rescue shelters," Dr Ralph said.

After being treated for a toe injury, the peacock was sent to carers and it will eventually be reunited with its owner and canine friend.

A koala with her joey was admitted to Dr Ralph's temporary clinic yesterday. The mother was suffering burns to her feet, dehydration, exposure and lack of food.

"She was in severe trouble last night but she's looking a lot brighter this morning," Dr Ralph said.

But there were of course some animals who had to be euthanased.

A wallaby whose eyes had been destroyed from severe burns around the face had no possibility of surviving.

"Unfortunately we had to give up on her," Dr Ralph said.

"I always feel sad for these animals so dependent on the environment. They don't ask for this on their lives… they just suffer the consequences," Dr Ralph said.

"If I can do something to alleviate the stress and suffering of these animals… that's why I'm in this line of work."

Dr Ralph has attended wildlife rescue operations all over the world including in Borneo but has previously worked as a doctor and anaesthetist in Sydney and Canberra and at Moruya Hospital.

He is currently setting up Southern Cross Wildlife Care in Braidwood in southern NSW.

Source: ‘Four-legged fire victims rescued’ by Josephine Asher, ninemsn, 14 February 2009

Our readers involved in bushfire response

Ex-Kiap and leader of the Kiap Recognition Project, Chris Viner-Smith, is a volunteer with the Australian Capital Territory Bushfire Task Force and has just got back home after spending five days fighting the Victorian fires at Murmungee near Beechworth.

After getting a mere 15 hours sleep between Sunday morning and Thursday night, Chris has hunkered down for some well merited rest.

The photos here were taken by Chris; the lower one shows him standing in front of the Task Force’s fire communications unit.

Meanwhile Rod Hard reports that Channel 7 News in Sydney featured a couple of segments showing the work being done in the bushfire areas by Dr Howard ‘Howie’ Ralph [ASOPA 1962-63].

Howie, who is both a medical specialist and a veterinarian, has a passion for Australia’s native animals. He’s been in Victoria tending to animals (native and domestic) injured by the fires.

“He certainly has a presence with the white hair and beard,” says Rod, “and came across as good as, if not better than Dr Harry Butler. It is easy to see where his passion lies. Best wishes to him...he is doing are great job.”

PNG ATTITUDE pays tribute to Chris and Howie for their sterling service to the community in the Victorian bushfire tragedy.

Friends all over the place: bits & pieces

BILL WELBOURNE writes that he sold his Mount Cotton home in Brisbane as he embarks on a move to Victoria where he has strong personal and family connections. “Brisbane has been my home since 1976 after returning to Australia from PNG,” says Bill. “It is difficult to leave Queensland as part of my heart belongs here and I feel I am a fully qualified Queenslander after 33 years. My son Andrew and daughter Angelique as well as six of my eight grand children are firmly entrenched Queenslanders. My deceased wife Pam and eldest daughter Julie-Anne are buried here. I also have my many friends, particularly those formed through ASOPA who settled here after our years of teaching service in PNG.”

“I noted on most of the Victorian number plates a slogan: ‘VICTORIA - The Place To Be’. But I now question that slogan after the worst natural disaster in Australia’s history with all the bushfires. Perhaps it should be ‘VICTORIA – The Smouldering State’? Some of you may be question my wisdom but I will have the company of two doting granddaughters and a very dear friend.”

KATHRYN AND JOE CRAINEAN rejoin the grey nomads and hit the road to give Australia a major going over tomorrow. You can keep up with their travels on their Kermit blog site at www.kermitcrainean.blogspot.com. Kathryn writes: “In the words of Numbers 6:24-26, we are assured of His hand over our travels.” And for the unBiblical among you, the citation is: “The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you; The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace." Go well, good travellers.

COLIN HUGGINS is also deeply engaged in travel pursuits from his Brisbane base. In his case the focus is on maintaining contacts with former ASOPA buddies. Colin has just been to Ballina to see Brian Smith, who’s doing well, as is soon off to the South Australian bush town of Burra to catch up with Val Rivers.

Colin will also be staying withy us in April as he visits Sydney for the annual general meeting of the PNG Association. Methinks it would be a good idea to nominate Colin for the national committee of this organisation. He’s a great networker and the Association could do with some Queensland blood.

ASSOC PROF MARTIN HADLOW has drawn my attention to the Myer Foundation Melanesia Program, an initiative of the Lowy Institute. You can visit the website at http://www.lowyinstitute.org/Program_Melanesia.asp - it is rich in PNG references.

According to the Institute “Australian aid has not been effective in helping the Pacific Islands region make significant progress in meeting the Millennium Development Goals. The focus of aid on improving public sector capacity and governance has not stimulated sufficient private sector participation to meet the development aspirations of Pacific Island populations.” There’s much more similar material on the site.

Phil Ainsworth – profile of a reformer

Phil Ainsworth, who last Wednesday was appointed to lead the PNGAA Reform Group as it seeks to engender a new mood of unity, harmony and reform in the Association, is a founding partner and long-serving Managing Director of King and Co, a leading Queensland commercial and industrial property company. He also has other business interests in Queensland.

Phil was in PNG for 21 years from 1960, serving through Independence and post Independence before retiring to Brisbane, his hometown, where he took up a cartographic position in the Department of Forests assisting in the mapping of PNG forest areas. In this role, he was involved in the production of the first true topographical maps of PNG. He also began a cartographic course for Papua New Guineans at the Forestry School in Bulolo.

After graduating in Economics from Queensland University, Phil was involved in PNG forestry project negotiations before moving to the Central Planning Office in 1972. He stayed with this organization until 1981, serving under its head, Charles Lepani, present PNG High Commissioner to Australia.

Phil established King & Co in 1988 and it quickly became a leading player in South East Queensland's commercial real estate market. This company’s expertise have made it a respected authority in this field. Phil is also credited with strongly influencing the debate on transport in South East Queensland and he is a respected analyst on the relationship between the commercial property industry and major transport infrastructure.

For the past four years Phil has also been the President of the New Guinea Volunteer Rifles and Papua New Guinea Volunteer Rifles Ex-Members Association Inc, which has a strong track record in working with Papua New Guinea to ensure that the contribution of this group is recognised and remembered. Phil’s association with the military began when he was obliged to undertake National Service training in 1955. He transferred to the CMF at about the same time he was commissioned in the Artillery Corps in 1959.

As soon as he was appointed to PNG, Phil transferred to the PNG Volunteer Rifles, an Australian CMF unit, as a platoon commander in Port Moresby. He recalls as perhaps the most satisfying part of his military service being in 1964 when the integration of Papua New Guineans into the PNGVR occurred.

When the PNGVR was disbanded in 1973, just prior to self government, over 80 percent of members were Papua New Guineans and the first commissioned officers had been appointed. Phil transferred to the military reserve in 1968 with the rank of Captain.

Phil has been a member of PNGAA since October 2008, about the time he first made contact with the organisation concerning the proposed Montevideo Maru Memorial at Subic Bay. He became interested in joining the Association because of the restructuring proposal he read about on the Association’s website. Although the NGVR/PNGVR Association is working positively to benefit relations between Australia and Papua New Guinea, it would always be limited because of its nature.

The renewed PNGAA seemed to him to be an ideal vehicle for building the relationship: a fairly large and growing Australia-wide membership; an excellent journal; and, above all, a broad community of people who had an affinity with Papua New Guinea and who seemed committed to develop and build meaningful engagement with our nearest neighbour.

Val Murphy – in a league of his own

There are some who spurn, others who yearn and the ones who earn, and Valmore Murphy is the latter. Val, just awarded life membership of the Australian Secondary Schools Rugby League for his major contribution to the game’s development, has been an outstanding advocate for rugby league in Western Australia and has, over many years, ensured that players have been given every opportunity to develop and play at the highest level.

Val is best known in the context of these Notes for his own rugby league playing prowess at ASOPA [1961-62] and, while teaching in Papua New Guinea, for his sporting endeavours there as well as his initiatives in organising and managhing tours: NSW Combined High Schools to PNG 1967-76 and a PNG tour of NSW in 1973.

Val – already a life member of the WA Rugby League - has been an Australian Secondary Schools Rugby League delegate for Western Australia since 1999 and was the State’s team manager from 1994-2002. He was also the Affiliated States’ team manager in 1999, 2002 and 2003. And, in 2007, inaugural team manager for the Combined Affiliated States team. All of this contributed hugely to raising the profile of rugby league in Western Australia and in other non-traditional rugby league states.

As Principal of Aranmore Catholic College, Val established the Rugby League Academy in 2001. This supported new pathways to elite rugby league players from Western Australia. The number of players who travelled to the eastern states to pursue rugby league is a testament to Val’s work. The College also toured Great Britain in 2000 and South Africa in 2001.

The citation for Val’s life membership describes him as “a man of great integrity and wit [who] has always been a strong advocate for Rugby League, both in Western Australia and at ASSRL Council. He is truly worthy of this awarding of ASSRL Life Membership.”

And so say all of us.

Diane's blog records life in the slow lane

Diane Bohlen’s Adventure Before Dementia blog is a homely and warm place to visit. Diane blends spare prose, often with a PNG theme, and great pictures. You can visit ABD here.

“There are people all over Australia who used to work and live in Papua New Guinea,” Diane writes in her latest post. “Some of them have joined the Papua New Guinea Association of Australia. We sometimes get together to rekindle friendships, reminisce and discuss ideas for the future. Colin (Mr Mellow Yellow) organised a lunchtime get together at Sofitel Hotel in Brisbane. He arranged for us to meet in the Whistle Stop Bar at Central Station. Then we adjourned to the restaurant for a buffet lunch.

“When we all had our fill we went to the coffee lounge and discussed ideas about the future objectives of our Association. Among other things we would like to strengthen the civil relationship between the people ofAustralia and Papua New Guinea. After coffee it was time to roll our big bellies home.”

We do reconnect severed relationships

Rotorua. Things are good in Rotovegas, the cultural heart and Geyser Capital of New Zealand. I’m visiting relatives (my daughter-in-law’s folks who are into fast cars and fast boats), and who are as fine and good-hearted a couple as you would find in either hemisphere. Being in such a positive relational mood reinforces with me (as if I needed reminding) that good friends are one of the great things about being alive.

Which brings me in a roundabout way to this piece. One thing PNG ATTITUDE does fairly often, and with some success, is to bring former PNG associates together – often when they have not been in touch for many decades and the only thing they remember is a name. This feel good thing is mostly consigned to the MISSING PEOPLE column at left, which happens to be one of the most visited parts of this blog.

So let’s see how well you, the collective readership, can do in meeting these first two requests to locate missing people in 2009.

Firstly, Jim Humphreys. Ed Brumby is trying to locate Jim, who was an E course graduate (the first E Course, which produced so many teachers of great merit), maths curriculum specialist at Education HQ (Konedobu mid 60s), gentleman punter, raconteur, former Army officer and representative athlete. “He fronted the Temlab rollout in 1968,” says Ed, making it sound like a tank attack on Dien Bien Pho. Ed thinks Jim is possibly residing in the Windsor area in NSW.

Like Ed I knew Jim, and his best buddy Wal Kapper, very well. Wal, also an ex Army officer and aficionado of the track and the bourse, is long gone. It would be good to catch up with Jim again. He was a hard man and sometimes it’s the hard men who teach you the most important lessons in life.

If you know anything about Jim’s career after PNG or, and this would be a real boon, his present whereabouts, contact Ed Brumby here … ebrumby@theinstitute.com.au

Second, from Terry Patten who, unlike Ed, I do not know. Terry is looking for Des Chow, and he writes: “I wonder if you could advise me as to how I can find out where an old friend would be now. I was working for the Bank of NSW, Rabaul branch, in 1959-60 and became good friends with Desmond Chow, who along with his parents owned a trade store and I think a copra plantation. On returning to Australia, I lost contact with Des and another friend - Jack Seeto.”

If you can help Terry, who now lives in Western Australia, you can call 0409 113 686 or email tpatten@amnet.net.au

A serologist’s reminiscences of PNG

Dr Peter Booth arrived in Port Moresby in October 1962 as the first Director of the Red Cross Blood Transfusion Service. He was a serologist. His wife, Kitty, a haematologist. Between them, they knew everything about blood that could be known. When Peter arrived, the Blood Transfusion Service consisted of two nursing sisters in Port Moresby, one in Lae and one in Rabaul. When he left, shortly before Independence, there was a fully operational blood bank in all the major centres.

After some years in Christchurch running the Blood Transfusion Service, Peter and Kitty returned to Port Moresby to share a visiting professorship at the University of Papua New Guinea.

Well into his retirement, Peter was invited to deliver the inaugural Ruth Sanger Memorial Ovation at the Conference of the Australasian Society for Blood Transfusion in October 1990. He wrote the paper but died in February 1990 before he could deliver it. It was his 100th paper and, renamed the Peter Booth Memorial Ovation, it was read at the conference by his son Nick.

It is both an erudite and witty presentation (the original has slides, but it won’t affect your enjoyment of Peter’s prose), with many references to his work in PNG. An extract below and you can read the full paper, which is on the PNGAA website, here.

This is in fact the old hospital at Saiho, 18 miles and 18 rivers from Popondetta. Bush materials, flat swampy ground, a tropical paradise, and absolutely lethal. Infested by mosquitoes all full of talciparum malaria, not chloroquin-resistant in my day. The lab was much the size of an average garden shed, and, when it contained two burly Melanesians - Edward the technician and his mate - and myself, it seemed like WembleyStadium on Cup Final Day.

Reverting to Saiho old hospital, l had another picture to show you, but have mislaid it. It showed preparation of the patients' lunch: slices of bread being fried in pig grease on top of old 40 gallon drums. It smelt delicious, and l was even more envious after lunch with the Saiho Medical Officer He was a single man, with a mind well elevated above the humdrum, so he failed to notice that his housekeeping was being deplorably neglected by a handful of slovenly Papuan house-boys, who served up an abominable lunch.

However, an even worse meal from PNG is on record. It was served in 1888 at Government House, Port Moresby, to the Resident Deputy Commissioner, Hugh Hastings Romilly, who was living alone there, awaiting the arrival of the first Administrator, William MacGregor. When Romilly came to breakfast on his first day, he was confronted by a table covered with a dirty old blanket on which was arranged a bizarre meal.

Cockroach Cheese, One Dutch

Blue mould sardines, One tin opened

Bitten bread, One hunk

Brandy, One bottle

Whisky, One bottle

Office gum, One pot

On meeting an ex-student after 40 years

Colin Huggins

Today I lunched with Sue Hurrell, a former student of mine at Wau Primary A School in 1968. I was full of trepidation before the meeting - like a first day at school.

To ensure that after 40 years I would be recognisable, I was attired in my flamboyant yellow garb. I needn't have been worried. Sue and her husband had no trouble spotting a retired gentleman clothed in yellow. Then the stories flowed. It was a wonderful experience.

Sue is a teacher and her husband has been appointed headmaster of Byron Bay Public School – an hour’s drive from their residence on 150 acres with 50 Hereford cows and a Brahman bull.

Both Hurrell boys (if I can use that word - Lloyd now 92 and Frank not far behind) and their wives live in retirement villages. Lloyd has written a book on his time in PNG [Hurrell's way: an autobiography] - pre-war, war and after.

Sue and her husband have been regular visitors to PNG. They have climbed Mt Wilhelm and walked- the Kokoda Track. There are schools on the track with no pupils because there are no teachers (due to the government not paying salaries). Some schools have been sponsored by Rotary and books and materials remain in their crates in empty classrooms. Of course the local population is anxious for the kids to have an education. It’s considered to be of paramount importance just as it was 40 odd years ago.

Sue said they never felt any danger when in Port Moresby - they even went out at night. But Lae was another case entirely, verging on anarchy. They visited the Tami Islands off Dregerhafen on a dive boat and had a wonderful time diving, swimming and in total harmony with the locals. I recall the long canoes arriving at Dregerhafen with the Tami carvings - they moored right in front of my Bulolo style house.

Sue has also worked in Boggabilla – in NSW just over the Queensland border from Goondiwindi. I spent my primary school years not far from there – in Boomi and Moree - and I can tell you Boggabilla is the pits of the earth.

And so to this day. Today 40 years ago I was on my way to Medicine Hat, Alberta, Canada. I never got there. My diary tells me I celebrated New Year in Tokyo at the Imperial Hotel Ballroom. There is no entry for what I did on 1 January 1969, so I can only assume far too much saki - which I no longer drink - was consumed.

Happy new year!

Obituary: Alf Uechtritz, an epic PNG life

 

Alf Uechtritz traced his lineage to both Queen Emma and the European aristocracy. Emma Forsythre Coe came to the Duke of York islands in 1878 and, realising the potential of New Britain, asked some of her family in Samoa to join her, particularly her sister Phebe who had married Richard Parkinson, a Danish/German botanist and scientist.

With their help, Emma established a trading empire and a large chain of plantations on the Gazelle Peninsula. Richard did the botanical work and Phebe recruited labour and translated. At the time Richard was also engaged in anthropological studies and his work, Thirty Years in the South Seas, was honoured by worldwide scientific bodies.

When Richard died in 1907, Phebe remained in New Britain among the Tolai people, living in a little house of local materials in Ralum village and, despite her advanced age, continuing to earn an income by recruiting labour for plantations.

During the Japanese invasion in 1942, Phebe was imprisoned in a small village on New Ireland, where she died from neglect and starvation in 1944.

One of Phebe’s daughters, Dolly, had married Peter Uechtritz who had come to the Duke of Yorks to work for Hernsheim, and Co. Alf was born to Dolly and Peter at Petalobo near Kokopo in 1926, delivered by a doctor who was to become Lady Phillis Cilento. He was a mere three-pounds but grew into a tall lean man, constantly tanned from an outdoor life.

In his early days at Sum-Sum Plantation, about 100 km from Rabaul, Alf spoke German, Kinigunan and Pidgin. When he was sent aged six to the Sacred Heart College in Bowral NSW he was considered “a little heathen”. Alf also retained his father’s German nationality and this proved to be a burden when World War II broke out.

In 1940, when his father was forced to leave Sum-Sum and could no longer afford to pay school fees, Alf – aged 15 - went jackarooing. For a short time he worked as a groom in Bathurst until reported by an English gardener as “a subversive foreigner”. He was arrested as he boarded a train and spent the following three weeks in gaol.

He was eventually freed by Alan Meagher, an influential friend of his father, and went to work on one of Meagher’s properties at West Wyalong. During the next five years he developed a love of the rural lifestyle. In 1948, his father died in Sydney. Fortunately Sum-Sum had not been confiscated during the war so, aged 22, Alf returned to New Britain to rehabilitate the plantation.

In Rabaul he met and married Mary Lou, a teacher whose father had come to PNG as a patrol officer and later settled at Biwa Plantation on Djaul Island, New Ireland. Maintaining the family tradition of large families, Alf and Mary Lou had 10 children.

In 1959, after 11 years at Sum-Sum, worried about problems in Indonesia, Alf took the family on leave, hired a caravan and found 5,000 acres at Capella in Central Queensland. The property flourished, growing cattle, sheep, wheat, sorgum and sunflowers.

But the call of PNG was strong. In 1968, Alf and Mary Lou returned and Alf became a supervisor with the Department of Primary Industry, head of the training school at Erap near Lae and finally OIC of all the Department’s training schools in PNG.

Source: ‘Meet Alf Uechtritz, our man on the land’, By Robin Horley, Your Guide to PNG, 1981

PNG pioneer Alf Uechtritz dies at 82

Alf Uechtritz, who died yesterday at the age of 82, was a member of one of PNG’s great pioneering families. He was the grandson of Phebe Parkinson, daughter of a Samoan princess and sister of ‘Queen Emma of the South Seas’. When Emma was establishing her trading empire in New Britain and New Ireland, she asked Phebe and her husband Richard to join her, thus establishing a famous PNG dynasty. In 2003, Alf wrote this memoir of his grandmother.

Concerning Phebe Parkinson

Alf Uechtritz

 

 

My parents parted in 1930 when I was four. So it was that our Grandmother Phebe Parkinson spent a lot of time with us at Sum Sum Plantation (New Britain). Granny Parkinson ran the household and was still there when I left for boarding school in Australia at the age of seven in 1934.

Everyone, black, white, and brindle loved Gran. She was a happy person, gentle and soft spoken but a great organiser with a twinkle in her eye. All the piccaninnies and the labour line would always run to her. They would do anything for her. I loved to listen to stories told by Gran about the early years in Samoa as well as the early years of settlement at Kuradui and Ralum, Malapau and also about Gunantambu, my Aunt Emma's place.

She described her trips with Grandpa into the bush and down the coast to gather artifacts and get material for the book my Grandfather later published Thirty Years in the South Seas. Grandfather spoke German, Danish and English but Gran could also speak the local Tolai language and was able to pick up enough of other dialects to translate for Grandpa.

I last saw Gran in Christmas 1937. By that time Granny had left Sum Sum and was living with her eldest grandchild Rudi Diercke on a plantation near Kokopo, which Rudi was managing for Carpenters. She still had a small block of land near Raluana Village with a small house and stayed there at times. When we returned for Christmas 1938 Gran had moved, with Rudi, to a plantation in New Ireland.

In December 1942 we had a knock on our door around midnight. It was a Seventh Day Adventist from Kambubu who told us that all women and children had to be in Rabaul the next day to be evacuated on the Macdhui to Australia. We hurriedly packed and left in their workboat for Kambubu to collect the women and children there and then proceed to Rabaul. We arrived in Rabaul at daybreak and headed for the Macdhui which was berthed nearby. The Australian administration was supposed to have notified all families about the evacuation. However they had not notified us - probably because my stepmother was married to a German. Phebe and Rudi also had not been informed and so it was that Phebe missed out on being safely evacuated.

After the Japanese occupation Phebe and Rudi were allowed to stay on Komalu plantation as they were classified as German. However, in late 1944 an American bomber was shot down by a Zero. The pilot, Lt Byron Heichel, belly landed the aircraft on the reef off Komalu homestead. Three men on the plane were dead and three others were seriously injured. Rudi and his boys brought the injured men to the Komalu homestead and Granny tried her best to save them. Rudi said that Gran's bedroom was a mess of blood and torn sheets to use as bandages. Unfortunately these three airmen also died and Rudi had a large grave dug on Komalu and the six dead airmen were buried there.

The next day Japanese soldiers landed and took the rest of the crew prisoner. The Japanese accused Rudi and Granny of harbouring allied airmen and took them to a POW camp at Bo just out of Namatanai. Rudi, with the help of some bois, built a small bush house for Granny and himself to live in. Food was very short. The Japs gave them nothing. There were many Chinese and mixed race people in that camp. All had to make their own gardens. With not enough food and no medicines Granny Parkinson died. She was 81.

In July 2002 I attended the Memorial Service, in Kavieng, for all those who had been killed or died under the Japanese in New Ireland. We did not know where her grave was. Unbeknown to me, my son Gordon had made some enquiries. Gordon set out for Namatanai and approached an old native named Das Das and when asked 'wanpela missis I die pinis na planimnabout' said he knew and led Gordon about 500 yards from his house to the grave site of Phebe Parkinson.

Gordon noticed a Tanget bush planted at the head of the grave and asked Das Das whether he planted it there. Das Das said that he had planted it there because, when the missis was buried they could hear her voice, very unhappy, crying out that she wanted to be planted in her own ground. That evening at the Memorial dinner in Kavieng, Gordon returned and told me he had found Gran's grave!

Source: Extracts from a memoir by Alf Uechtritz

Art, tragedy, adventure, politics, art ...

The notion of rip-snorting, tearaway, kiap, croc shooter and political hard man John Pasquarelli turning his attention to brush and palette intrigued me. 'Out of character' seemed hardly an adequate description.

Anyway, I decided there’d be no harm asking.

Brisbane 1947. John is ten. His Aunt Dorothy (Dolores) encourages him to attend the Stanley Hobday Art School in Queen Street.

“The drill was my Mum took me to the school from Yeronga and my Aunt trammed in from Cooparoo and took me back home,” says John. “I forget how long I had classes – perhaps every Saturday morning for a couple of months.”

Then the unthinkable happened.

“One Saturday morning a lunatic stalker shot my Aunt at the Cooparoo tram stop. Then killed himself on the spot. My Aunt died that evening despite my [surgeon] father's efforts to save her at the Mater. And that was the end of the art until 2002 - 55 years later - when I picked up the brushes again.”

My other questions seem redundant against the canvass of this monumental tragedy. But anyway…

John will be 72 in February and has had four exhibitions since 2003, selling 56 paintings for prices ranging from $2,700 to $6,000. To service the other side of his brain, he writes pungent editorials for the Melbourne Observer.

On the subject of Pauline Hanson, who he served as political advisor during her window rattling political days, John conveys the clear impression that the less said the better. “Hanson has discredited herself completely. Conned me nicely.” Say no more.

On Papua New Guinea. “PNG and the rest of the South Pacific is simply a disgrace, like Africa and the rest of the Third World. Wonderfully rich and beautiful places ruined and ransacked by their bongo bongo leaders!”

And Australia. “On the way out - the evil virus of multiculturalism has divided and demoralised us.”

So there you have it. You thought painting had taken the fire out of his belly, did you?

Pasquarelli art: [top] Taradale Station, [bottom] Sepik Shield & Lavender.

After the PNG 'sturm und drang' … art

 

John Pasquarelli’s been many things. Kiap, croc shooter, trader, Member of the first PNG House of Assembly, publican, self-described “maker of mayhem”, controversialist, and political adviser to Pauline Hanson. Now, at the age of 71, he’s an overnight success. As an artist. The paint-splattered clothes just give it away.

Overnight is not too much of an exaggeration. John has been painting just 18 months. When he gets round to sending PNG ATTITUDE a few samples that readers can't copy and hang on their walls, we’ll publish them. But in the meantime if you go to his website here, you can have the experience without waiting.

John’s father came from Northern Italy to Ingham before World War I and served in PNG in World War II. There he met Bill Dishon, who later recruited John as a pikinini kiap in Melbourne in 1959/60.

“After a lot of meandering,” John says, “I ended up here in Newstead, Central Victoria”. Many of the timber and stone structures still surviving in this region, and which have become a strong motif in much of John's painting, were built by Italians from Ticino near the Swiss border. This affinity, I am advised by John's website, inspired him to paint.

As the promotional blurb puts it: “Out of the Sturm und Drang of Pasquarelli’s past, a new and worthwhile field of endeavour has emerged. His paintings are striking and have the authority of a genuinely individual vision. Their mood is positive, as is his future as an artist.”

That’s the spin. But believe me, the products of this new Pasqua in his post modern persona as a man of art, are very pleasing to the spirit indeed.

 

 

The crowded life of a Governor-General

Sir Paulias Matane

My usual bedtime is 8.30pm and I wake up to go to work just after 2am. I use the time between 2am and 5.15am to work in my study answering emails, reading manuscripts, and writing Forewords for many books.

Since retiring from the Public Service (but not from public service) on 1 January 1986, I have helped Papua New Guineans to write books. Forty of those people have published their first books here and overseas; six have published second books; and four have published third books. Last week, after reading through three manuscripts by two new authors, I recommended their publication. My estimate is that by the end of 2009, there will have been more than 50 books by PNG authors.

Two days ago I went with the vice regal party for a very busy schedule in East New Britain. We arrived at 11am and went straight to the first meeting with six provincial leaders. I then had a lunch meeting before leaving for my village at 1.35 to meet with students and teachers of my old school and then with the members of the school board who I briefed on my plan to redevelop the school. The idea is to build five double storey buildings each with six classrooms and eight offices. I hope building will start early next year. The school will be used not only by children but village people as part of a Global University for Lifelong Learning. We left for Kokopo at 4.15.

Yesterday was another busy day. At 9.30am, we arrived at the Kokopo Business College where I was guest speaker for the 144 people who graduated with certificates after two years of accounting and business studies. We left just after 1pm and between 2.30 and 4.20, I met with six provincial leaders at the Governor’s office to discuss some important matters including an autonomous government for ENB, a plan to give city status to the quickly growing town of Kokopo and the need to register clan land.

This morning after breakfast, I met with a successful businessman to discuss issues including his request for me to open his new Kokopo Beach Bungalow. At 9.45, we left in a Hertz rental car for a meeting and at 11.10 drove to the airport for another meeting with two provincial leaders before we departed for Port Moresby at 1pm. It looks as if I will be at this desk until 7.30 before I go to bed.

Tomorrow I will lead a group of over 100 walkers for the last Governor-General’s Monthly Health Walk for the year. We will gather at Government House at 4.45am and, after some warming up, set off at 5am on the dot to climb Touaguba Hill before we return just after 6 for refreshments and a Christmas cake. I’ll then depart for work just before 7am.

PNG ATTITUDE thanks Sir Paulias for allowing readers to share this glimpse into his life. At 78, the Papua New Guinea Governor-General has a schedule that would daunt a man half his age.

Tongan Tonsils gets top Pacific affairs gig

'Alopi Latukefu (aka ‘the Tongan Tonsils’) has been appointed chief of staff to the Parliamentary Secretary for Pacific Affairs, Duncan Kerr. ‘Alopi is the son of Dr Ruth Fink Latukefu and the late Rev Dr Sione Latukefu, both of whom were active in Pacific academia during their twenty years’ service with the University of Papua New Guinea. Ruth, of course, was also a celebrated lecturer in Anthropology at the Australian School of Pacific Administration.

Announcing the appointment, Duncan Kerr said “Mr Latukefu has served with distinction as my Pacific Adviser and I am confident that, in his new role, he will further advance the Government’s focus in the Pacific region. He brings to the role knowledge and personal experience of the Pacific, the information economy, private sector development, and international development generally.”

‘Alopi is also leader of Alopi Latukefu & Palermo Express, a five-piece ACT-based jazz and funky lounge band. One critic has written that “Latukefu's oaken voice mines the soft sensuality of Pacific Romanticism with the rhythms, melodies and skat of the Jazz world.”

And another: “Alopi Latukefu leads this smooth jazz funk band. You will immediately warm to this charming man, the moment he steps on stage, with his engaging smile, smooth looks and a voice like velvet, as it caresses the many soulful jazz tunes in his vast repertoire.”

Quite an acquisition for the Parliamentary Secretary.

Encounters: Ray Whitrod and Bob Cole

In 1968, after a 30-year career in Papua New Guinea, Police Commissioner Bob Cole, who has just died on the Gold Coast, was ready to retire and return to Australia. As he searched for experienced police commanders who could replace him, he sought advice from Ray Whitrod. In an oral history for Film Australia, Whitrod tells the story....

Ray Whitrod: I had been going to these commissioners' conferences for a number of years and I'd grown very pally with the Commissioner of Police from Papua New Guinea, a chap called Bob Cole. He wasn't a proper policeman. He'd been what we call a kiap, a government patrol officer in New Guinea, but he was the Commissioner up there, and he used to come down to our conferences and in a sense he was a bit on the outer like I was, in that we weren't regular, standard State police forces. So we got very friendly.

And one day he rang me up from Port Moresby and said, 'Ray, my wife says I'm getting too old to stay in the territory. I'm fifty-five. It's the usual retiring age for kiaps. My superannuation is ready. She wants to go south to be with her grandchildren. I need to give up'. But he said, 'The force is coming along slowly and I don't want to leave without making sure it's in good hands. Can you find me somebody who'll replace me?'

And I said, 'Sure, Bob, it's an interesting, challenging job in Papua New Guinea . I know a number of young assistant commissioners, who would jump at the chance to do some years in New Guinea'. So I rang around to all my assistants, people I'd met at various conferences and so forth. None wanted the job, partly because independence was coming in New Guinea, partly because their wives refused to move, partly I think because in the eastern states they had a larger income than they should have had and they didn't want to go.

So I rang up Bob and Bob was crestfallen about this and said, 'Look mate, I've gone ahead and I've made accommodation arrangements down on the Gold Coast. I really can't get out of leaving'. So I said, 'Bob, I've been here fourteen years now. I've got a good assistant. I'll come up and take your place'. Then I went and told Mavis, 'We're going to New Guinea '. [laughs] Of course she was a bit staggered by this. We went up to Port Moresby , at an age when Bob Cole was leaving to come south.

Interviewer: Could you sum up for me what the New Guinea experience was like?

Whitrod: Well, it's a short story because it was stupid of me to go in the first place.

Source: Australian Biography, Film Australia, Ray Whitrod (1915-2003)

PNG great, Bob Cole, dies on Gold Coast

Yesterday Papua New Guinea lost one of its greatest servants and Australia lost a pioneering officer whose association with PNG began before World War II.

Former pre-war kiap and PNG Police Commissioner Bob Cole OBE MC died on the Gold Coast. His PNG career spanned the years 1938 to 1968 and he served in the Sepik, Bougainville, Western Highlands and Southern Highlands Districts, attaining the rank of District Commissioner before being appointed Commissioner of Police.

In Una Voce, the journal of the Papua New Guinea Association, in March 1993, Bob wrote a story about his late wife Kay’s introduction to New Guinea. Some extracts.

We were married in 1943, during the War, and after I had spent three years in the Middle East writing her letters. We married within a week of my return to Australia and only had two weeks together before I reported to Melbourne and then New Guinea two months later. These separations were the pattern until the end of 1943 when I was discharged. After the war we had a wonderful ten months together before deciding that I should return to work, which meant New Guinea where the Provincial Government was in operation.

Bougainville was my posting and there being no married accommodation available I was not able to take Kay with me when I returned. I was required to build my own residence before a permit would be granted for Kay to join me and this did not worry me very much because I knew I could knock up a suitable house within a few weeks, and so off I went to get started, giving Kay an assurance that she would be with me within a week or two and that the Territory people would look after her all the way to me.

I landed at Sohano at the end of November 1946 and was sent to Buin where I arrived two weeks later, and where Jimmy Hodgekiss was in charge as ADO. Jimmy did not like crowded stations (we had a Patrol Officer, Jim Humphries, and an EMA, Alan Pinkerton) and now me, who intended bringing a woman to the station. This was too much for Jimmy so he went bush to start Boku and left me in charge at Buin to build the house for my wife.

The house was built by the end of December, native materials throughout except for the floor which was constructed from Japanese bed-boards salvaged from the huge overgrown Jap army camp in the bush nearby. These boards were better than limbum, but only just, because they were very thin and gave way frequently underfoot. Our furniture was patrol issue to start with, no refrigerator, and a camp stove salvaged from the same Jap camp. Upon completion I convinced Raleigh Farlow, the District Officer, that it was suitable as a married quarter and he notified Moresby to this effect and asked for approval for Kay to join me.

Passages to Papua New Guinea, on aircraft, were at a premium in 1946 and baggage allowances were very limited so when Kay did get a seat on 27 January 1947 she filled her handbag with cutlery and the allowable baggage space was used for linen in addition to her own clothing. I remember Treasury hit me for £10/13/6 to cover excess baggage, and duly collected it.

You can read this wonderful story in its entirety here.

Photo: Bob Cole (centre), as Honorary Colonel, Papua and New Guinea Rifles, with Col JK McCarthy and Lt Col H Green

PNG leader praises “wonderful” Una Voce

A couple of weeks ago in these Notes, I mentioned that the most recent issue of the PNG Association journal Una Voce was being distributed and suggested you might join the Association (just $20 here) so as to obtain this quarterly publication.

I have just received this letter from PNG Governor-General, Sir Paulias Matane, a PNGAA member and Una Voce reader, which may spur you into action.

We send to you sincere greetings from Government House, Port Moresby.

I write this to express my sincere thanks and appreciation for the wonderful PNGAA journal. I read the various contributions with a great deal of interest because, apart from other things, they bring back memories of the past events in PNG, particularly during the colonial days.

It is encouraging that many Australian former employees still have nice feelings and memories of their times here. Some have written books about their activities. I would like those of you who may have not written books about your experiences here should do the same as people like Dame Rachel Cleland and others.

It is encouraging and gratifying to read that members of PNGAA are going to do something for the catastrophic Cyclone Guba that devastated the Oro Province last year. Congratulations.

When I read the first Letter to the Editor from Alan McLay in the current PNGAA issue about Fred Kaad’s tribute to Harry West, my mind went back to the time when I knew them as District Commissioners. They probably do not remember me. I was also interested in saying that Alan married a Tolai lady, Nellie, in 1982. I mention this because she and Alan helped to organise a fund raising dinner on 15 November (at the Melanesian Hotel in Lae in the Morobe Province) for the Morobe Bikers’ Charity Club, or MBCC. I was the main guest. The vice regal party paid for two tables.

What is MBCC, you may now be wondering. It is a charity club, formed and registered in 2003 by unemployed youths, some of whom were prisoners before but have changed to become useful citizens of PNG. There are over 300 members of the Club.

Some of the routes they had followed since the Club was started were: Madang to Lae; Goroka to Lae; Lae across the mountains to the Gulf Province, to Port Moresby where they worked for 3 months to raise money before continuing to Alotau and back to Lae.

After the fundraising dinner, ten members went by truck to Enga Province. They started riding at Porgera on 17 November, then to Laiagam, Wapendamanda, Mt Hagen, Kundiawa, Chuave, Goroka, Kainantu, Watarais, Nadzab and then to Lae where they will arrive on 1 December, World AIDS Day, to address the crowd.

On the various stops, they carried out awareness on HIV/AIDS; Violence Against Women and Children; Law and Order Problems; Consumption of Alcohol and other Drugs by young people; etc.

I am so much impressed with their initiatives and that’s why I support their activities. I had made a public call for youths in other parts of PNG to do the same as MBCC members. I will continue to raise this issue.

I thank you and the leaders for your plans for the future PNGAA as recorded under What’s Next in the PNGAA – Building on the Legacy. I can only see good things coming.

The other very interesting items include Those Early Days Had Their Moments by Jim Eames; Emirau by Warren Martin; The Murder of Errol John [Jack] Emmanuel by Derek Bell. This really shocked most of the people as this kind of killing was new to many of us at that time. Jack was a very good and peaceful man. We missed him. The other that stands out is Extract From ‘Bilong Gut Taim Bipor by Henry G Eekhoff.

The Ian Boden story, as told by himself

As told to Malum Nalu

 

 “I came [to PNG] as a relieving radio announcer for three months. I was supposed to be going to Rabaul. 9RB was the furthest-flung station of the ABC empire. It was the kind of station where you had to be a jack-of-all-trades, from playing records to trying to train PNG staff. We had quite a collection of Tolai announcers, young guys. At least three of them are still alive. One is Anton Kaut, he was probably the youngest. The others were Jack Ainui, Robin Popat and Nelson Bale. They were the core of the presenting staff outside Port Moresby.

“We had programs like Blue Hills which ran twice a day, classical music and religious programs. It was very much European-oriented. The town itself was like something out of a page by Somerset Maugham. It was quite remarkable. It had everything going for it. We were in a hostel on the top of Namanula Hill. That became the ABC Hostel. I built myself a bush material house, and lived there: ‘Boden’s gone troppo’.”

“I [later] became principal training officer of the NBC. That’s how I came into a training role with people like Justin Kili, Memafu Kapera and so on. They were already accomplished broadcasters. Apart from that I was involved in producing a lot of radio drama, taking part in a lot of radio drama by people like Peter Trist, who was a very good producer, and lots of people who are very well known today.

 “I have to say that after all these years, nothing has changed (for me). I still feel the same way about the country and its people. I know there are problems. I think we become bogged down and we fail to see the very real achievements that are being made. I suppose the ultimate goal of young Papua New Guineans is to see personal development opportunities, and through their contributions, ensure the development of the country.”