Re-colonising Papua New Guinea

The Australian Government has at last "persuaded" the 
government of Papua-New Guinea to sign an agreement to admit over 
200 police, judges and "economic managers", allegedly to help 
restore "law and order" and to overcome severe economic 
difficulties there. Australian police officers are expected to 
move into PNG later this month.

For some time the PNG Government has been holding out against 
this intrusion, including refusing to accept that these 
Australians should have immunity from PNG laws during their stay.

However, an agreement has now been signed by PNG Foreign Minister 
Sir Rabbie Namaliu and Australia's Foreign Minister Alexander 
Downer. Downer is well known in the region for his stand-over 
tactics.

This move into PNG follows a similar operation in the Solomon 
Islands.

Australia is flexing its imperialist muscles in the region having 
reached an understanding with the United States that the South 
Pacific region is "Australia's patch".

Real objectives

The real objectives of the Australian Government's operations 
have been set out in an article by Helen Hughes who is described 
as a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) 
and is also an Emeritus Professor with the Australian National 
University. CIS and that other "think tank", the Australian 
Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), are well known as the source 
of policies subsequently implemented by the Howard Government in 
the region.

Helen Hughes bemoans the "civil strife and crime" in PNG, the 
"unconscionable" delay of PNG in reaching an agreement with the 
Australian Government, the lack of productive work, the absence 
of "secure private property rights", corruption, the impediments 
to local entrepreneurship, and, above all the continued existence 
of communal ownership of land.

Her "solution" for all these supposed "ills" is the imposition of 
a full-blown capitalist economy and the necessary political 
structures to go with it.

Helen Hughes fails to analyse the cause of PNG's difficulties 
except to say that "Australia's transfer of its social and 
political institutions to PNG before and at independence are now 
widely seen as misguided" and that "External attempts to guide 
PNG's political development are doomed to failure".

However, she fails to take her own advice and asserts that 
"Australian assistance to policing and making the existing legal 
system function before it disintegrates could be a catalyst for 
change".

Colonisation

She claims that Australia's intervention "is not a step towards 
re-colonisation" and that "After independence, Australia took a 
'hands-off' stance so as not to appear to pursue colonial 
policies." Helen Hughes makes it clear that that approach has now 
been dumped. It is to be hands-on in PNG and "do as you are told" 
in future.

This is exposed in a comprehensive political and economic program 
outlined by Hughes.

She calls for the adoption of "mutual obligations" by the two 
countries which is a sort of "work for the dole" scheme applied 
to international relations. Hughes asserts that "in return for 
financial assistance the PNG Government pursues reforms that will 
remove the roadblocks to growth. Where reforms take place, 
Australian aid could perhaps be effective".

In plain language this means: without reforms acceptable to the 
Australian Government, no aid.

She provides the Australian Government with the necessary 
justification for such policies by hypocritically claiming that 
"Australian Governments are accountable to taxpayers and voters 
so that aid has to be seen to be effective" and that "If 
components of the aid programme are not working, they have to be 
suspended until performance improves."

The economic and social programme put forward by Helen Hughes 
asserts that:

* Removing impediments to local entrepreneurship will be key;
* Secure private property rights, the rule of law and appropriate 
economic policies are essential;
* Communal ownership [of land] has not permitted any country to develop;
* Privileged consumer and construction goods still have high import barriers;
* Banking, water, power and telecommunications have continued in 
the public sector long after the inefficiency of public enterprise
was recognised worldwide;
* The lack of security makes investment dubious for foreign operators
with effective public utility experience;
* Public services and enterprises have been unable to shed surplus
workers because there is little new employment;
* Awards still specify inappropriate shift, weekend, holiday, long
service pay and other on-costs that raise wages and salaries well
above productivity;
* Attempts to establish internationally competitive labour-intensive
export industries have failed;
* Firms will require location in secure manufacturing estates and
secure dormitories for workers;
* PNG trade unions would have to give their support to such an initiative.

Political will

"All that is needed is the political will to act", says this 
advocate of unbridled capitalism and spokesperson for Australian 
big brother imperialism.

These policies, taken straight from the agenda of the 
International Money Fund and the World Bank, have failed in all 
other third world and former colonial countries. They have 
created massive poverty and unemployment and are intended to 
serve the economic and political interests of the developed 
industrialised countries and not the people of the countries that 
are forced to endure to them.

Furthermore, the domination of one country by another, even when 
it is claimed not to be colonialism, is colonialism none-the-less 
and will inevitably brings forth a national liberation movement.

The Australian Government has acted hastily, concerned that 
several Asian countries are offering assistance to PNG. These 
include China which is putting up 100 percent of the capital to 
develop a nickel/cobalt mine. PNG will own 35 percent and another 
five percent ownership is going to PNG landowners.

But Hughes attempts to decry this Chinese/PNG project, suggesting 
that the Chinese have "no experience in open-cut mining" and that 
"New projects are reducing pressure for reform".

At the same time she links the disastrous records of BHP at Ok 
Tedi and Bougainville Copper at Panguna with "civil strife and 
crime". By "crime" Hughes does not mean by the criminal 
destruction of the environment by these two companies or their 
disregard of the interests of landowners.

Help your neighbour

Yes, Australia should aid PNG and other countries in its 
neighbourhood but as a good neighbour, not as one that comes to 
dominate and exploit. Instead of "mutual obligations", policies 
based on "mutual benefit" are more likely to succeed and be 
accepted.