August 1, 2008
Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands (RAMSI)
A leading American political philosopher and economist is warning that the Regional Assistance Mission to the Solomon Islands (RAMSI) which includes nearly 100 New Zealand soldiers and police cannot end any time in the foreseeable future because of social conditions there.
The alert came in a paper by Professor Francis Fukuyama of John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
In a World Bank study, Professor Fukuyama says an exit strategy is not possible because RAMSI had made short term progress.
“The militias responsible for the violence earlier in the decade have been disarmed and disbanded, and the formal criminal justice system has been functioning to identify and punish those responsible for serious crimes,” he wrote.
“On the other hand, the social conditions that led to the violence persist in ways that make it impossible to consider ending RAMSI’s presence any time in the foreseeable future.”
A very large Malaitan population remained on Guadalcanal and there was a significant population of jobless and disaffected young people in the settlements around the capital Honiara.
Professor Fukuyama said the most troubling indicator of potential future problems was the Solomon’s police which, in the short term was RAMSI’s chief success.
The militias had grown out of the Solomon’s Police as they were more loyal to their ethnic group or wantok (extended family) than to the Solomons as a whole.
“It is not clear that any progress has been made in changing this mindset,” he wrote, adding there were still many officers in the police who were involved in the conflict and have not yet been purged.
Professor Fukuyama said one of the striking gaps was “the absence of any sense of national identity” in the Solomons.
“In the absence of a long-term nation-building project owned and promoted by the country’s political leadership, I am at a loss to understand how the country will ever overcome the divisions that led to the 1999-2003 violence.
“Ethnic and wantok loyalties will never disappear, but they can be held in check by a national elite that is loyal to a larger concept of nation. At the moment, I don’t see any dynamic that would lead the country in this direction.”
Few people were willing to admit to actively thinking about an exit strategy or are able to contemplate even a rough date for termination of the mission and handing back the currently shared state functions.
“RAMSI is thus operating under rather fictional premises, namely that at some point the country’s capacity will improve across the board to the point that RAMSI can be withdrawn.”
Professor Fukuyama argues that the region needed to give up the idea that RAMSI was a crisis response and should move to sharing sovereignty over the state and keeping the current monopoly it has on lethal use of force.
While RAMSI had dealt with the immediate issues, “there is no dynamic process that that will permit RAMSI to wind down at least a residual security role any time in the foreseeable future”
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Fuel price increase squeezes transport sector
Throughout the country goods and services cost more, thanks to the increase in the global fuel price, which is being passed on to businesses and consumers, according to the Bank of Papua New Guinea. In 2007, the fuel price per litre was around K2 (US$0.72) compared with K5 ($1.82) now.
Many remote communities in Papua New Guinea are not accessible by road so air service is vital to their local economies. However, some small airlines, including Madang-based Airlink, have cut back or ceased operations because of higher fuel costs. National flag carrier Air Niugini continues to increase fuel surcharges because of the high cost of aviation fuel.
In Bougainville, an autonomous island which is still an integral part of Papua New Guinea, taxis charge K100 ($36.45) for a three-hour ride to and from mainland Bougainville to Buka Island and another K2 ($0.72) just to make a three-minute crossing by boat to and from Buka Island. The whole trip used to cost only K20 ($7.00), a price that was quite affordable for a worker who earns an average of K300 ($100) a fortnight. The price increases really hurt, workers say.
One vehicle owner, Francis Baru, said, “We sympathise with passengers travelling in our vehicles but at the same time we also need to make enough money to repay our loans and look after our families.
“If fuel prices continue to rise,” he said, “we will be forced to pass on these additional costs to our passengers, but we hope they will fall … that will be really good for all of us,” Baru said.
In Manus, an island province north of Port Moresby, the capital, fares are even higher as people are dependent on boats, which are particularly costly to run.
Linus Pokanau, a fisherman and boat owner from Manus Island, said the price of zoom (petrol mixed with oil) was the most expensive and many boats now were anchored as fishermen could not afford the fuel.
Thomas Abe, chief executive officer for a consumer watchdog group, Independent Consumer and Competition Commission (ICCC), expects fuel prices to continue rising due to global demand. The ICCC regulates the pricing formulae of petroleum products in the country.
Even though Papua New Guinea is a crude-oil producing country, once the oil is refined by InterOil, a Canadian petroleum company, consumers pay a rate closely pegged to the world rate.
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Mining, Puka Temu, in June announced that the government would start subsidising fuel prices on 1 September 2008, by reducing the excise duties on fuel products, which would cut the prices of petroleum products significantly.
“Eliminating the excise tax on zoom will be of particular assistance to those that use small boats for transportation and for fishing in rural areas,” he said.
“Reducing the excise on diesel will also help PMV [taxi] drivers, transport companies and those who run power generators, while reducing excise on petrol will help all those drivers who dread having to fill up at the petrol station. This government says it is working with key stakeholders to see if there are other ways that the price of fuel at the pump can be minimized,” Temu said.
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