[stop-imf] IMF/WB interference in PNG sparks riots

[Robert Weissman]

Sydney Morning Herald 27/06/01
Passions Will Be Hard To Cool
By Craig Skehan Foreign Affairs Correspondent

When blood is spilled in Papua New Guinea the unfortunate but usual course
is for anger to grow until more lives are claimed in retribution. So with
the police shooting student demonstrators in the dusty capital, Port
Moresby, tensions were last night escalating.

A danger is that strife will spread to other centres such as Lae and
Madang, on the northern coast, and the populous highlands. The government
buildings and private businesses in Port Moresby vandalised or looted,
some reduced to smouldering ruins, were reminiscent of rioting in early
1997 over the planned use of foreign mercenaries to fight secessionist
rebels on the island of Bougainville.

One of the hot spots yesterday was outside the capital's Murray Barracks,
which has a big shopping area nearby. In March a group of soldiers at the
barracks broke into an armoury and stole dozens of firearms.

A 10-day stand-off followed. Some of the rebels were reported in various
media outlets to have threatened to kill Australians.


At issue were proposed reforms, promoted by the Australian Government, to
streamline the country's armed forces, comprising about 4,000 personnel.
Fury erupted over widely circulated claims that the force would be cut in
half.

The PNG Government's general aim has been to restore morale - severely
damaged over the tragic Bougainville debacle - by developing a small but
better trained and armed military.

Nonetheless, the tensions within the military could complicate current
unrest related to other reforms - principally the privatising of
government telecommunications and electricity instrumentalities as well as
the government-owned bank, airline and authority responsible for ports
administration.

Trade unions claim that thousands of jobs would be lost under private
management. The unionists have struck an alliance with some prominent
student groups on both privatisation and the vexed issues of land reforms.

It is land that is perhaps the most volatile of the issues that have
rocked PNG in recent days. A key recommendation of international advisers
centres on freeing up land tenure provisions to facilitate development
projects. The World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and foreign
governments, including Australia, have cited an urgent need for
modernisation of the land ownership system.

Vocal critics say that registration of customary land - allowing it to be
sold or mortgaged - is a thinly veiled land grab by rich individuals and
companies.

The Prime Minister, Sir Mekere Morauta, regarded by a substantial
following of admirers as honest, hard-working and genuinely committed to
economic and structural reforms, believes his views on land ownership have
been maliciously misrepresented by political opponents trying to
appropriate power for themselves.

A central problem for him is that passions aroused will be extremely hard
to cool.

The use of riot police, brought from their base in the Highlands centre of
Mt Hagen, rather than stemming a blockade of the Prime Minister's offices,
sparked sporadic rampaging by thousands of people, many of them youths.

Reports that the protesters remained peaceful before the police moved in
with tear gas and weapons fire have acted as a catalyst for dissent.

Locals say that while Highlanders made up a large proportion of the crowds
that went on the warpath, the ethnic mix included coastal people. As well
as political activists driven by political grievances, there were many
opportunists interested in grabbing what they could from broken shop
windows.

In recent days groups of protesters - sometimes several hundred at a time
- have protested outside the Australian High Commission in Port Moresby, a
conspicuous multi-storey building near the national Parliament. There have
been chants of "rausim World Bank, rausim IMF, rausim Australia" (chase
out their official representatives).

The Australian Government has lent high-profile endorsement to the
privatisation push demanded by the World Bank and the IMF. The two
international institutions have demanded progress towards privatising
government-owned bodies such as Air Niugini and the Papua New Guinea
Banking Corporation before they will provide a further $US210 million
($407 million) in restructuring loans.

Sir Mekere maintains that he will only undertake reforms he considers to
be to the country's benefit, and denies that he is a captive of outside
forces.

An Australian Department of Foreign Affairs Department spokeswoman said
yesterday that the Howard Government believed that key privatisation and
other reforms were "absolutely necessary" for PNG.

Australia wants to be seen as supporting Sir Mekere, rather than acting as
a deputy sheriff for the World Bank and the IMF. The danger, though, is
that those who fear they will be adversely impacted will not draw such
distinctions and that resentment will be directed generally against
Australians.