Comments

Agree with you, Thomas.

Thanks Mathew!

I worked with Tony on Lowering the Threshold in the 1990s. one of the most influential and wisest people that I met in over 40 years in the Pacific. Tony's work will leave a mark for many years to come.

Very sad to read of John Waiko’s passing. Thanks Keith Jackson for this beautifully researched and written tribute. In the 1970’s, at UPNG History Faculty we were following John's progress, excited by his PhD and looked forward to his return. Wonderful to read of how it all turned out: John Waiko’s extraordinary legacy in film and politics as well as details of his books and their contribution. Vale John Waiko.

@Stephen Howes, could you kindly advise when the first group of successful applicants who have met all requirements will travel to Australia? I am asking because employers who made job offers are expecting these awardees to commence employment promptly. Therefore, it would be ideal if individual applicants are assessed as soon as all documents are submitted, and their visas processed quickly.

Good article Kingtau. It is not rocket science to learn what you pointed out. It needs visionary leaders to drive the change. However, we can from Malaysia if we are to progress economically, socially and physically. Your article is much appreciated.

Matt Withers and Sophia Kagan assert that the freedom for PALM workers to change their employer is a human right and therefore is not an option. In other words, they claim that the freedom to change employers is an absolute human right, enforceable regardless of the circumstances or context. But this is not the case. As the Australian Human Rights Commission notes ‘most civil and political rights are not absolute’. The same also applies to social and economic rights which are aspirational rather than enforceable. As we know, the right to free speech does not include the right to cry fire in a crowded, enclosed space at the first sign of smoke. The public good dictates that a more measured response is needed to minimise the harm caused to others. So also with PALM workers who are mostly employed as a group. For an individual worker to respond to the first sign of smoke (or problem) in the workplace exercising an ‘exit’ option rather than ‘voice’ is highly likely to affect the other workers in the same workplace. This affect could include creating a panic response by other workers to also leave rather than work through the problem. The exit option by a worker or workers would also be likely to undermine the ongoing employment of other workers. This was the case during the extreme worker shortages under Covid-19. Rogue labour contractors enticed some workers to leave their approved employer by offers of cash in-hand wages and lower cost accommodation. This created a greatly increased work burden on the workers who wanted to stay with their existing employer. It also exposed the workers who left their employer to manipulation by these rogue contractors, such as withholding their passports. How a worker defines what is unfair treatment will vary widely. It can range from a minor issue that can be resolved quickly through a mediator to a major issue that cannot be resolved easily. Also crucial is how quickly a worker decides when the matter of concern cannot be resolved at the workplace. There are mechanisms in place to respond where a problem has occurred, involving welfare officers provided by employers, and the country liaison officers. Also available to respond to worker concerns are those providing worker support through the network operated by PALM scheme Community Connections program managed by the Salvation Army. The program involves local community members from the New South Wales Council for Pacific Communities, Pacific Island Council of Queensland and Uniting Church of Australia in Victoria and Tasmania. If the matter cannot be resolved at the workplace level, the approved employer, who may be a grower or a labour hire operator, can be asked by the authorities to allow the worker to change to another approved employer. Withers and Kagan recommend that workers wanting to change employers should be able to join a recruitment pool for PALM workers already in-country who are looking to change employers. However, if workers are not willing to use existing support mechanisms in their workplace, are they going to put their name on a public list? If they do, will employers be willing to hire these workers from that list. Withers and Kagan also claim a precedent exists for short-term seasonal workers in the UK to have the ability to change employers provided they are still have the same immigration sponsor. This is similar to the situation in Australia. Most seasonal workers are employed by a labour hire operator who is their approved employer and official sponsor for immigration purposes. This means they are not tied to a specific workplace and can move, with the approval of their labour hire employer. It is very much in the labour hire firm’s interest to do so because the investment they already have made in time and effort to ensure the worker is productively employed.

Excellent observations, Kingtau. While PNG shares similar fundamentals with Malaysia, such as collective culture, or being sensitive to social hierarchy, etc... we used these wrongly, I would think. We used our collective culture to reinforce or normalise things that are not serving our collective good - like corruption, or hatred towards a foreigner evading taxes disguising xenophobia, while we ignore our own big men misusing tax revenues. We also respect those in power even if they're abusing that power. If only we understood the power of group thinking and aligned it in the right trajectory, we could have been somewhere ahead already.

Great comparative analysis! It is interesting to see value of the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index for PNG to be below the one for Malaysia in 1997. I am wondering what were the underlying factors and if some lessons from the past could still be relevant today.

It would be better if we can create a talk back show and get every young ones to talk about what they're really facing today in their everyday lives. Let them speak up for themselves, the people in the parliament won't come out to the public and start interviewing youngsters on the street. Or else, make awareness throughout the whole nation instead of Port Moresby alone. Think about the next generation and what could possibly happen if we don't step out of our comfort zones and start acting for others.

How to register for seasonal work and does it need a specific experience? I would love to work even though I have not much experience, only the one for the village life where I grew up doing all the farm work on my grandparents' farm.

In my experience this article succinctly captures an elephant, or should that be a veritable herd of elephants in the room of the public service that is either overlooked, ignored or missed completely? Often something that on paper appears to be a straightforward to implement becomes irretrievably mired in “politics”. Not politics in the accepted sense but rather as Mark has described it. An impenetrable wall of silence, polite obfuscation or “mi no savi” that is part of what Professor Severus Snape would probably have described as the workings of the dark arts. The flow on effect is most deeply felt at the community level. The manifestations of clientelism go a long way towards explaining why drugs are not delivered to a particular area, why a teacher who abandoned a school years ago and returned to their home province still remains on the payroll even though the school is no longer operating. The machinations are endless. If you ask at the community level something is generally muttered about “O, em blo gavman tasol.” A polite passing of the issue back the one entity almost nobody trusts. If you ask at district or the provincial office, the query is either met with blank looks or is passed off as a matter for someone else, who if they can ever be found will tell you there is no money for that. Everybody has their excuse, their long-practiced alibi. The point being, communities, the bottom feeders in the service delivery food chain are not empowered to drive the kind of change that might make a difference. In a clientelist environment power vests with government actors who remain unaccountable to the people they are supposed to represent. In practice the majority of public servants do not represent or act in the best interests of communities. Indeed, given the workings of clientelism, they might jeopardise their positions if they did. And the people at the bottom of the food chain know this implicitly. It should therefore not be a surprise that women die in childbirth in horrendous numbers and youth, many of whom have access to social media but not an education that leads to a meaningful job are rebelling in greater numbers and in ever more concerning ways as time passes. This is where I take issue with models of development that do not recognise that in such a hugely diverse society, a country that was cobbled together to suit its colonial overlords over a century ago, where hyper regionalism and clientelism prevail, the Westminster system of public service, "without fear or favour and in the best interests of the common good" and all that are just a line in a manual. As a keen observer of PNG for four decades I believe time has run out for a development approach that while undoubtedly well-meant, has in practice left ninety percent of the population without the tools to lift themselves out of the dire situations they now find themselves in. I believe Mark’s analysis has thrown down a gauntlet to those who live by a Canberra facing model with no pathway to empower the target population that desperately craves change. We have GEDSI and MERLA but what do we have for ten million rural folks who live by patronage in ten thousand clientelist mini states. Where are the culturally appropriate approaches to mobilise their own talent to facilitate the basic services and economic development they can manage in a sustainable manner? A layer of activities that directly addresses and meets the needs of women and girls and gives youth greater agency over the outcomes they desire. Activities to supplement and extend the reach of government but not detract from it while it in turn gets its house in order. Until and unless we as the nations largest donor partner understand the elephants lounging around in plain sight, the ones we have long chosen to ignore and adjust our focus to directly facilitate community empowerment, expect the unexpected.