Png guns control summit day 1: unofficial notes

proceedings start with a prayer from a pastor. I overhear him getting politely warned before he begins: “It should be an appropriate prayer and an appropriate text. Remember who will be here and why we’re here...” He sweats a little up on stage.
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Singirok: wears polished shoes the colour of toffee apples. Is short and compact, and not the most charismatic public speaker, but is accorded an impressive level of respect from everyone. Still not sure whether he’s a goodie or a baddie – probably both, he’s no different to the others – but I am smitten with the cultural mythology around him. And he says “g’day” to me!
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A pile of guns is spread out on the stage (have photos but not on me tonight; will post some this week: nice egs of some homemade things, carved wood and pipes – heavy and you’d be lucky it didn’t explode in your hands when you tried to fire it. But also some fierce looking imports, terminator-style). These are from the Goroka police stash, which means they’re probably outmoded: people turn in/get rid of/lose their guns when they get hold of more powerful ones. So those homemade types would be the first to go, replaced by something bought by the police, say.

A big stir is caused by a report from Philip Alpers* about the Southern Highlands (a landlocked province, so tracking gun movement in and out of there opens up gun movements nationally). There is no evidence that guns are smuggled into the country – contrary to what politicians, police and the defence force claim. The most common guns you find are SLRs (self-loading rifles; Australian made) and M16s (American) – both from the PNG defence force stocks (serial numbers also match them there).

More: most of the high-powered guns are deployed by people running in elections, sitting MPs, and their supporters: to impress and intimidate. An August 2004 audit of PNGDF small arms that revealed 16% were unaccounted for; after this, apparently, the Office of the Minister of Defence ordered that this audit be revised.

(will this be publicised? The chief editor of one of the daily newspapers is on the gun control board; he’s published several front pages on the border issue. He’s here in the front row.)

(there’s a lot more: http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/publications/special.htm)
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After Alpers there’s a panel of government security high fliers. And they are all spinning from what has just been heard. The Defence Force Commander (Peter Ilau) is furious, so much so that he becomes incoherent. “Don’t let history influence the way you lead” he rails, whatever this means. On the firearms audit, he threatens: “That was a leak and I am going to find out who is responsible and hold them accountable. That is not public information!”. You worry about the fall out; he is raving mad. “Cause and effect does not equal time and space!” he shouts. It’s so good he shouts it again.

The other responses aren’t so crazy, but they still insist on pushing the border protection line. It’s worrying: the whole point of this summit is surely about internal security, but none of the govt security agencies look willing to talk about it – let alone do something about it. Aside from border control, the other big theme is whinging about Waigani and failures in leadership. (Somare isn’t named, but he isn’t popular.) A round of applause is almost guaranteed if you say “Waigani runs the country by remote control!”. It’s easy to forget that so many of the people in the room are the leaders.

Although the majority of speeches have been like rally cries or preaching, there were some good talkers who were punchy and specific. Enough to make it an interesting day.


*A mate tells me Alpers used to be a journo on New Zealand tv, a “Current Affair”-type program called ‘a fair go’ (what a name). Now he’s a doctor and associated with U of Syd; far more respectable…