Winning over minds and hearts!

J. Roughan

12 January 2010

Honiara

 

Our Social Unrest years--1998-2003--seem a long time ago in the minds of some people. So much of what happened, they say, happened in the last century. We now live in a new century, in fact, a week ago we finished the first decade of this new century. Let's focus our minds on the future, they caution. Basically, forget about the past, the years to come need our insights, work and attention! Let's move on!

 

Although such thinking does have some merit, many of those hurt, traumatized and pained of that time are of another mind. They are the ones who currently drive the Ministry of National Unity, Reconciliation and Peace to address the pain, suffering and disappointment they experienced during those awful years.

 

Not only do a crippled and hurt people of that period thirst for justice, they seek to have their pain and suffering acknowledged. Losing a loved one suddenly through sickness or accident is always hard to take. But when such a disastrous event happens right in front of one's eyes, the guilty one is known--a friend, an acquaintance, even a relative--and government authority doesn't seem to care, this makes it more than likely  these serious painful incidents will be repeated once again.

 

Of course many people who currently walk today's villages and town streets have their own explanation why parts of the Solomons went so badly off the social rails during that 5 year period of murder, rape, arson, beatings, humiliation, etc. Growing levels of poverty, poor development patterns, terrible leadership, corruption and not the least, the land issue go a long way in explaining why we suffered the social unrest period. Once the Ministry of National Unity begins to publicly listen to people's testimony, however, many of these very same reasons will certainly rise and help explain to the people of this nation why, after 20 years of relative peace, our beloved country exploded into chaos.

 

But if we cast your minds back to our earliest days, the period immediately after independence, 1978-1986, another more profound reason begins to emerge. Our first eight years of local government were ones of great hope and promise. Finally after 85 years of colonial government, our own people now held the reigns of power. Solomon Islanders to a person headed up government as Prime Minister, ministers of the crown and each and every ministry was directed by Solomon Islanders all.

 

At long last the nation had accomplished a rare feat, complete inclusion! Each island group, men, women, youth, all ranks of people were now actively included in the political life of the country. The nation was experiencing, it seemed, a country where there were no such thing as an outside group except those who were indeed born outside the nation. Of course most people easily allowed that certain groups in society because of education, training and skill were there to lead but no one was actively excluded.  

 

Then things began to slowly change in the 1987-1998 period when round tree logging became the rage. During our first eight years of national history, as difficult and as expensive as it was, there was an active desire to bring education chances, medical attention and infrastructure building to the bulk of people. It was a slow business! Our leaders and not a few of our village chiefs thought they could speed up the whole  development process by selling off their tree wealth to wealthy logging firms, pocket all this easy money and voila, the nation would achieve development. On the national scene, however, it became clear that only those groups--those with accessible timber areas--were more important than those where timber was much difficult to harvest. It soon became clear, for instance, that Guale's Weather Coast which had always been a hard place to get to was becoming much more off the map of government's political concern.  

 

Of course things didn't go that way! Rather the easy, fast money not only turned the forest lands of good, abundant, clean water and rich soil to a shadow of themselves. But the social breakdown in logging areas came on fast and furious: brother against brother, son against father and family fighting family was too often experienced.

 

Certain areas of the Solomons were being actively excluded in government's concern. Take for instance what SIDT's many Report Cards dating back to 1989 was measuring. Social reachout in the form of education, health attention and living standards were not strengthening but seriously  weakening for most people. The typical villager was slowly but surely being excluded from the Good Life. What had started the nation off on a strong footing of total inclusion was failing and descending into more and more exclusion. The further a villager was from an urban centre, for instance, the weaker was government's reachout to their ordinary way of life. Our Social Unrest years--1998-2003--became an extension of the elite's understanding of politics.

 

Our new parliament's main job then come June 2010 is Winning over minds and hearts! Money alone won't do it. A new type of political leadership is needed which will include the whole of the Solomons, leaving out no one!