Tingting Blo Mi

Learn to unpackage CODE words!

2011-04-06T14:09:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

6 April 2011

Honiara

Every language in the world uses CODE words. These are words which have more than one meaning. On one level, the meaning of a word is clear but it may carry other meanings. For instance, when I first arrived in the Solomons, people would might say that someone was a trouble maker. In my mind such a word meant what it said; the person labelled a trouble maker was making life difficult for people in the community. . . gossiping, showing public anger, fighting, etc. It did not cross my mind that this was really a CODE word, a shorthand way of saying that the person was sexually active and causing trouble among people sexually.

Political life is also filled with CODE words .It would be most useful for citizens to unpackage these words to make sure all of us--politicians as well as the ordinary citizen--mean the same thing when we use them. No good that our servants, the Members of Parliament, mean something different when they speak in Parliament and what we the citizens of the country think they mean.

Take for instnace the word Budget. Over the last three weeks and probably for another two weeks more, Parliamentarians will discuss the Budget, a vital document which determines where and how the nation's money will be spent. Perhaps it would be worth while to once and a while rather than referring to this vital document as a Budget, it be called the people's money!

Once the Budget word is unpacked and opened up to its fuller meaning, then Solomon Islands citizens begin to realize how important the Budget debate is for the whole nation and for their own lives. Thus, the current Parliamentary discussion on the 2011-2012 $2.2 Billion is all about your and my money, not some financial numbers belonging to someone else. Citizens become extra watchful when someone other than themselves talk about and debate how their money will be used.

But there are other words, too often left unpackaged, which would do well if the whole nation takes the time and effort of looking inside the word and see what they find there. A favorite word of our political leaders is development. It's so used these days that it's basically lost its real meaning. Suppose rather than using the word development one would substitute the word people's well being. So that everytime a citizen hears the word development, it would be replaced by the words people's well being.

Forcing our political leadership and those running the government to use the well being word in their speeches and tok tok, then much of development discussion wouldn't make the grade. Can you imagine speaking of Casinos in terms of well being! However, when Casinos were first introduced into this country, a number of politicians spoke glowingly about them being some sort of development.

And of course the politician's favorite CODE word is rural development. Imagine if people of this nation insisted that the political elite drop using their favorite CODE word and start talking about villager well being instead. Priorities would begin to change! The services of quality education would happen, working and adequately staffed and resourced clinics would stand out, necesssary and repaired road infrastructure would be normal, etc. Service to people not things would be uppermost in the minds of decision makers.

But to accomplish this mind-set change, requires a recognition where the nation's strengths really reside. Of course a place like Honiara is necessary but far more important to the Solomons is the village which caters for more than 8 out of 10 of our people live their lives. As was written in this space two weeks ago, the rural numbers are going to remain pretty much unchanged for a long, long time to come. There is no head-long drive to live in the Solomons urban centres. No, the vast majority of our people still prefer to reside in the village and even though there is a slow drift to Honiara, for instance, our people still prefer their resource rich village life rather than any barren urban centre.

Part of people's preference to village living is the fact that that's where they get their daily kai kai, housing material, wood for their power needs, etc. So often when decision makers use the agriculture word they use it as a CODE word meaning cash crops--cocoa, oil palms, coconut, timber, etc. Rarely does it spell out the backbone of the country's major strength, gardening. Of course once gardening is thought of we are really speaking about women and their contribtuion to the nation's well being.

And that kind of thinking comes near to the actual reason why our decision makers, political elites and politicians prefer to use CODE words . . . to hide behind the reality that is Solomon Islands. The nation is made up of an equal and competent number of people called women. Until that basic reality is accepted then the nation will continue to limp, be prone to violence and lack drive. Unpackage words, see what they are saying underneath and begin to use better descriptions of reality to make sure our nation grows and prospers for all.

Parliament needs- to catch up!

2011-03-31T13:28:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

1 April 2011

Honiara

These past seven months, the months between the August national election until today, have not been light and sweet for the members of Parliament. Unfortunately, many of the missteps, difficulties and bad press have been of its own making. Members jumped from one side to another, from Government to the Opposition one week only to see the very same member jumping back to Government once again. Parliament's public image has taken a severe knock. People's respect and confidence in this institution has been badly shaken.

Describing Members conduct to 'grasshopping' presents a false reading as if all this political meandering was being done to show a clear direction or purpose. What it did do, however, was to show that some members did not have sure and clear principles except what would benefit them personnally. Their actions had little to do with the people of the constituency.

Now, somehow citizens of the nation are suppose to forget all about this unseemly conduct, somehow put it all aside and take this week's House's deliberations on the Budget as the real face of Parliament. That's a big ask!

With so many serious problems face the nation--deep and persistent youth unemployment rates, few Adult Education programs, difficulty of women's entry into Parliament, falling behind in the implementation of the Millennium Development Goals, round tree logging coming to an abrupt end, etc. etc.--the last thing the nation needed or wanted was to witness some Parliament members putting themselves first above national interest.

The present government--Philip's National Coalition of Rural Advancement--has basically wasted 7 months in office fighting off the Opposition and finding it difficult to create unity among its own members. Historically, at least in the period between 1978-2000 a new government enjoyed only 33 months on average in office before being ousted in a motion of no confidence.. It's gotten worse, in this the newest millennium--2000-2011--, a Prime Minister's time in office has fallen from 33 months to 19 months on average.

If this proves true to the present NCRA government, then, no matter how well thought out and ambitious its development plans are, it has at the best a year's grace before having to face a successful motion of no confidence. This reality is the country's basic political instablity. The Philip- led government, unfortunately, wasted its first 7 months in office with much in-fighting.

Now during the Budget debate Members must begin redeeming themselves in the eyes of people. Game playing, press statements and public antics rather than real leadership qualities only reflect the years gone by--the last century, for instance--and are a far cry from what our people need and demand.

Members, however, are in an excellent position to begin redeeming themselves this time around. Parliament is currently working through a $2.2 billion budget. The easiest thing to do would be to merely accept ways of spending such a whopping amount of money without seriously thinking about the impact it has for our future. Take the Growth Centre idea, for instance. The basic thrust of Growth Centres is to enhance people's knowledge, advance understanding and share local wisdom and insights.

A first step would be to set up a FM radio station in each constitunecy for the member to be in constant contact with his people, Closely following should be local research teams searching out the weaknesses and strengths of the constituency, shared out on the FM radio and through a monthly newsletter. Not far behind, Centres should be experimenting with better ways of using, storing and transporting local foods, profitable ways of harvesting timber and bush products, employing youth supervised by local experts in building leaf houses, trying out solar lighting, etc. etc.

Economics follows on a society's knowledge base. The cart doesns't come before the horse. When Japan became the second most powerful economy after the devasting destruction of World War II, it's knowledge base became the foundation of its economic miracle. There are no short cuts. Investment in Japan's economic miracle came when the outside world realized that although Japan had limited natural wealth--few minerals, no oil deposits--it did have a well educated, eager population. Isn't it about time that our own majority--the 83% rural population--have a bite of the apple and not limit growth to the urban centre which has so disappointed the nation?

Villagers latest message:"We're staying home!"!

2011-03-22T00:44:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
23 March 2011
Honiara

The Solomons latest Census--December 2009--could be published within the next month or so. This is an important public document, not only to help government plan future national growth and prepare the country for the next ten years or so but for Solomon Islanders themselves to know where the nation is headed and how to prepare for a future different from the one we now live in.

Yes, the 2009 Census confirms that our population numbers have passed the half million mark (510,000) and also reconfirms how many or our citizens have decided to live in a growing Honiara city and our many provincial towns. But it also reminds us how many people have not moved to the Solomons urban sector but prefer living their lives at village level.

In the 1976 Census, for instance, our urban population had reached 12% and we were informed by experts of the day to expect that by the turn of the century, only 24 years away at that time, almost 1/3 of our people would have left village life to take up residence in Honiara, Auki, Kira Kira, Buala, etc. etc. The migraton from rural areas to the urban was unstoppable and happening all over the globe. Every nation was undergoing the same shift from rural to urban. Some nations, like China, were set to have in the 21st century a dozen or so mega-cities with more than 10 million people. Suva, for example, is already home to more than 1/2 of Fiji's population and still growning. How would the Solomons be any different!

Yet, our rural people were sending the nation but especailly government officials a different message! In 1989, the next Census already showed a slowing down of Solomon Islanders heading for town. In that Census only 16% of village people decided to take up residence in an urban setting. That meant a 4% increase of population in a 13 year period--1976-1989. The 1999 Census, moreover, confirmed that there definitely was a slowing down of people settng up urban residence when that Census showed a shift from village to town had been modest. Of course the Social Unrest period--1998-2003--made it difficult to secure an accurate count of what was happening nation-wide.

Hence the preliminary figures for the 2009 Census do not come as a complete surprise. It seems that rather than the urban numbers increasing like so many other nations currently experience worldwide, the percentage of our people leaving the rural area and those living in town has hardly moved. The 2009 Census shows that the urban population has gained only 1% over a ten year period to reach 17% for the whole of the Solomons. Here's a brief table to clarify the issue:

                                                        SOLOMON ISLANDS URBAN POPULATION GROWTH.
                                                                                              (1976 - 2009)

                                                                            CENSUS                       % INCREASE

                                                                              1976                             12%
                                                                              1989                             16%
                                                                              1999                             16%
                                                                               2009                            17%

These urban Census figures cover a 33 year period--1976-2009--of national history and are unlikely to change much over the next ten years or so. These numbers mean that the vast majority--currently 83%--of our people continue to vote with their feet to remain solidly village bound, are quietly resisting the lights of town life and yet seek to be served with better education opportunities, adequate medical assistance and a modest portion of the national investment.

Yes, the Solomon's urban sector continues to grow (but at a much slower rate than previously predicted), more people have chosen to live city life but the best meaning of these figures is that most people are determined to stay close to their village resource base which guarantees a place to grow sufficient food and insures protection, security and peacefulness in their daily lives.

:Politicians of all stripes, both at national and provincial levels, have their work carved out for them. Unfortunately, as SIDT's nine Report Cards dating back to the Mamaloni era in 1989 have shown government after government have had terrible track records in assisting people in accessing life's basics. Perhaps if our political leaders became more interested in their people's daily lives, then when election time does roll around the Member's 50% failure rate at the polls could begin to change to something more positive.

Jobs, Jobs and more Jobs! But what kind of jobs?

2011-03-15T11:49:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

16 March 2011

Honiara

Government leaders in countries like Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, etc. are currently kicking themselves for not acting well and strongly over these past few years. Their youth, especially those who have been out of meaningful employment for years now, have taken to the streets, are rebelling and actually destroying the old government structures. Within a twinkling of an eye, these so-called poor, frightened and powerless young people have ousted national leaders many of whom have dominated the political scene for more than 30 and 40 years.

Other nations in the Middle-East--Suadi Arabia, Yemen--as well as those further afield--China, Zimbabwe--are pushing their own panic buttons. Yes, local corruption, growing poverty levels and mis-rule have contributed to the weaknesses of these countries governing systems but at the core, youth's lack of sufficient and proper job opportunities, lie at the heart of their troubles.

Our own young people are also feeling the pain. They have spent years in the classroom, some have already gained an undergraduate degree, but meaningful paid employment escapes them. It's a cruel joke to offer them work which asks them to swing a bush knife, pick up paper and plastics and stuff the rubbish into old copra sacks. It's not that this kind of work is beneath them but an insult to their training, years of study and hard work. They can swing a bush knife as well as any one, clean Honiara's streets and roads but a youth doesn't need a degree or a Form 7 certificate to perform such tasks.

The face of today's youth job market must be the kind that can pull the nation out of its deep information/education poverty gap. For instance, although the last two national governments spoke glowingly and had public signings of villagers allowing their precious land holdings to be converted into palm oil plantings or opening up new overseas shipping ports, nothing has gotten off the ground. Of course land disputes are part of the problem but Olos Adult Education classes, for instance, where these issues should be discussed, argued over and worked on are simply non-existent.

I go back to my 1980 days when SIDT began operating throughout many of the nation's provinces. For almost 30 years now, SIDT's emphasis has been to "Strengthen the quality of village living" which called for 230 part-time village animators who conducted hundreds of village level "Development Education" workshops, 13 full time provincil coordinators, 14 office staff who published bi-monthly LINK magazines, featured two touring theatre teams (one for men and another for women), ran an Eco-forestry team and finally an admin group which ran the organization.

Some of these workers have been with the orgnization for more than 20 years, extending SIDT's original work patterns and creating new ones like Radio Reachout, Restorative Justice Programs and others. The point in all this is to show a way where new, exciting and fulfilling work, jobs and employment opportunities can root.

With the present government's acceptance of the Growth Centre idea (Not economic Growth Centres, please! That's something else!) in many constitutencies with an emphasis on becoming communication hubs,.services locales, research teams base and FM radio broadcast spot then these information/education realities would attract investments. They would also become powerful magnets for youth's need for new and an expanding job market. Investments follow the information/education pattern!

Growth Centres, as was SIDT's experience, act as job creators and most importantly, such jobs would not be found in urban centres but in rural areas where more than 80% people currently live. A distinct strength of rural job creation over ones created in the urban area is that part-time employment becomes a real option. The SIDT experience employed many part time workers because living in one's home village meant no monthly rents, the use of local foods, no water, power or transport bills on pay day. Although a village-based SIDT worker earned about $150 monthly, at the end of the month, he/she had almost the entire pay packet as disposable income. The urban cousin, on the other hand, earning more than $500 monthly, found that far less of his pay packet belonged to him/her since rent, electricity, water, food and transport expenses ate into the monthly income. In reality, then, the urban worker could count $100 of his $500 monthly salary as disposable income.

For social stability, youth must find worthwhile work in today's world. The Middle-East nations are learning this basic lesson the hard way. Our own nation need not go down that path if the present government remains true to the Growth Centre concept and places communication/ education with the highest priority. Failure to do so or to count on grass cutting, rubbish removal and clean up work as the best and only job for our educated youth will work against our national interests.

RAMSI in photos! Only half the story?

2011-03-09T10:37:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan
9 March 2011
Honiara

Honiara's newest highrise--the mid-town Hyundai Building--currently hosts a great photo history of the RAMSI presence in Solomons from its earliest days in country. A couple of hundred pictures detail RAMSI's history from its initial arrival at Henderson Airport in mid-2003 to the present day. No matter what you may think of this intervention force, this picture-history makes for a worthwhile addition to national understanding of recent major historical events.

Historians, social scientists and Pacific Islands experts from different universities have flocked to our shores for a closer view of what actually happened here durng our Social Unrest period (1998-2003) and the RAMSI event (2003-2011). They have given themselves the task of more fully understanding why the RAMSI intervention event had been necessary to help not only Solomon Islanders grasp its full meaning but to learn what the intervention did right and what could have been done better.

The world's new millennium, not yet a dozen years old, has had more than its fair share of military interverventions. Three months earlfier, for instance--March 2003--just before RAMSI landed in the Solomons, America, Britian, France and other nations intervened in Iraq. In 2001, Afghanistan suffered its turn for military intervention. Currently, Libya with its Colonel Gaddafi, looks more and more likely to become a candidate for military intervention as well.

Scholars focusing on the Solomons RAMSI intervention eagerly search out what lessons could be gleaned from what happened in this neck of the woods to make other interventions more productive and peaceful and much less destructive. Over this 8 year period, then, only a single RAMSI soldier was killed in the line of duty. Yes, the RAMSI force suffered a few additional accidents but the outcome of a two-thousand military, police and admin presence, working in a strange and foreign context, has been so remarkably peaceful, one could say, tranquil. Where else in the world over the past hundred years has such an outcome been achieved?

And this question highlights the second part of the title of this essay: Only half the story? Are RAMSI's truly great accomplishments--quickly bringing peace back to troubled parts of the nation, rounding up, bringing to court and jailing many criminal militants, re-setting government's ability to once again function, getting the national economy back on track, etc. etc.--the fruit of the intervention force alone? Or have there been other forces, quite silent ones, working in the background which were as vital and critical to the very success of the whole RAMSI operation?

I speak of the typical Solomon Islands villager, the nation's silent majority, who seems to have been overlooked in the RAMSI photo history. Of course there are many photos of islanders in the picture-history but they are often portrayed as interested by-standers, as outsiders applauding the positive outcomes of the foreign presence. Factually the nation's Social Unrest period was basically confined to Honiara, Guale's Weather Coast, the Marau area, parts of North Malaita and one or two places in Western Province. Fortunately 95%+ of the Solomons were not involved with the disturbances of the Social Unrest period.

It was, however, the nation's little people who kept the country glued together, functioning and caring for the women, children, sick and Olos at the village level. For five years--1998-2003--village people with little help from central authority and less from a compromised police force kept villagers, who make up more than 80% of the population, fed, housed and protected.

These very same people too had suffered the pains of over a twenty-year period, poor political leadership patterns, inept delivery of basic services of education, health services and infrastructure work, growing poverty levels, rampant corruption, etc. etc. but they never took up arms, killed people different from themselves and caused the nation to fly off its social rails.

For every unrest and social dislocation that was found in Guale, Malaita and Western Provinces, these were more than matched by other the Solomons provinces of Temotu, Makira, Central, Isabel, Choiseul where little or no unrest rooted. RAMSI, in fact, didn't set a foot in these other provinces until more than a year had gone by since its landing.

I'm the first one to say that RAMSI has been a blessing to the Solomons. I make the point, however, that this great success depended a great deal upon the common sense, backing and cooperation of the 'silent majority'--the Solomons Villger. Yet, these have yet to be thanked much less duly rewarded with better political leadership and a stronger functioning state. The RAMSI photo history should at least recognize the place the Solomons small people played in keeping this nation alive.

MDGs are everyone's business!

2011-03-02T11:33:00.002-08:00

J. Roughan

3 March 2011

Honiara

At the beginning of our brand new century, Solomon Islands as well as many other nations across the world vowed to do something clear, precise and do-able to reduce poverty, address major health issues and, in general, help the small people of the world become healthier and to live better and longer lives. In other words, produce a fairer world for all!

The 8 Millennium Development Goals (MDG), as they came to be known, were worked on by world leaders to reduce severe pockets of poverty, to help the weakest members of society to a better life and to produce a fairer world. These goals were carefully crafted so that the poorest nation in the world could achieve many of these goals within a context of each individual country..

And what makes the MDGs especially powerful is that each and every nation promised to do these great things by 2015 . . . five years from now. But this year--2011--is crunch year! Nation after nation is required to examine itself: How well have these 8 MDGs been achieved, how many are still do-able within the target date and how many are way off target?

In our own country, for instance, we are on target to achieve two goals--reduce infant/child mortality and improving maternal health. Six other goals are either in the 'worri worri' basket--underachievement in universal primary education, fighting malaria, AIDS and TB and reducing poverty. However, we are currently way off the mark when it comes to empowering women and protecting our environment.

We have less than 5 years to hit our targets! The next few years are critical! What the nation is saying: most of our people are being left behind, the lives of thousands of them are wasted and the health of the whold nation lies in balance. The rebellion in Near-East countries--Egypt, Lybia, Tunesia. etc.--cry out to the rest of the world: Either all lives must be built up or in the long run, no life is protected. Colonel Gaddafi is currently learning this painful lesson in his own country, Lybia..

Solomon Islands' government's track record for raising people's quality of life since 1989 has been poor. That is how long SIDT"s Report Cards have been measuring people's responses to the governments of the day. Over a 21 year period, then, government after government has proven themselves in capable of reaching out to the bulk of its people to produce quality education, adequate medical service, people's resource assistance and for people to earn modest amounts of money. These are all MDGs!

If the nation is to successfully achieve its MDGs' goal by 2015, then a new working model must be created. Government, on its own has proven incapable of pulling it off. It needs nelp--organized, nation-wide and commitment.

First of all the largest and best organized and long standing structure--the country's many Churches--must be involved in a far deeper and more sustained way than they have been in the past. Each of them have a deep vested interest in having their own people's lives bettered. Which group, then, would be more than interested to see the whole nation not only reach the MDGs goals but surpass them?

But all the good will in the world is simply not enough! The private sector--large businesses (the banking establishment, communications giants, major and minor wholesale and retail houses)--must be part of the mix as well. After all, all their profits and business success, depends upon the very people who are the MDG focus. Without these small people, then each and every Solomons business enterprise would be forced to close up shop and head for the exits.

According to a business' yearly turnover it should connect with a number of individual villages. A large business enterprise, for instance, should connect with two to three villages in each province while a smaller business house would connect with a single village in two provinces. This plan does not speak about sponsoring or financially supporting such villages but to enage with villagers to become more involved with the whole concept of what the MDGs are all about. These connections would be done through provincial authorities, churches themselves and the NGO sector.

Solomon Islands is a nation of villages! In past years and even in the present, the Solomons has been viewed as two nations: Honiara and a few provincial centres and the rest, about 85% of the population. This unfortunate state of affairs must cease for the good of all. Those with the most to loose must work at the forefront to change things for the better for the majority. If not, then the country will be known for its poverty rather than the Good Life.

Human rights security and peace!

2011-03-02T11:33:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

23 February 2011
Honiara

Near-East countries—Egypt, Bahrain, now Libya, etc.—to name but a few are currently in deep social and political turmoil. Governments, decades in power are being swept away overnight like so many dead leaves on a tree. Strong men, kings, Prime Ministers, dictators and whole government systems are feeling the awesome strength of People Power.

Machine guns, even the use of heave duty mortars, rockets and anti-aircraft guns are being used to quell their own people who only last month cowered in their homes in deep fear. Now thousands, not just young men but women, older people even children in parents' arms continue to come out on city streets. Nothing stops them until they see and feel a new political order in their country beginning to take root.

This new order represents a full flowering of basic Human Rights where all—peasant, villager, worker, business owner, politician, ruler, etc.—are all equal under the law. Where corruption, no matter at what level, is tackled head on, people voice out their frustrations without fear of prison, a safe life becomes the fundamental part of all levels of society and not just for the rich, famous and powerful.

All of these happenings began in mid-January this year. Of course the peoples' frustration, fear and poor lives were rooted in decades of discrimination and government contempt of Small People. What could these poor, ordinary people possibly do? They had become so used to repression, without any rights and powerless to act that the only option open to them was to keep a low profile, pray a lot and hope for the best.

But this faded overnight! One young Tunisian had had enough! All he was doing on a daily basis was to feed and care for his small family by earning a few cents selling fruits and vegetables at the local market. But he refused to pay a bribe to the local police. They confiscated his meagre garden produce and refused to give the vegetables and fruit back to him until he paid the bribe.

Rather than giving into their unjust demands, he burnt himself in a public square rather than continuing a life of salivary. That was 25 January 2011, less than a month ago! Since that time, however, ordinary people of the Near-East have exploded in rage. After years of repression, lack of basic Human Rights and living in deep poverty, they exploded on the streets of many capitals.

No one could have predicted that such a minor happening—a street vendor's refusal to pay a bribe—could have caused so much upheaval. Yes, had a head of state been assassinated, or a government toppled by an army of terrorists or some kind of a natural calamity hit the region, perhaps that would have been enough to trigger off a universal rebellion.

In hindsight, however, the continuous government refusal to honour people's fundamental and basic Human Rights for many years must now be added to those events which have the power to change the direction of history overnight. The question we in the Solomons must now ask ourselves is: Will the continuous disregard by authorities to people's basic rights trigger a revolt among our own people?

Like the Near-East countries now burning out of control many of their people's grievances—growing poverty levels, youth unemployment, corruption at society's highest levels, poor delivery of basic social services of education, health and infrastructure building, etc.—are alive and well here in our own islands. Twenty years of SIDT's survey work is proof enough that village people and the urban poor are dissatisfied with government non performance.

Are we building a big stick to beat ourselves with by refusing to listen to our people and to their just demands on human rights, security and therefore peace? The utter nonsense of parliamentarians hopping from one side of the House to the other leaves the nation gasping for breath. When will it stop? When will our leaders take their citizens seriously? Must the country explode like the Mid-East nations are doing right now before we come to our senses?

Forget the big 'D' word! Focus on The Basic Life

2011-03-02T11:29:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

10 February 2011

Honiara

Since our first tentative steps as a nation in 1978, there hasn't been a single political part which hasn't drummed up the idea that what the nation needs, in big doses of course, is development, development and more development. It has become the big 'D' word! Yet, year after year it's been emptied of any real meaning.

Anything, so long as it talks loud and long about money, is called development. Honiara's casinos which regularly suck out money from the poorest people's pockets is labelled 'development'. That is why I'm calling on public leaders, politicians and business people to stop using the word development for the next three to five years. What the nation needs is much less development but loads and loads of The Basic Life things for all.

First of all The Basic Life is about the majority of our people living their lives in peace, harmony and tranquillity in their everyday lives. If various levels of fighting, discontent or discord reign among our people or worse still a gun culture controls ordinary life, it's hard to speak about advancing people's life, without a strong presence of peace and harmony. Our recent Social Unrest history—1998-2003—gives a potent example of what happens when basic peace is absent.

But most recently The Basic Life's peace, harmony and tranquillity got a severe jolt. A major part of any kind of peacefulness depends upon the proper working of the police, court and prison systems. Tamper with any one of these vital three pillars of a well run society and watch peacefulness fly out the window.

This is what happened last month when a government minister, although properly sentenced by the courts to more than 2 years of prison, was then set free with only a 'slap on the wrist' by some other government body. A major pillar of society which underpins The Basic Life had been trashed. Our court system has been made to look powerless—one set of laws for most citizens but another kind of law for the 'high and mighty'!

The second part of The Good Life are governments fulfilling their work to supply basic human services—strong education patterns,, working medical facilities and infrastructure projects—which the vast majority of citizens need for their well being.

Yet, SIDT's 8 Report Cards, dating all the way back to 1989, regularly show how the small people of our country fail the governments of the day for falling down on the job of adequately providing citizens with quality education, strong medical attention and a minimum of infrastructure projects.

Malaita farmers, for example, are constantly begging government to repair damaged, water logged roads. Our one and only referral hospital in Honiara has four operating theatres but is limited to two of them which actually work. Recently the Government earmarked $24 million for overseas students education but not a penny is allocated for Adult Education. And the list goes on and on!

The third leg of The Good Life idea is the chance for ordinary people to gain modest amounts of cash through the sale of their market goods, copra, cocoa, timber, fish, etc. Fortunately, most of our people work hard to make a success of this part. Local shipping agents supply the boats, truck owners do much the same and there is a strong network of local farmers—read women—who regularly feed Honiara's 70,000 population on a daily basis. Locally owned and operated busses and taxis take care of the travel needs of town dwellers.

If these three pillars—peace, government supplying services and people securing modest amounts of money—are allowed to flourish for a few years, then the big 'D' word could start to be used once again. At present, however, the big 'D' word is at best a distraction and at worst a way of fooling people.

Egypt is telling us something!

2011-02-14T17:19:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

15 February 2011

Honiara.

Egypt's 80 million people have been shouting at us lately. Local TV, radio and newspapers are filled with their recent happenings. In fact that country is sending warning signals out to many others not only in the Arab part of the world but to many other nations as well.

Many nations—Yemen, Algeria, Tunisia, etc.—are seriously taking note of the Egyptian events and studying closely what it means for them and their leaders. If the mighty could fall and so quickly, what does that say to other nations, smaller and less oppressive.

Over the past three weeks, Egyptian youth startled the world. Basically, in non-violent ways—thousand-people marches, camping out in public spaces, chanting and singing—they have managed to topple a dictator of 40 years, send him and his family packing and put on notice that the high and mighty military as well, to follow its lead or face the same rejection.

All this political turmoil happened without a gun in sight, a bullet fired—at least not from the protestors but only from those desperate to hang on to power, privilege and wealth. The youth involvement showed People's Power at its best. Yes it was a close call. Certainly and definitely dangerous since people had no guarantee that the military wouldn't mow them down like so much grass. But their freedom and liberty was worth it and so they stared down the military and more importantly, the dictator and his cronies.

These youth, society's poor, had little hope of securing meaningful jobs although blessed with many years of education and in many cases much better than their parents ever had. The old Egyptian regime had grown brutal, even murderous. However, the one area where the youth were strongest—the use of the computer, Twitter, cell phone—were the tools they used to topple the Old Guard.

Many times those at the top of the political ladder—cabinet, parliamentarians, civil servants, lobbyists, the Old Guard-- can hardly make their way around the simplest of computer programs much less harness its power to enhance their everyday political lives.

Youth on the other hand pressed home their advantage. They organized marches, talked to each other over cell phones and kept messaging hundreds and hundreds of their followers on a minute by minute schedule. The Old Guard worked on the out dated theory that if the media was controlled and directed then those opposing the regime would find it hard to do anything meaningful against it.

How wrong they were! In less than a month, thousands and thousands of Egyptian youth had out foxed, out smarted and out flanked the powers of the state which the Old Guard thought was unbeatable.

But is the Egyptian scenario saying anything to us sitting in 'far away' Solomons? First of all we are not 'far away' at all! TV, radio and the print media bring local youth into the international picture quite quickly. Secondly, the Egyptian youth's situation—poor, unable to get jobs, representing society's largest sector, better educated than their parents—are currently duplicated here in these islands as well.

No, fortunately, the murderous, repressive regime housed in Cairo is far from anything here in the Solomons. However, our youth are terribly upset to be experiencing first-hand the non-governance antics of the present government and opposition. Many youth ask themselves: What can we be doing to get our nation out of this mess? Does the Egyptian event have lessons we too should be learning?

Is the no-confidence vote the only, it certainly is not the best way, of resolving our disagreements? Can't 25 level-headed, fair minded Parliamentarians be found to lead the nation out of its impasse, work together to better the country and lead the majority of its poor people to prosperity?

Solomons Society and Political Life

2011-02-03T05:58:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

2 February 2011

Honiara

Over the past 33 years of Solomons political history—1978-2011—the nation has experienced 14 changes in central government leadership. On average, then, during more than three decades of our nation's political history, the leadership changes have been occurring at a frightening rate. Buy lately the pace of instability has grown worse, not better!

In our first 22 years—1978-2000--, the rate of PM change, although unacceptable, was at a much slower pace: only 8 major leadership changes. But during this newest millennium the change-pace has picked up considerably. In the 2000-2010 period, for instance, the rate of a new leaders taking the reign of government has climbed to 6 but all of this happened during a much shorter time frame: eleven years.

This kind of major overhauling of our top leaders indicates severe instability in our government system. On average, then, during our first 22 years of political history, each PM and his cabinet served approximately 33 months running the country.

Now in the 2000-2010 period, only half the years of our initial period, we have witnessed six changes of the top leaders. A PM's time to run the country has dropped from 33 months to 19 on average. There is a distinct possibility that there could soon be another shift in the PM who currently leads the country.

While our political class 'fiddles while Rome burns', however, the rank and file of the nation, the backbone of the country, the villager, is filled with life and is hardly waiting for members of Parliament to get their act together.

Our current mobile phone revolution is an example. This silent revolution, not in their ring tones, of course, are seemingly everywhere—not merely with the town's elite and business class but in Honiara's many suburbs and hamlets, villagers in Are'are, Kwaio,, Makira highlands, Isabel coastal places, etc. etc.—has quietly been transforming the nation's communications scene.

It seems that having and using a mobile phone has become more important than food. If a choice must be made between 'topping up' the mobile or buying a packet of fish and chips, often the mobile wins out. Solomon Islanders' need to talk, to keep in touch, to be part of the 21^st Century. That is why the mobile phone business grows by leaps and bounds.

But the mobile phone revolution by the masses is but one aspect of a changing Solomons. Notice the number of students clamouring to enter universities and secondary schools. Their thirst for higher education is somewhat like the mobile phone revolution. People are not to be denied and will squeeze themselves in whenever and where ever possible.

I mention these two different major changes which currently shape the modern Solomons. Shouldn't our political class be thinking along this same line and get in step. Game playing, press statements and public antics rather than real leadership qualities reflect times gone by—the late 20^th Century—and are a far cry from what our people need and demand.

Just as in the Social Unrest years—1998-2003—it was the so-called uneducated, inexperienced and politically powerless—that kept the nation glued together in spite of the political elites poor performance. So too now we are having a re-run of People Power who look in dismay at our current leaders. Basically, it is our small people who are saying to our political leaders: 'Shape up or Ship out!

It's a two way street, gentlemen!

2011-01-27T19:09:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

27 January 2011

Honiara

Recently, the Solomon Islands Taxi Association proposed a serious hike in taxi rates . . . more than 40% above the present one of $7.00 per kilometre. SITA members are asking the travelling public to start paying $10 per kilometre at the beginning of February this year.

Certainly the rapid rise in fuel costs both petrol and diesel has forced taxi owners to review their cost structure and they feel the public must bear these new cost increases. However, it would be most re-assuring if other South Pacific nation's capital cities taxi costs were included in their discussions. How does Honiara compare to Port Vila, Suva, Moresby and other cities in taxi costs?

Is Honiara once again leading other Pacific cities as it does in the costs of telecommunications, electricity, water, etc. services? Fuel costs across the Pacific have gone up dramatically! Honiara is not alone in feeling the costs of higher transportation fuels. But have other taxi services across the Pacific asked their public to shoulder a more than 40% increase in one hit? Please, SITA do some basic homework, find out what other Pacific nations are paying and share the info with us.

But as important as the proposed rate hike is to the Taxi Association is, there are other areas of public concern which could be worked on and which would be a great help to Honiara's riding public. Let me share these concerns with you, how the Taxi Association could bring to the minds of the nine groups which are currently running the taxi service.

CLEANLINESS

Although most taxi drivers do their best to make their cabs clean both inside and out, there are just too many vehicles which are not passing the test. It certainly is heartening to see the many taxis lining up along the cemetery road, getting washed down and teams of women brushing and cleaning out the interior of these cabs. But this cleaning station, unfortunately, is too often the exception. An increase in basic taxi fares should also mean a cleaned up and neat inside and out of every taxi as well.

DRIVER DRESS CODE

The taxi itself well might look in mint condition—clean, shinny, neat—but if the driver is dressed more like a Hollywood extra for a pirate movie, what kind of a reception is that?. His headgear has all the trappings of a bright flag wrapped around the head, his shirt would well be advised to be introduced to hot water and soap while his trousers are in need of patches in a number of areas.

Perhaps we in Honiara have grown used to such 'pirate' dress but believe me the overseas visitor comes with different expectations. At Henderson Airport, for example, where more than 90% of people visiting the Solomons for the first time come into the country, visitors need to be reassured by taxi cab drivers who are carefully dressed and driving cabs which not only look respectable but are truly inviting.

SAFTEY CHECKS

Of course before a taxi is legally allowed to travel our roads, it must pass the safety requirements issued by government. It's system of checking on the good working order of breaks, tires, signal, etc. of any vehicle before allowing it to work our roads, needs help from the Taxi Association as well.

Road safety calls not only for safe cabs, but more importantly, the taxi drivers themselves must be screened as well. The raw ability to steer a car, work the gears and step on the break is not sufficient training for drivers who are allowed to pick up passengers and are expected to transport them from A to B safely.

It is here where the Taxi Association could play a pivotal part in making taxi travel not only pleasurable but most importantly, safe. If the proposed taxi fare increase could also guarantee a cleaner vehicle, neater driver but most importantly a more competent and careful driver, then the increase of fare would be more than worth it. It's a two way street: fare increase must also mean cleaner, neater and safer taxis trips.

A second coup?

2011-01-27T19:08:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

19 January 2011

Honiara

In June 2000 the nation suffered its first and until most recently its only coup. Misguided leaders of the time thought that by using the business end of guns, they could overnight right many long standing injustices, correct government shortcomings and gain a bit of loot for themselves on the side. Yes, that Civilian Coup certainly did achieve results, most of them destructive--dozens of Weather Coast killings, torture, house burnings, hundreds of displaced villagers, rapes, bitterness, etc. The Coup left the nation reeling in misery for the better part of 5 years.

In the minds of most of our people the Social Unrest years of 1998-2003 seemed to be on the way out and heading for a happy landing. RAMSI had been invited in and now into its 8th year of presence, it seemed that the idea of people taking the law into one's hands and doing things the 'bush way' was slowly on the way out. But, unfortunately, last week's events put a stop to such thinking!

Last week's shady and underhanded way of freeing a self confessed criminal--James Lusibaea--from a court ordered prison sentence must go down in the nation's short history as another kind of coup. The 2000 Coup had focused its attention on the elected government of the day. It forced the Ulufa'alu Government, for instance, to vacate office and the Coup Masters installed a new one, something more in tune with its understanding of how a 'proper' government should act.

Of course rarely do such results come about the way we plan them! What the Solomons actually received, however, was a destructive social situation as stated above--killings, unrest, burnings, etc. What then can we expect from this, the latest of Coups, this one against the nation's court, justice and prison systems. The Law of Unanticipated Consequences, much like happened after the 2000 coup, will now darken our future.

In the 2000 Civil Revolt, for instance, few Coup Leaders expected such dreadful consequences that occurred on Guadalcanal, parts of North Malaita, in the Western Province and a few other places. They were convinced that they would be able to contain most evil deeds because they alone had gun-power which they were ready to use. But once a group of poorly trained leaders think they know best, have guns at hand to enforce their plans but are not truly formed by time-tested principles of good behavior, then all kinds of unintended evil begin to root in society.

The recent Lusibaea Saga will bring about its own serious consequences. One of the first things that will hit us is the drying up of investment monies to the country. What international business house, corporation or individual won't be thinking twice about sinking serious money into a country where a small group of political elite play so loosely with court convicted criminals. Already many outside investors are running for the exits taking their monies to other shores where the return on investments is as good as here but where the Rule of Law actually operates for all in a fair and transparent way.

But of course the drying up of much needed investment monies will become the least difficulty because of this Justice and Prison Coup. What's far more serious, as actually happened in the 2000 Coup, are the social and community fall outs. The nation, some now believe, operates two kinds of justice. If a criminal doesn't agree with the way the present court system works, then he will get cronies to mount a campaign of intimidation, pressure weak politicians to bend to their will and have their man out on the streets once again. This can happen no matter how serious the crime committed.

If there are two criminal systems at work, the clever, well connected criminal, will opt for the easier way out. What criminal wants to spend years behind bars, deprived of freedom and live a strict life under supervision when with a bit of creativity freedom can be once again available.

We in the Solomons are fond of practicing the strange doctrine of 'charity to one at the injustice to the many'. Mr. Lusibaea's freedom has been bought at a huge cost--placing in danger the well being of our society. Just like the 2000 Coup, a few dozen leaders and their cronies had convinced themselves that their way would be best for all. When the dust of the 2000 Coup finally settled, it became crystal clear that the majority of our people had become worse off, dozens of them dying in the process, while only a handful of coup leaders ever faced the courts for their attempt to destroy the nation for their own greedy purposes.

Living on borrowed time!

2011-01-27T19:07:00.001-08:00

When a tsunami, cyclone or earthquake hits the country, there is little the nation can do until the event plays itself out on our shores. We can just hope for the best! Have we prepared ourselves and the community well enough--heading for higher pieces of land, stocking up on food, water and other necessities, planning for temporary shelter, etc. etc? In other words, many natural disasters can and must be prepared for. Leaving everything to the last minute is a recipe for a greater disaster.

J. Roughan

13 January 2011

Honiara

However, there are some disasters which are rarely forecasted on the radio or written about in newspapers. These are what we can call the 'silent disasters' which have a habit of sneaking up on us and literally killing many in a community. One such disaster has already claimed dozens and dozens of lives PNG and in this new year has already sickened almost 300 sick people in Port Moresby. It has an excellent chance of hitting us here as well. It's the cholera epidemic!

In Haiti, for instance, more than 3,000 people have already died from the cholera epidemic which hit that poor island after the devastating earthquakes of January 2010. Its an epidemic that is far from over and the country is bracing itself for many more of its citizens to die. PNG recently received a helping hand from mainland China with a gift of several hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight this disease.

Cholera, a highly infectious disease features watery diarrhea, vomiting and cramps which can lead to death within hours especially among young children. One of the best preparations against this kind of disaster getting a foothold in groups of people is plenty of clean water, proper sanitation and taking care of solid waste. These are the very things that Honiara and most villages are in terribly short supply.

Honiara's new city council's top priority is to increase the salaries of its workers. That is a solid idea since many of Honiara's longest serving workers find themselves at the bottom end when it comes to monthly salaries. But not far from that payment priority must be doing something about the city's poor public health track record over the past ten years. Truly Honiara's citizens 'live on borrowed time'!

Anyone staying in town has a first hand knowledge of the shocking state of our water supply. Add to that serious health condition is the fact that the Solomons only city does not have a single public toilet, its record on collecting rubbish from its 70,000 inhabitants has been dismal and its handling of solid waste leaves much to be desired. Each of these serious problems acts as an open invitation to the cholera disease to take hold and produce a lethal epidemic which would certainly overpower No. 9's ability to stop it.

Currently we are sitting in the midst of a 'silent disaster' which could hit us at any moment. Cyclones, floods, earthquakes, etc. are beyond our power to stop. All we can do is make the damage they will cause a bit less by proper preparation. But a disaster like cholera is some thing quite different. We can actually stop this disease in its tracks, before it has a chance to take hold, not by hoping for miracles, but by strengthening the basics of ordinary city life: insure a clean, abundant water supply, pick up people's rubbish on a daily basis and take care of the city's solid waste..

But one of the greatest defenses against a killer disease like cholera, however, has been totally forgotten by Honiara authorities for more than 10 years now. It is the city's duty to take care of human waste, to have a number of public toilets scattered around the town. Currently I know not a single public toilet that is working anywhere in town.

Of course public toilets are an expensive proposition! People don't use them correctly. They waste too much water! City workers don't want to have anything to do with cleaning them! Etc, etc. Public toilets don't come cheaply. But try cholera! See how cheap that is. PNG has already lost dozens and dozens of its citizens to this dreaded disease which is preventable.

Please read what I'm proposing to Honiara's newest elected members to plan to do in this matter of public toilets in my column next week. Can the city make public toilets less expensive, in fact, a money spinner? What is your answer to the fact that we are 'living on borrowed time!'

A Dual Development strategy!

2011-01-27T19:06:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

6 January 2011

Honiara

Every new year gives the Solomons a chance to write up a new page in our short history. A chance of starting over once again! To review what hasn't been working for us over past years and start doing certain things differently. After all, a fair definition of mental madness is to insist on doing the same action over and over again and expect a different outcome.

Each and every Solomons government, from its earliest days in power, has fervently preached the development message. Once in power, so each successive government solemnly promises, people's development will be first and foremost on its mind. In fact, the word development is never far from its lips, it fills their programs of action documents and directs policy statements. Yet, when it falls out of power or is voted out of office after a few years, little is seen at ground level of any kind of development.

And people are well aware of this profound shortcoming and know all about this failure in their very bones. That is why they currently cry out for more and more of the constituency funding to go directly to them and not get lost in politicians' pockets. People's reasoning is clear, simple yet persuasive! For almost 33 years now millions and millions--at this writing development funding has already grown to BILLIONS--have been handed over to parliamentarians, given to government ministries and spread among provinces and State owned Enterprises but the country has little development to show for the tons and tons of money so generously showered on them.

It has become so common that the ordinary citizen now thinks that development can only come about if and when people themselves get direct funding for their projects. Government's position, in this kind of thinking, is seen as being an interested by-stander but it is the village man and woman as the main and major agents of change.

But it wasn't that way in the beginning! Not at all! In the nation's earliest days--1978-1984--for instance, the governments of the day started their development plans off in the traditional way: enhance medical coverage, strengthen and extend educational opportunities, assist villagers with their agricultural production and help people earn modest amounts of income from small businesses, sales of produce and employment.

However, when Namu Cyclone hit us (1986), political thinking began to change radically.. It became clear to many leaders, our political masters and moneyed individuals that the traditional development strategies would take many, many years to accomplish, cost millions of dollars to bring about and those very leaders would no longer be around to gain credit for the up turn and progress of the masses.

There had to be a quicker and more local way to bring about this fundamental development change. The answer to their problem was literally staring them in the face: invite southeast Asian loggers to harvest the nation's tree wealth so that millions of dollars would flow into the country. Such a profound money injection would allow the state to gain millions of dollars of revenue almost painlessly and with that money in hand, real development would begin in earnest. There would be no need to beg for donor money any longer since our round tree log exports would supply the necessary funding.

Many political leaders saw few negatives coming from such a great plan. None of them, for instance, realized that by 2015 the forests which were covering the Solomons at the time--1987-2000--would almost completely disappear from our shores. But even worse, society's social fabric would lie in tatters. Our Social Unrest years of 1998-2003 are directly linked to this disastrous decision of allowing strangers from afar basically steal our tree wealth during the years following Cyclone Namu.

It was during this period that citizens came to the conclusion that development--lifting up the majority of our people out of poverty by bettering their living conditions--would best be undertaken by the people themselves. Government had become less and less interested in raising the quality of people's lives.. SIDT's Report Cards, for instance, published since 1989, more than a twenty-year period--detailed how governments of the day consistently scored failing grades when it came to lifting its people out of poverty and strengthening their quality of life.

Those 8 Report Cards allowed small people of the nation a chance to measure how well or poorly their government was doing when it came to better medical attention, a stronger school system, assistance to people's cash cropping activities and garden production and the availability of ways to gain modest amounts of money. Unfortunately, in each and every Report Card people failed the governments of the day in their efforts to raise the quality of people's lives.

That is why the nation is witnessing a strange dual development strategy: people seeking funding for small projects to raise their quality of life while government busies itself with other concerns: foreign affairs, the state of the economy, large infrastructure projects, e.g. Tina Hydroelectric scheme, etc. etc. Until government makes the people of this nation it's number one priority, then all its other works will come to nothing.

But it didn't happen here!

2011-01-27T19:05:00.003-08:00

J. Roughan

29 December 2010

Honiara

2010 was one of our best years in a long while! Compared to what happened to us during our Social Unrest Years (1998-2003) and the 2007 Tsunami we did quite well this year. Not that 2010 was perfect but what didn't happen to our country and what could have taken place plus what actually did take place made 2010 a year not easy to forgot! And especially to thank God for!

Just take a few natural catastrophes that struck the rest of the world but almost completely passed us by. In January this year, for instance, the poor people of Haiti were hit by a massive earthquake which killed more than 270,000 in a matter of days. Your heart would have to be stone not to be moved by all the pain, suffering and death that's still happening on this small Caribbean island. How fortunate Solomon Islands has been over the years that a similar earthquake hasn't hit us. What grace worked on our behalf to have been spared such a fate?

No two countries, of course, are exactly alike but some do come off being quite similar. Haiti, although on the other side of the world from us, sits on its own 'ring of fire'--earthquake zone--as we do, both of us are island nations of almost the same land mass dimensions: Haiti has 10,700 sq. miles while Solomons is 11,100 sq. miles. Haiti's land mass, however, is basically a single large island while our country is broken up into major and minor island groupings.

The similarity of social indicators for both countries, however, is striking. Both boast of huge youth populations under 15 years of age--Haiti, 38%, Solomons, 41%; life expectancy for both is low--Haiti, 57, Solomons, 62; there's little difference in Gross Domestic Product numbers: Haiti, $1,300, Solomons, $1,900; and both have a Human Development Index (a way of measuring economic and social well-being) scores that are almost the same: Haiti, .521, Solomons, .591. The biggest difference between Haiti and ourselves is population. The Caribbean nation has 20 times our number (almost 10 million) while we have only recently hit the 500,000 mark.

Had Haiti's devastating earthquake hit us much the same suffering, pain and death would have been our lot for sure. Yet, our Guardian Angles were working overtime to spare us that suffering. Even the destructive forces of other natural disasters, Pakistan's floods, for instance, were ours but on a very minor scale. Guadalcanal's northeast corner was hammered in March and April this year by torrential rains but nothing in comparison to those of the East Asian continent.

Our biggest blessings of the year, however, were on the social side of things. We experienced a national election--the 8th one so far--that went off without a major hitch. Overseas observers as well as local and domestic observers were pleased with our people's conduct. Such an accomplishment is a major step in the country's political maturing which many an African nation would give its back teeth to pull off.

At this very reading one African nation, Ivory Coast, is locked into two presidents, two prime ministers, each with separate cabinets. The country's national election went off smoothly enough but the losing candidate refused to gracefully accept defeat. Military action to get rid of the losing candidate is actively being considered. In the meantime, however, dozens of people lay dead and literally thousands are fleeing for their lives to neighboring countries for safety.

Our own elections, on the other hand, went off like clock work and although some losing candidates did not fully agree with the final results, they didn't turn to the gun but went to the courts for an election review. Hopefully the misguided leaders of our Civilian Coup of 2000 have finally woken up to themselves and realize that the path of violence but breeds more violence and accomplishes very little in the way of social and political peace.

Even this year's severe international financial meltdown which brought so many nations, both big and small, to the brink of destruction was contained by our own institutions, leaders and traditions. The half-hearted Youth Riot which followed on the jailing of a government minister was quickly taken care of. Not only was the Chinese community wise in their way of protecting their stores--iron fences in front of a business as well as strong steel doors--but the police were quick off the mark to contain the few dozen rioting youth. There was no repeat of the 2006 Chinatown Burndown!

We as a nation can do little to change the course of a storm, stop an earthquake or to lessen torrential rains from hitting us. However, we do have much to say when it comes to caring for our social order. We can do one of three things. Leave it all up to God to make things better, try to do things completely on our own or finally, act in partnership with him. The last way, working in partnership with the Lord, is the way he has made the world to work. He doesn't interfere with us if we decide to take things into our own hands. These actions have a habit of self-destructing nor will he do things wholly on his own. But working with Him seems the best way to make good things happen. Perhaps in 2010 we were beginning to learn after all! A peaceful and enjoyable New Year to all!

Time is not on government's side!

2011-01-27T19:05:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

22 December 2010
Honiara

The Philip Government has been in the driver's seat since late August. That's more than four months now! Although it has survived a number of dangerous internal shocks--death to two of its members, a cabinet member's return to Rove and other serious internal woes--it still manages to function as a going concern. But that reality is not the same as saying that it is governing the nation. The events of the last three to four weeks--ministerial shuffles, fining of illegal fishing ships, etc.--are more about its own survival than exhibiting a strong governance model!

But NCRA backers are claiming that the Government is still very early into its hopeful four-year term of office. Present difficulties and its hic cups should not be seen as anything very special. A quick review of the reality of Solomons' politics, however, quickly raises doubts about this claim. Basically the present government should only count on being in power for three years, not four, to accomplish anything of note. 2011, 2012 and 2013 if undisturbed by a successful 'no confidence' motion, are the only years open to it to push through its legislative program.

During any government's last year in office, and 2014 is when the next national elections should be coming on stream, national political history reminds us that Parliamentary campaigning comes on strong, one could say, overwhelmingly in the last year of the life of any parliament. Little else fills Members' heads during the last year of their term, except, of course, how to win back their seat in the House once again.

So allowing that the last four months of this first year in office has already disappeared like rain in desert sands it is a 'big deal' for any new government to start off strongly in its second year of service. NCRA is going to find it tough to gain back its initial drive of becoming the new government of the land. But that hope must be part of its new year's strategy to gain back people's respect and hope. They are looking forward to a better and brighter future than what they have received so far at the end of 2010.

NCRA's Policy Statement document is filled with dreams, visions and hope-to-do plans. But few of these plans, given the three-year time frame available to NCRA, are able to get off the blueprint table much less become realities on the ground. There is one project, however, that could be unleashed in early 2011, which could respond to a much forgotten people, historically sidelined by government after government since independence, and answer our youth's hunger and thirst for paid employment and to be part of the nation's development story.

I speak of a villager-crafted road stretching along Guale's Weather Coast from Kuma Village in the west of the island to Marau at Guale's southern end. Such a locally worked road project, if properly presented to the donor community, could open up a whole new stretch of Guale's land holdings to thousands of people who have been abandoned by the authorities for more than 30 years. In fact, it has been this very abandonment over a number of generations that lies at the heart of our Social Unrest years of 1998-2003.

Of course, permanent bridges construction, culverts, strengthening road sections, etc.call for expertise, advise and over sight monitoring from outside the local community but the basic road building work would be assigned to village populations lining the road way. Extra workers could come from the youth population when called for.

Such a major development road making project sends an unmistakable message: Weather Coast people are important to the nation, it would bring in much needed income for many levels of society of the area and re-establish links of people with government both on the provincial and national levels.

The message in this short essay is that the present government has little time on its hands to effect projects and works to make a difference to the citizens of this nation. It's vital that the newly established government 'put runs on the board and quickly so'! Its first four months of power have not been that productive and it needs to show the nation that it is the right group of people who given half a chance can bring the nation up to its potential.

A Solomons Stock Take!

2011-01-27T19:03:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

16 December 2010

Honiara.

Successful business people, to keep their enterprises healthy, normally conduct an-end-of-the-year Stock Take. The business owner--counts what hasn't been sold over the year as well as the business' money already in the bank--to see whether his business has been a profitable one, or still struggling to survive or worse, failing. We as a nation would be well advised to do much the same exercise and conduct our own Stock Take to see how well we as a people have been doing over the last ten years.

Compared to the nation's first decade of the 21st century, the Solomons has started its second decade off strongly, well and most importantly we are a nation at peace with ourselves. Recall that the nation's first ten years in the 21st century was filled with major unrest and dislocation to our normal island life. For all intents and purposes, during the first few years of the present century, Solomon Islanders found themselves in the middle of conducting a war with itself, a Civil War.

The roots of that conflict were not hard to find. Leadership, especially our senior political leaders, were caught up with searching for easy, fast money. Governing the nation was put on auto-pilot, something best done on its own. One needs only remember the folly of the Tulagi Gold Dig, the Musingku's (Bouganiville's own conman) billion dollar scam, plans to bottle bush oxygen, senior ministers jetting off to the Far East for 'free money', etc. etc. It was no wonder that although these easy money schemes didn't on their own create the Social Unrest years, they certainly added fuel to an already raging fire of national discontent.

Our 2000 Coup, years of Social Unrest--1998-2003--, RAMSI's on going presence since 2003, the 2006 national election with the Chinatown Burndown, the most recent 2010 national election and the Lusibaea court sentencing have left a series of deep scars in our people's minds and hearts. Not that the rest of the world outside these islands we call home, has been all that rosy and tranquil. Far from it! The world's events have had.too often, direct negative impact on our own island home--the Iraq invasion in March 2003, for instance, made it that much easier for other Pacific Island nations especially Australia, to jump into our lives with the hope of coming here to help us sort things out.

What international events, already afoot in the Big Outside World, will have serious impact on our own lives here in the Solomons over the next ten years or so? There are many examples of world-wide breakdowns: the many financial crises in Ireland, Greece, Italy and France; the strained relations between China and Japan; the threat of war between North and South Korea; Vladimir Putin's warning of a Russian nuclear escalation; the nuclear build-up in Iran; the deteriorating peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians; the pervasive corruption in Iraq, Afghanistan; Wikileaks embarrassing world leaders, disrupting international relations, endangering lives, and threatening candid diplomacy.

These world events coupled with our own home grown pains and difficulties have a strong tendency to make our next ten years or so more, not less, difficult. That is why it is important for the nation to conduct its own Stock Take, figure out where our next set of major problems are coming from and prepare ourselves to cope with them.

Not many nations like the Solomons get a second chance to re-invent themselves and end up in a positive position. Africa's Somalia remains a failed nation even after 20 years, Iraq and Afghanistan are in the middle of a nine year war with more years of unrest to follow, etc. Our economy, although not the strongest in the Pacific, still functions well for the Solomons half million people with months and months of overseas reserves to pay for the importation of food, energy and goods.

No, our difficulties will come from an other direction.Climate change, for instance, will test the nation to care for those village communities which will experience the strength of the ocean which surrounds us, Our poor of food security is another areas of concern and one which will test our strength to assist those people who may not be wantoks but certainly are citizens of the country and must be helped when the time comes.

But the most pressing difficult we face is our unemployed, bored youth who have been at the forefront of each and every riot since 1989. Last month's unrest at the delayed Lusibaea's court case is an example. Whether the unrest is unleashed by swear words posted on a market stall (1989), a failed football game (1993) or a tainted national election (2006), the major actors in each and every riots have been our youth. They are expecting that the new government will create a youth cadre willing and able to help the nation in its infrastructure building or other works that pay modest amounts of money so they can do something useful for the nation.

Block the choke points!

2010-12-22T21:38:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan
7 December 2010
Honiara

More than 20 years ago, 8 -10 November 1989 to be exact, Honiara
braced itself for an invasion of more than 5,000 rioting youths. That
youthful riot made last month's rampage along Honiara's streets a pale
imitation. The 1998 Youth Riot was the first in a series--1993 and
1996 ones followed--that hit Honiara but it was one that had the real
potential of turning into something quite serious.

The 1989 youth troubles was triggered off by swear words supposedly
written by a Renbel person against Malaita. The paper which had the
swear words written on had been tacked to a store door at the old
Central Market. Unfortunately, no Commission of Inquiry ever reviewed
the origins of this riot and so Solomons people never knew for sure
what was the truth behind the 1989 Riot. But that didn't make any
difference. Youths from all over town believed that the swear words
had been posted in the market and they were determined to do something
about it.

What better way, they reasoned, than take their anger and frustrations
out on an innocent group of people, the Chinese, ruin their
livelihoods and loot their stores. How such mob rule--stoning people,
breaking into shops and stealing goods--responded to swear words
written on paper and publicly posted on a market wall is beyond
belief!

But the police reaction to the 1989 Riot presents valuable lessons we
should listen to. Hasn't the youth-riot pattern been the same kind of
response as in the 2006 Chinatown Burnout and in the most recent one
last month? Honiara rioters seem to follow the same behavior pattern
since 1989. Heap up dozens and dozens of young angry men, march them
along Mendana Avenue towards Chinatown and before burning stores,
shops and businesses, loot them first. However, in 1989 the youth
rioters were in for a nasty surprise.

Solomon Mamaloni, the PM of that period, had his own ideas how to
bring Honiara's streets back to peace and to do it without loss of
life. He ordered his Police Commissioner of the lightly equipped
police force to do three things: block all entry into Chinatown
especially at the old Metanikau Bridge site as well as the entrance to
it opposite the Referral Hospital; use tear gas to disrupt and
disperse the mob if they refused to obey the Police Commissioner's
orders and, finally, refuse the rioters entry to the road leading to
White River where they intended to do some nasty things.

The PM's plan proved quite successful! Dozens and dozens of rioting
youth never reached Chinatown. When they tried to get through to
Chinatown by way of Honiara's main road--Mendana Avenue--the police
used tear gas that stopped them cold. Dozens of the rioters jumped
into the river to get away from the gas. Then the crowd re-grouped and
marched along Mendana Avenue towards the White River settlement. But
here too the PM had a surprise waiting for them..

Approximately a dozen or so burly, stone-faced Solomon Islands' police
personnel with billy clubs in hand were lined up across the road near
St. John's School, a natural choke point. When the rioting-youth crowd
reached that part of Honiara, the police gave them an option. Turn
back and forget their plans about getting to White River by the main
road since it was blocked off from them by the police. The alternative
of swimming around the road block at St. John's School or taking the
bush track in back of Rove was not particularly inviting. In no time,
then, the youth marchers lost their enthusiasm for the march and most
of them returned home, disappointed of course, but little damage was
done either to the city or to themselves.

I checked the old Metanikau Bridge on Tuesday afternoon when the riot
was in full swing and there wasn't a policeman in sight. Streams of
young men--no young girls, no women, no olos, only youths--were
streaming across the bridge. A number of youth who recognized me
warned me away from the bridge and advised returning home. When I
drove to Chinatown by way of Menadan Avenue near the hospital, I found
it completely open as well, nothing and nobody stopped me from getting
into the Chung Wah School area.

This kind of security lapse would not have happened if Solomon
Mamaloni's tactics had been put into operation. Blocking off critical
entry points to Chinatown seems normal, natural and should be
inevitable. Every riot since 1989--and there have been at least six of
them--rioters have marched on Chinatown hoping to cash in on loot,
goodies and stock. The 1989 Riot was stopped dead in its tracks by
blocking off the town's natural choke points. Shouldn't that tactic be
one of the first strategies used to frustrate other would-be rioters?

Time is not on government's side!

2010-12-22T21:34:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan
22 December 2010
Honiara

The Philip Government has been in the driver's seat since late August.
That's more than four months now! Although it has survived a number of
dangerous internal shocks--death to two of its members, a cabinet
member's return to Rove and other serious internal woes--it still
manages to function as a going concern. But that reality is not the
same as saying that it is governing the nation. The events of the last
three to four weeks--ministerial shuffles, fining of illegal fishing
ships, etc.--are more about its own survival than exhibiting a strong
governance model!

But NCRA backers are claiming that the Government is still very early
into its hopeful four-year term of office. Present difficulties and
its hic cups should not be seen as anything very special. A quick
review of the reality of Solomons' politics, however, quickly raises
doubts about this claim. Basically the present government should only
count on being in power for three years, not four, to accomplish
anything of note. 2011, 2012 and 2013 if undisturbed by a successful
'no confidence' motion, are the only years open to it to push through
its legislative program.

During any government's last year in office, and 2014 is when the next
national elections should be coming on stream, national political
history reminds us that Parliamentary campaigning comes on strong,
one could say, overwhelmingly in the last year of the life of any
parliament. Little else fills Members' heads during the last year of
their term, except, of course, how to win back their seat in the House
once again.

So allowing that the last four months of this first year in office has
already disappeared like rain in desert sands it is a 'big deal' for
any new government to start off strongly in its second year of
service. NCRA is going to find it tough to gain back its initial drive
of becoming the new government of the land. But that hope must be part
of its new year's strategy to gain back people's respect and hope.
They are looking forward to a better and brighter future than what
they have received so far at the end of 2010.

NCRA's Policy Statement document is filled with dreams, visions and
hope-to-do plans. But few of these plans, given the three-year time
frame available to NCRA, are able to get off the blueprint table much
less become realities on the ground. There is one project, however,
that could be unleashed in early 2011, which could respond to a much
forgotten people, historically sidelined by government after
government since independence, and answer our youth's hunger and
thirst for paid employment and to be part of the nation's development
story.

I speak of a villager-crafted road stretching along Guale's Weather
Coast from Kuma Village in the west of the island to Marau at Guale's
southern end. Such a locally worked road project, if properly
presented to the donor community, could open up a whole new stretch of
Guale's land holdings to thousands of people who have been abandoned
by the authorities for more than 30 years. In fact, it has been this
very abandonment over a number of generations that lies at the heart
of our Social Unrest years of 1998-2003.

Of course, permanent bridges construction, culverts, strengthening
road sections, etc.call for expertise, advise and over sight
monitoring from outside the local community but the basic road
building work would be assigned to village populations lining the road
way. Extra workers could come from the youth population when called
for.

Such a major development road making project sends an unmistakable
message: Weather Coast people are important to the nation, it would
bring in much needed income for many levels of society of the area and
re-establish links of people with government both on the provincial
and national levels.

The message in this short essay is that the present government has
little time on its hands to effect projects and works to make a
difference to the citizens of this nation. It's vital that the newly
established government 'put runs on the board and quickly so'! Its
first four months of power have not been that productive and it needs
to show the nation that it is the right group of people who given half
a chance can bring the nation up to its potential.

Towards a fairer world!

2010-12-01T14:42:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

2 December 2010

Honiara

From the Solomons earliest days, from 1978 onwards, most political leaders actually worked hard to make Solomon Islands a better, more productive and peaceful place. In a word they wanted the nation to be a fairer place for all: villagers, urban people, elite and the leaders themselves. Unfortunately, over the years, many of them lost their way and led the people and the nation down the wrong path.

Solomons first 6 years as a nation, for instance, were solid and growth-full. We had started off our historic journey in 1978 a poor nation but one that had no great war wounds to heal, our colonial masters gifted us with a $30 million golden handshake and our people although scattered among hundreds of islands were no less united.

The first few years of independence 1978-1984 were ones filled with hope. Unfortunately the base price of copra, cocoa and oil palm, worldwide, took a nose dive and this development thing, we were fast learning, was becoming harder and more expensive by the day. In was in 1985 that our leaders with the help of many landowners made their fateful decision. There had to be a better, quicker and easier way to become more independent, rich and developed than the road they had been following for the first 6 years of independence.

For the next 10 years or so our leaders claimed they knew a better and easier road to gain riches and strengthen independence. Sell off the nation's round tree log wealth to Asian buyers became the wisdom of the day. Not only would vast amounts of money roll in but peoples' lives would become easier by the day. Yes, by 1995 millions of dollars had flown into the Solomons (but land owners also lost millions more into the pockets of the round tree loggers and some of our own corrupt leaders).

Rather than continuing along our initial path of slow but constant development for all and government work to strengthen schools, better health facilities, more involvement in people's cash crops and the creation of more employment our leaders convinced the resource owners that there was a quicker and better way. Harvest the round tree logs and sell them at bargain basement prices. The result of this decision proved disastrous for the country and produced a profound weakening of village life.

But the real cost of that poorly thought-out decision came in the 1998-2003 period. Hundreds of our people died, thousands more lost homes and livelihoods and a nation was forced to call in strangers from other parts of the Pacific to help us get back on our feet. We, fortunately, did make it back to normalcy, back on our feet as it were and once again we had a functioning government, a trust worthy police force and a people once more at peace with themselves and each other. But that process is now into its seventh year and still we're not sure of ourselves.

Once again our nation faces a crossroad. More than 180 nations worldwide, Solomons included, in September 2000 made a solemn pledge to achieve the 8 Millennium Development Goals by the year 2015. In 2005 these same countries reviewed how well or how poorly the nations of the world were on course. This year, 2010, again there was another review of the progress or lack there of on how far we have come to achieving these 8 goals. The jury is still out for most nations and Solomon Islands is very far from its target.

These 8 goals--eradicate extreme poverty, achieve primary ed for all, empower women, reduce child mortality, improve maternal health, fight AIDS and malaria, ensure environmental health and develop a global partnership for development--are at the heart of producing a fairer world. No where in the listing of these goals, however, is there any mention about the need to work on projects.

Once again our leaders have looked on a universally accepted way of bringing about a fairer way of life for most people by working on the MDGs. We as a nation in 2000 publicly signed up to work on these goals. But over the years things changed and we decided that there is a better way of bringing about a fairer world. Fund individual villagers and town folk to work on projects. This is the wave of the future we are told.

Let central government work on the MDGs our leaders say. Each constituency will concentrate attention and resources on achieving a fairer world by pumping money into project work and hope for the best. As in the 1986-1995 period we made a commitment to go one way--help our people--and then did something completely different--sell off our tree wealth. In 1998-2003 period we suffered the consequences of this decision with severe Social Unrest. What will the nation and its people pay for once more promising something--fairer society through the MDGs--but do something quite different--project work.

Journey from the village to $$$

2010-11-24T19:00:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

25 November 2010

Honiara

Solomon Islanders are in the middle of making their most difficult journeys since 1900 or so. It's the journey from village subsistence way of life to the cash economy. It wasn't that long ago when most islanders gathered their total daily food intake from garden lands and from the near-by sea. There was no such thing as home mortgages! Housing materials--roofing, flooring, posts, walling, etc.--came directly from the near-by forest. Cousins, uncles, aunties, wantoks all, were the labor force. Feeding them for a week or so while they put up one's home took care of labor costs.

Energy needs were found in abundance from the plentiful supply of wood in the near-by forest. Water for cooking, drinking, cleaning, washing was at hand because a well situated villages was built close to the many major streams running in the area or from natural water holes. The rest of life's necessities--medicines, salves, antibiotics, lotions, etc.--were found in the nearby bush or at least a clan member had mastered the necessary local medical knowledge.

If the local scene was peaceful, tranquil and orderly--there were few family feuds, pay back situations or out right war--then life was fairly predicable..Unseasonable rains or droughts, plagues of insects or plant infections were a few of the things rural people couldn't control but these were few and far between. Life was physically tough--long hours of garden work almost on a daily basis, hauling bush material to the village, etc.--remained routine but peaceful

The modern world of commerce, education, invention, military power, transportation, communication, etc. etc. had hardly penetrated the village sector 50 years or so ago. It didn't take long for villagers who had little knowledge of matches, kerosene, tinned food, suitable clothing, etc. however, to latch on to these useful items and in no time make them their own. From the lure of luxuries to becoming necessities came over night as it were. But what was clear that the life offered by the cash economy seemed an easier one than what they experienced in their daily lives.

In truth this journey from almost a total self reliant life style to today's cash dominance to buy 'luxuries' has been gaining strength especially since our first days of independence in 1978. Honiara and all it stands for has been the strongest 'pusher' of the nation in this journey but other forces like the 1980s -1990s logging boom, paid employment, access to education, cash cropping and especially the overseas influence have helped fuel this present journey.

It was quite timely, therefore, for our own Central Bank and the Pacific Financial Inclusion Programme to join forces and conduct a two day workshop accenting the need for a people to gain financial literacy. The workshop lasted only two days but it was a wake up call for our leaders to take heed. Just as the ability for a modern citizen to know how to read and write, it's obvious that getting a working handle on how to understand, use and work with money is critical to a successful Solomons citizens future life.

No one argues that the reading/writing skill should be only for certain types of people, so too is the necessity of learning to use the special skill of money management, financial understanding and working with the modern world of money. To make all this financial literacy happen, however, different financial actors--banks, credit unions, lending societies, National Provident Fund, saving clubs, even money lenders--play a vital part in helping rural and urban people become financially literate.

That is why it was so disappointing that not a single Parliamentarian showed up at any part of last week's two-day financial literacy workshop. Fortunately, the Minister of Finance did kick the meeting off with a key note speech. However, once his speech was finished he was the only member of Parliament to grace the meeting and become a lead presence in the formation of financial literacy program.

For the typical villager to take this difficult trip from village subsistence living to one where cash dominates requires a good deal of courage and luck. It's vital, then, that national leaders lend a hand, appreciate what this new kind of life means and work on ways to smooth the passage.. Of course with greater access to more and more cash, then a villager can live a better, more productive and secure life. The opposite is just as true as well.

The serious weakening of national economies across the world currently show that the cash economy still has much to learn. The country of Ireland, for example, which only three years ago boasted that it had become an "Economic Tiger". Twenty years ago its youth were hopping on planes and ships, running away from the country looking for employment in other parts of the world. But the Euro cash economy transformed Ireland into a leading world class economic miracle.

But it didn't last long at all. Now Ireland is in serious trouble, owing billions of Euros and wondering how it had gotten itself into such debt. If a European country with high education standards, first class economic system and tested leadership could have fallen so hard, so fast, what does that say about us? That's why it is so important for leadership to be at the forefront of helping our people make the journey from village to $$$.

Marau is the place! Not Doma!

2010-11-09T14:10:00.001-08:00

J. Roughan

11 November 2010

Honiara

Last week's essay detailed why it is vital for the Guadalcanal Provincial Assembly to put as much distance between itself and the Solomons national capitol as possible. Today's writing makes the case that the tip of Guadalcanal, the southern end of the island, would make a fine location for a provincial headquarters.

The Marau area, on its own, however, even with its fine natural harbor and working air field, is insufficient to be chosen as a worthwhile candidate to establish it as a provincial headquarters centre. But Marau located at one end of a villager-worked road starting at Kuma stretching along the Weather Coast's far west right into the Marau area makes all the difference in the world. Of course it's not a perfect choice! Land purchases would have to be negotiated with local landowners and water rights could be another problem area but these would be minor issues.

More importantly, the Marau area is far enough away from Honiara not to have to constantly worry about its influence and it allows provincial members a chance to recognize the whole of the island is under its jurisdiction. Most vitally, however, a Marau centre establishes a creative way of responsible leadership responding to Weather Coast villagers' concerns about being once more abandoned by government as they have been for more than four generations in the recent past.

As mentioned in last week's essay, Weather Coast villagers profound sense of government abandonment directly contributed to the nation's worst case social upheaval. It would have seemed only proper, once RAMSI's militantly force had calmed down the social melt down in the area, that responsible authorities would have tried their best to respond to the people's profound hurt.

But just the opposite happened! Like a very bad dream political leaders, provincial as well as central both, distanced themselves from their own people. The Chinatown Burn Down in 2006 where not a single person was killed and only a few were slightly hurt attracted its own Commission of Inquiry in less than 2 years.

Guale's Weather Coast atrocities--at least 100 murdered, hundreds of houses burnt to the ground, untold rapes of women and girls, severe dislocation of many village people--caused no public outcry nor called for a formal inquiry to be held. Only court proceedings which sent less than a dozen or so men to jail for life time sentences became the nation's sole response.

Once again, when provincial authorities could do something positive and creative to respond to their own people's deep seated feelings of abandonment they spectacularly failed the test. A Marau Provincial Capital could go a long way in repairing the hurt feelings of these people but what we are currently hearing is a continuation of the pattern of running away from responsibility and setting up some kind of commercial centre in Doma, not too far away from Honiara.

A Marau site for a provincial headquarters makes it easier to establish a village-made coastal road along Guale's Weather Coast's shores from Kuma in the west right to Marau in the east. Such a track/truck road would go a long way to helping villagers along the coast to transport their cash crops of cocoa, copra and vegetables to Marau's all weather port. No matter how bad the seas are and at all times during the year, Marau's peaceful, sheltered waters hold out the hope of transporting people and getting cash crops to market without waiting for weeks and months. Once a Marau centre is established would a similar road be constructed linking Honiara with Marau be too far in the future?

But the most important consideration is that the political hub of the province has a place of honor among its people and it is not seen as simply an addition to an other urban centre. Tangarare, Doma, Aola and others should be seen at this stage as fulfilling the idea of a Growth Centre which would be information hubs housing telecommunication gear and awareness building locations. These are needed of course but the political heart of the province should be sited at the core of its people, especially a people who have suffered so grievously over a five year period.

Doma?? Please Re-think this decision!

2010-11-03T19:14:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

4 November 2003

Honiara

Last week, Guadalcanal provincial authorities formerly asked Central Government to help them build a brand new provincial centre set up in the old Doma plantation, just west of Honiara. The price tag on this proposed establishment stands at a bit shy of a billion dollars--$871 million to be exact. At the outset may I congratulate the Province in making this historical decision . . . to flee Honiara's smothering influence and set up its own admin headquarters anew, away from Honiara's overbearing presence towards everything provincial .

Over the years, the Guadalcanal Province has been forced to take a lowly third place in Honiara and this in their own land. Of course, Central Government has always seen itself taking pride of place, becoming number one in the pecking order. Next came Honiara City Council and way down, in third place, came Guadalcanal Province. Now with a desire to shift out of Honiara and move to a totally new location, Guadalcanal Province has begun its exodus from Honiara domination to take the first step towards a State System.

On closer study, however, the shift from the Honiara city area to Doma is not that much of a change at all. The smallness of the move but continues Honiara's domination, control and influence but it pretends to give the Guale people something new. Villagers along Guale's northern coast would travel a few miles less for services, markets and commercial activities. Villagers all over the province especially those on the Weather Coast, however, which suffered so severely during the Social Unrest years of 1998-2003, will be aided not at all by a shift to Doma. In other words, the vast majority of Guale people get no benefit at all from this kind of shift.

In fact such a shift but continues the Honiara influence at the expense of villagers who are in great need of services. Our Social Unrest years seem to have happened so long ago. The terrible happenings that made for an unwelcome history—cool blooded murders, burnt homes, rapes committed, loss of life, etc. etc.—have been partly forgotten. The nation's courts have dealt with many of the criminals who had unleashed these crimes upon their own people. Yet, why these events had taken root in only one part of the Solomons with few similar examples in other parts of the country have hardly been addressed.

Weather Coast's people's present day silence, however, does not mean that the root causes that tore at the heart of society's social fabric have been adequately addressed. Before those terrible days at the turn of the 20th century, many leaders thought that villagers in that part of Guadalcanal were much like the rest of the country. Yes, most villagers in the area were poor, politically marginalized, not adequately educated and with little hope that things would turn out well for them and their children in the new century. At first glance, these village people seemed little different from hundreds of villagers in other provinces. Why, then, did the serious social melt-down occur on Guale's Weather Coast and few places else?

Those people 'living on the edge', however, had unfortunately experienced another grievance that other Solomon Islanders were not exposed to. Weather Coast villagers had been suffering, over several decades, a severe sense of abandonment. Although they lived less than 30 miles away from the nation's one spot that housed the most modern, developed and prosperous part of the nation—Honiara, Weather Coast people never participated in that life style. The city was a mere two day journey overland, less than a day by ship or an hour by plane. However, it might have been located on another continent for the typical Weather Coast village visitor.

Shipping to Guale's Weather Coast was, at the best of times, difficult because of the rough seas and unsafe anchorage up and down the southern part of the island. There were no roads in that part of Guadalcanal and unless ships could safely land on its coast, then getting cash crops like copra, cocoa, garden vegetables, etc. to market proved impossible. It became heartbreaking for villagers of the area, to see ship after ship sailing past unable to land to transport people's market produce. What did happen, however, was their product slowly rotted on the shore for the want of a way of getting it to market.

Given these circumstances, some 'hot heads' took things into their own hands and staged a rebellion. Fortunately, the vast majority of villagers never joined in but did suffer grievously at their hands. Yes. the courts jailed the most notorious of the culprits but the underlying cause of the grievance--the almost perfect abandonment by government authorities--continues on to this day. This author made a plea to Nick Warner, RAMSI's first coordinator, to begin a hand made road from Kuma in the west of the Weather Coast to Marau, to do something concrete to lessen the isolation of the area, but to no avail.

Here it is, going on 8 years since the RAMSI landing, and little has changed in that part of Guale. Next week's essay will detail where this author thinks a new provincial centre should be placed and give the reasons for shifting it completely away from Honiara. and Doma.

Solomons' Third Rail

2010-10-27T16:25:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
28 October 2010
Honiara

Solomon Islanders have rarely seen a subway train up close. This kind of train operates much like a public bus except it usually travels underground but doesn't use either petrol/diesel power. Subways are driven by electricity delivered along a special steel rail. This rail is highly charged, quite dangerous but effective in delivering power to move a train.

Although this third rail, as it is called, is great for powering trains, it is also highly dangerous, and can be lethal to anyone who touches it by accident. Some political commentators use this third rail picture to warn the general public as well as politicians that to discuss certain national issues can be really dangerous, must be carefully studied before going public and that all be put on notice of their potential danger.

We had a case of a Third Rail topic on Friday afternoon last week. Solomons Law Forum set up a public discussion on government's up coming Forgiveness Bill proposal. More than 100 participants from across Honiara turned up for SIBC's two-hour live broadcast which featured a number of leading Solomon Islanders. Fr. Sam Ata (chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission), Hon. Manasseh Maelanga (Deputy PM), Mr. Andrew Radclyffe (Legal practioner), Mrs. Ruth Lilogula (Commissioner of Lands) and Rev. Ellison Baku (Pastor) were panel members. Mrs. Moodie Nanau, Supervisor of SIBC's Program Presentation led these Forum members in a lively discussion concerning this Third Rail subject: Government's Forgiveness Bill.

Although the exact wording of government's proposed Forgiveness Bill proposal has yet to be drafted, many Panel Member as well as those in the audience voiced out their disquiet on the merits of such a bill. It didn't take long during the discussion period for many to raise some basic questions both from the floor as well as from the dais. Forum participants zeroed in on the issue with such questions as: 'Forgiveness for whom?', 'Forgiveness for what?', 'Who has the basic right to forgive: the government, society in general or the victim?'

So even before a single sentence has been written about a possible Forgiveness Bill, people are lining up not only to study what Government might want to enact into national law, but, in this case, are questioning the very basis of such legislation. In past years, national leaders were ever so quick to reach for amnesty legislation when something terrible had been done. Before the courts could begin to operate, some politicians were calling for amnesty for those who had committed the crimes. The Townsville Agreement comes to mind. Heaven forbid that some Big Man face a court of law, be found guilty of committing a serious offense and then sent to Rove for years for his crime!

Although the Townsville Agreement was conditional--all arms had to be returned before any amnesty would begin to operate--few if any guns were returned. It made little difference to those who were demanding amnesty that high powered guns had been returned or not. Only when RAMSI came on the scene in 2003, were many of these arms finally surrendered. Even to this day, it's common knowledge that some high powered guns are still out there in villages and are yet to be returned. But that doesn't matter! The Amnesty part of the Townsville Agreement must be honored no matter what is said about the unreturned high powered guns.

This basic imbalance is one reason why last Friday's Forum surfaced people's distrust, disquiet and disgust which a Forgiveness Bill would create if it were made the law of the land any time soon. As many said during the Forum, who is it that can offer forgiveness? Isn't it first and foremost the victim, those who suffered major loss of loved ones killed, serious property damage and loss of livelihood? Is forgiveness simply a juridical thing? Is government thinking that there should be legislation dictating that certain crimes at certain times can never be tried in a court of law?

How such a mind set could bring lasting peace back into the hearts of people who have yet to be compensated but only a handful of the offenders have stepped forward and said from the heart: "I'm sorry for what I have done to you and your family! Please forgive me!" Once that giant step has been taken, then a Forgiveness Bill might have some meaning for society and a chance of being passed by Parliament.

During last week's public Forum one participant made the point that the proposed government legislation would best not be called a Forgiveness Bill but something else, e.g. a Restoring Justice and Peace Bill with an emphasis on reconciliation, personal, communal and national. But mere word change is enough! There has to be national preparation geared to change minds and hearts. For years, now, SIDT has been running a Restorative Justice Program which police personnel, police trainees, Rove prisoners, village groups and women's organizations have participated in. The present Truth and Reconciliation Commissions' reach out program is another way of touching the hearts of our people and showing how important healing and reconciliation are to the national health.

For our political leadership to bank solely on a piece of legislation to heal a divided people who have been so terribly hurt is the wrong way to go. Before any legislation comes before Parliament, victims and offenders should be given a chance to reconcile. A few pigs, some shell money and a heap of yams on their own will never accomplish this task. It takes people meeting together, looking into each others eyes and saying from the heart: "I'm sorry for what I did!" Perhaps with that major step taken, legislation could be crafted which would seal the healing process.

When did Adult Education disappear?

2010-10-20T20:43:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

22 October 2010

Honiara

Each and every political party which contested last August's national election, made a special point to stress the need to seriously increase the education budget. The promise made was crystal clear! If a particular political party formed the nation's newest government, then it promised to spend big bucks on education.

The present coalition government, NCRA—made up of at least six political parties--was no exception. It put teeth into its education promise in its recently published Policy Statement. NCRA "considers education as a key ingredient in all spheres of human development". Its Policy Statement details what it means by saying it "will fund tertiary education, including scholarship for SICHE", "recognizes the importance of promoting distant learning" and give serious consideration "to establish a National University of Solomon Islands".

However, lost in all this education shuffle is the vital place of Adult Education in the lives of our Olos. Of course tertiary, secondary, primary and pre-school education lie at the heart of keeping our nation up to the mark and running well. And the mantra that 'today's youth are tomorrow's leaders' is whole heartedly accepted! We know in almost backward fashion that our youth population makes up more than half of all our people. And it makes perfect sense to focus on youth, their education needs and what future the nation faces if it fails to educate its youth.

Yet, it's the Olos, not the kids, who still control the nation's resource base. They are the ones who must say "Yes!" if the land is to be used for oil palms, coconuts, cocoa, etc. But, here we are well into the 21st century and the Olos education base, compared to ten years ago at the turn of the century, has improved very little. Yes, you say, these Olos are close up to the grave, in fact many of them have one foot in it, so why pay attention to what they say or don't say. Well, let me inform you loud and clear that if we continue to try to get around them, dismiss their importance or just don't listen, then nothing will happen. Malaita gave us a clear signal!

In the 2006 Sogavare Government, great effort was expended to have Malaitan landowners sign on the dotted line to allow their land holdings be used for new palm oil plantings. The government at the time spent big bucks trying to accomplish this task but at no time that I am aware of was there serious attention given to discoursing the land issue with landowners, making them aware of the importance of this type of planting, etc. Too often raising land owners awareness, the resource owners concern, was too often simply a matter of waving bunches of dollars in front of them. Then, we expected then to jump at the bait. Well we all know what happened! Here it is four years later and not a single, solitary oil palm has been planted on Malaita.

When the Colonial Government became serious about establishing formal education in the Protectorate in the 1960s, things took off. When I first arrived on the scene, for example, the school fee at that time--1958--was two sticks of tobacco which I would hand over to a child's father to allow me to take his child to school at Tarapaina in South Malaita. By mid 1980s, however, school fees were no longer a few sticks of tobacco. They had jumped to hundreds and in some cases even thousands of dollars per year. Island people had been convinced of the worth of education and were willing to shell out large amounts of cold, hard cash to buy into the system.

Of course paying school fees was an accepted investment. People's reasoning was clear enough: have my child get a solid education and the world of work, paid employment, income and salaries, opened up for the educated student. The pain, sacrifice and hard work of getting enough money to pay school fees became an acceptable reality. This investment, after a few years, would begin to pay off for the family, uncles, aunts, relatives and wantoks who had scraped together the necessary school fees.

Why hasn't this same logic been followed in the case of oil palms and other large scale cash crop plantings? First of all little or no land was in question when school fees entered the picture. Families across the nation eagerly bought into this new thing called education. People could experience almost on a daily basis that the educated person had advantages and little was lost of any real wealth, their land and its resources. The world as they knew it and had lived by since childhood had not changed.by going to this new thing called school.

But giving over large tracks of precious land for many years to perfect strangers really attacks the very basis of how they think this world works. The only reality for the typical Olo is the land and its resource base. Few if any of them stash cash under the bed, even fewer operate cheque accounts or have IBD deposits with the banking system. All they have in this world is what they rest their feet on each day, gather their daily food intake and are comforted constantly, their land.

Taking that security away from them is like asking them to start off a new life in a foreign country. Yet, I do feel change is in the air. The Olo is not stupid, not dumb but is searching for a new way of remaining on his beloved land, living off it and still preserving a way of life that, although new in some respects, has a great deal of the old still sticking to it. That's where Adult Education must come into the lives of Olos. Less than 50 years ago many of them embraced a new way of living when they worked hard to get school fees. These same Olos are open to change but the nation has to help them find this new world which guarantees a way of life which protects their most precious gift, the land, and a people's future.

Some good things; many hard ones but some definitedly dangerous!

2010-10-13T19:54:00.000-07:00

J. Roughan

14 October 2010

Honiara

Government's National Coalition for Reform and Advancement policy statement has at last made it into the public arena. Although a bit on the thin side, it's still remarkable that in less than 50 days, half the time normally expected of a newly-formed government to publish its dreams, visions and plans into black and white, NCRA has done it. Of course, the devil will be in the details, how these dreams, visions and plans are actually carried out in a Solomons real world.

Some of Its aspirations--meeting the Millennium Development Goals, raising the quality of life (rather than the trite and overused D-word development), rural-based economic growth, etc.--are admirable. Other visions and goals present hard choices like registering customary lands, emphasis on all aspects of education, doing something creative in the forestry sector, substantially build up tourism, etc. are certainly hard areas of concern which will surely test NCRA metal.

But NCRA's most dangerous goal of all is to fundamentally test the idea that "control over resources will continue to remain with the state or outsiders." In uncompromising language the NCRA policy statement boldly announces that "ownership of land reverts to the control of resource owners" (p 12). This means a new direction for Solomons Islands and on the face of it, definitely dangerous. Dangerous to the nation's growing establishment--national politicians, Honiara elite, business interests, power brokers, etc.--which over a 30 year period has built up empires of money, power and position.

The Solomon Islands Constitution clearly states:"the natural resources of our country are vested in the people and the government of Solomon Islands;" Few of the country's landowners, however, have ever agreed with this statement. Its their understanding that the people through their clans, tribes and liens are the only legitimate owners of the nation's resource base. All others, including the State, are outsiders!

Over the past 30 years, however, government after government ever since 1978 simply assumed that they and they alone controlled, directed and for all intents and purposes acted as if they owned the nation's land and sea resources. Because of this belief by Honiara's elite, over a three decade period of time, Solomons people, in the process, have been changed into two different kinds of societies. One became rich, well educated, politically strong and dominant. The other part of Solomons society, the vast majority, the nation's citizens, traveled in another direction! Too often, it was the villager, although the true owner of the nation's resource base, who to this very day remains poor, half educated, politically weak and subservient.

For example, the annual average revenue allotted to all nine Provinces between the years 1995 and 2000 was $96.6 million. During that same period, the Honiara based elite through government salaries, housing allowances, different perks, vehicle allocation, etc. etc.--managed to gobble up a lion's share, $239.7 million each year. This terrible imbalance of national wealth resulted in a vertical split of 70% going to Honiara's special groups while the remaining 30% was earmarked for the rest of the nation.

It is no wonder then that some rural wealth producers finally rebelled and the nation experienced a Civil War during the 1998-2003 period. But leading up to those years of strife, ordinary Solomon Islanders were already voicing out their deep displeasure, in no uncertain way, by failing each and every government of the day. SIDT's twenty years of Report Cards scored 8 separate governments, starting with Mamaloni's one in 1989, to the Sikua-led group in 2009, with failing grades.

Governments' basic service delivery to the nation's poor majority has been consistently judged inadequate. In these people's Report Cards, citizens marked the governments of the day with a score of much less than a 60% mark. It was the people of the nation who consistently gave the governments of the day these failing grades. Yet, rarely did government listen to their plea and try to lift scores into passing grades.

That is why the NCRA government's plan to bring the natural resources back to the landowners will find difficulty in changing the mind set of those who have governed this nation since the late 1970s..These have so much at stake in how the present system works which awards them so well, to change. They find it hard to accept that the nation's wealth should be more evenly distributed. Our new government has finally detailed its dreams, visions and plans. Some of these plans are good, many, however, are going to be hard to put into practice but at least one plan--"ownership of land revert to the control of resource owners"--will be dangerous to implement. But it must be done to insure that this nation belongs to all and not to the select few.

Parable out of the blue!

2010-10-07T17:57:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

8 October 2010

Honiara

Most Solomon Islanders are already aware that Christ was fond of using the parable. It became his favorite teaching device. As he said more than once, his people were a stiff necked mob; very difficult to accept new ways of thinking. But the parable in his hands became a great tool to penetrate people's inner most thinking, offer a new way of looking at the world or at least undermine the certainty of their convictions. His Good Samaritan parable remains classic.

But the parable never died out! Even today in a Solomons context the parable remains an important teaching tool able to move people to re-look at their lives, to present a different way of understanding events or at least cast doubt on what was often considered unchangeable. Allow me to share with you a parables of an important Solomon Islander taught me more than 40 years ago.

Aliki Nono'ohimae, co-founder of Ma'asina Ruru with Nori, the father of Andrew Nori, lived in a village near Kiu in West Are'are. Our paths crossed many times during the 1960s but the most memorable came in 1968 when a group at the Rohinari mission station planned to erect a major health clinic in that part of Malaita. The building planned would be 30 meters long, 14 meters wide, steel framed with roofing iron and all the things necessary to make for a major construction.

In January of that same year, I called for a major meeting of all the Arahas of the area, including Aliki who was the Paramount Chief of West Are'are and beyond to discuss the construction of this huge building. The meeting was well attended, more than 150 chiefs from as far south as Maka to the north at Hauhui. During the meeting I made three non-negotiable demands: each family had to contribute $10 which at the time was serious money. After a bit of discussion, it was accepted. The second demand--each of the 9 villages involved would send 20-25 workers each week until work on the clinic was completed. This caused much debate but finally it was decided that as difficult as it was, it could be done.

However, my third demand almost proved insurmountable. I asked that the Are'are custom of holding feasts (houra)--marriage, death, compensation feasts, etc.--be suspended for the next 8 months or until the clinic was finished. I knew that even with the little bit of donated money at hand, without a work force the project would have come to grief. A feast given at Wairokai, for instance, would certainly attract hundreds from neighboring villages in Waisis, Rutorea, Kiu, etc. etc. That would mean no work force and lost time!

My explanations on the matter fell on deaf ears. No, said the majority of those present. Such a request was going far beyond what the group could agree to. Arguments for and against raged on for at least an hour with no break through in sight. Then, Aliki raised his hand to speak and the classroom meeting grew quite silent. He asked me: "Are you finished speaking?" My only response had to be a polite yes and I sat down in the front of the classroom waiting for Aliki to deliver his verdict.

Here was the Paramount Chief, fully in charge of custom and tradition, and rightfully accepted as the highest authority in these matters. I was a White Man of only ten years residence in the district and was asking that custom and tradition of many years standing be suspended in favor of building a clinic. The outcome for my plans didn't look particularly bright and already my mind was racing to think how to save the day.

Aliki rose from his seat, strode down the center of the classroom and at the same time he was reaching into the small woven pouch which hung around his neck. As he neared where I was sitting, he stopped, pulled out a 5 pound Australian note (worth $10.00 in Solomons currency) and gently placed it on the table before me. He announced in a loud voice: "Here is my contribution! Talk stops now and work begins tomorrow!"

Everyone in the classroom except myself understood the full meaning of his action. Not only had he blessed the project, he had also made it clear that, although he himself could never use the newly built clinic (in his spirit world, it would be taboo to enter any building where a woman had given birth) he wanted it for his people.

Aliki with minimal words had decreed that in spite of people's important customs and traditions, other forces were of more worth . It took me many months, however, to fully understand the full meaning of his action. As Paramount Chief he, in full public view, had stated that other forces were beginning to work in the area and a new mind set had to take root. His action was a Parable out of the blue!

We all come up together or no one does!

2010-10-07T17:56:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

7 October 2010

Honiara

Our people suffer from a deep, profound and weakening sickness. More than 6 out of every 10 citizens can't read or write. The world around us, including many of our island neighbours, boast of having better literacy rates than ourselves.

The modern age is marked by a transforming information network whereby people on the other side of the world knew as much about ourselves, our nation and our problems as we do. Australia, for instance, is currently spending more than $3 billion to lay fibre optic cables so that even those citizens far from urban centres and living deep in the bush will be connected up. Expensive for sure but absolutely necessary if their nation is to exist far into the 21^st century.

Its thinking is: invest in faster, more secure and reliable information technology or come in a distant second in the Information Revolution. We, on the other hand, don't seem to mind if the bulk of our population remains in the 19^th Century.

This Information Revolution is not about dry, dusty words in some book or other. Nor is it simply a repetition of the old ways of thinking but much faster and quicker through computer use. No, it is truly a Revolution, a brand new way of looking at this fast changing world. It's one of profound new ideas, new ways of thinking. No nation, no matter how rich with its natural wealth of land and sea can long last if more than half of its people are unable to enter the Information Revolution.

Unfortunately, our ruling class—politicians, business elite, educated personnel, moneyed leaders, etc.—feel little unease that most our people are unable to compete in this new world. Our people are crippled with a kind of 'polio' so that it's impossible for them to compete in the Information Revolution race.

Literacy, national leaders say, is a school problem, isn't it? Let the education system come up with worthwhile solutions. We will study them and if found acceptable, we will fund them. Our attention must be focused on more pressing problems like our salary increases, entitlements, housing allowances, etc.

But illiteracy is much more than an education issue or basically about village living. This profound basic issue lies at the heart of why our nation is currently so deeply divided into the 'haves and the have-nots'. What makes our national problem so serious, probably more than in other countries, is the fact that our 'have-nots' are the real owners, controllers and directors of the nation's resources. The 'haves', on the other hand, control little and even the little bit they do have a say in is fast slipping out of their hands, e.g. re-writing of a new Constitution.

But a major step to reversing this serious illiteracy issue is at hand. The present government is seriously studying the idea of establishing Growth Centres in each of the nation's 50 constituencies. A Growth Centre is basically an information hub where villagers will be at the centre of learning. With the use of an FM radio reach out, informing and opening up of new ideas on a daily basis, broadcasting in local language daily for a few hours, our Resource Owners could be energized to embrace the idea of reading and writing.

Already, however, even before a single Growth Centre has been established, different voices are accenting another kind of Growth Centre, one which business, commerce and the almighty dollar are king. Information, yes, it's important but put first things first, these are saying. People are cash poor and getting a bit of cold, hard cash into their hands immediately must be the order of the day.

It makes little impact on this kind of thinking that although the nation already experiences a tsunami of money—3 commercial banks, an expanding work force, new and multi-storied buildings spouting up in Honiara, hundreds of cars, trucks, buses, taxis roam our streets, yet many of our people remain poor. Government itself finds it next to impossible to reign in its spending ways. Supplementary budgets are dwarfing the whole budgetary process.

A Growth Centre, on the other hand, accents the vital need of people's interaction for information, first and foremost. Less we forget, it was only a few years back, that it was the small time worker, village gardener, fisher, etc. who snapped the Solomons economy from below zero in 2002 to take a giant step up to 5.8% in 2003, before RAMSI came on the scene.

All of this economic activity was not driven by government investment, or Honiara business involvement. It came from the small villager's limited information base, a great deal of local enterprise and sheer determination to make things happen for the better.

Literacy is not about 'them'! It is the basic step of the nation to lift itself out of poverty. We can't have part of society 'living high off the hog' while the vast majority sink more and more into poverty.

The Village: An information-poor zone!

2010-09-29T19:46:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

30 September 2010

Honiara

In 21^st century Solomons, village people are cash poor. Unfortunately, this reality has grown over many years, really since the nation's independence in 1978. And it really shouldn't be that way at all since it is they, the villager, who actually own and control the nation's vast mineral, tree, sea and water wealth.

Now that commercial logging is beginning to seriously dry up, government is starting to push the panic button. Its asking itself: Where will it get funds to run the nation—education, medical, salaries, etc.—if its biggest money-spinner no longer generates the necessary cash?

Gold Ridge when it comes on stream will still be at least a year away. The whole mining sector which is just getting on its feet still has a long way to go to imitate the logging industry of the 1990s and 2000s. During those days it furnished government coffers with much of its most needed revenue.

Solomons rural areas with its vast population base—8 out of every 10 islanders—are village based. The Ministry of Finance must be tearing its hair out trying to figure out ways of tapping into this great tax base. Currently most village people are cash poor; they don't have money under their beds, in check accounts at the bank or in their pockets.

So if economic activity could be markedly increased at the village level, then the nation's tax base could be substantially increased and the huge financial hole which the treasury is currently feeling would began to close. Hence, this is the major reason why the present Government and others on the other side of the house are interested, quite interested, in fact, on the idea of Growth Centres.

But the whole idea of starting up a Growth Centre is about bringing the bulk of our people into the 21^st Century which is truly one of access to clear, pertinent and accurate information. Once our people are on the receiving end of this kind of information, then economic activity is not far behind.

Do you remember what happened in the early days of our Social Unrest years—1998-2003? Many Honiara families who se husbands were government employees—teachers, doctors, nurses, ministry workers, etc.—found themselves without a salary on payday. Mothers of families didn't just descend into panic but opened up barbeque stalls, became betel nut sellers, hawked donuts, small cakes, etc.

In other words the economy didn't just dry up just because the government wasn't able to pay its workers on time. People simply took up newly created jobs and remained economically creative. In less than five years, for instance, the growing of flowers, preparing funeral wreaths and doing of flower arrangement became a thriving industry.

Government's dilemma of not having enough cash on hand to run the country shouldn't force it into short cuts. Growth Centres at the constituency level is a sure fire way of generating more and more income for those who have traditionally been overlooked. But the real lack at the village level is less about cold, hard cash but the severe lack of up-to-date, pertinent and clear information about the world about them.

To this date, the olos of our country have never been exposed to a constant and clear understanding why it would be in their best interest to allow their land holdings to be used for development. Four years have now passed since the 2006 signings, when Malaita people were informed how beneficial oil palm plantings would be for them. Yet, not a single oil palm has been planted.

Is it a case of the olos not being able to comprehend or is more likely to do with the constant, continuous and consistent information flow which they have lacked for many years now? The Village still remains an information-poor zone and it has hurt us economically.

Hundreds of islands, dozens of languages but One People!

2010-09-29T19:45:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
28 Sept. 2010
Honiara

The school kids were among my first teachers! I was running a small school (about 250 boarding pupils) in the southern Malaita area during the early 1960s. On a clear day the southern-most tip of Guadalcanal was clear to see. While standing on a near-by reef I pointed out that part of Guale and asked the kids with me what was that large land in the distance?

The kids, almost in chorus, told me: "That's the Solomons!" What about this piece of real estate we were now standing on? Isn't this the Solomons also? "No, this is Malaita!" they confidently informed me. In their minds eyes, then, Malaita and Guale were not only two completely different pieces of real estate; they had very little to do with each other. But that was 1960!

Now 50 years later, most Solomon Islanders are beginning to accept that these different island groupings do form a single country. We have, of course, a long way to go before everyone accepts completely that all these different island groups make up a single nation, one people. But compared to the 1960s we have moved a great distance in our thinking.

Our recent Civil War—1998-2003—attestes to the fact that these hundreds of islands, dozens of languages, many different traditions and customs but a very brief history of oneness continues to be an uphill struggle for the whole nation. Fortunately the present government is not simply sitting by and hoping that the task of forging so many different people into a single nation comes alive. It has publicly informed the people of the nation, for instance, that each MP has been given a significant yearly touring allowance. Visiting villages in one's constituency is a critical way to forge the country into a single nation.

But Government's most important step so far to this end has been its blessing on the idea of establishing Growth Centres for each and every constituency. These centres, however, must be thought primarily as information hubs, places for up-to-date, accurate and empowering information brought to the nation's people constantly, continuously and consistently.

Rural people's most pressing poverty concerns, for instance, have much more to do with not being aware of what's happening throughout their district, province and nationally. Economic life best takes root, depends upon and follows on when a people are made well aware of the different forces in their lives. Isn't that the major reason why so many land owners are reluctant to allow their lands to be developed? Money alone is unable to move them to give permission since they remain unaware and hence unsure what will be the consequences to the lives of their people down through the years.

Although more than 8 out of every 10 people nation-wide do not live in urban centres, and who actually own and control the nation's land, trees, rivers, fishing ground, reefs, etc. remain the least informed even today. Yes, of course, they are certainly cash poor but their most profound poverty has more to do with their information lack. Too often a villager leaves his home site, travels long distances on less than a comfortable ship to reach Honiara in order to re-join that most favoured part of society.

A Growth Centre is an attempt to invest in the village sector with some of the information, services, employment, etc. which we living in the urban parts take for granted. Investing in a Growth Centre is a way of bringing social equity to the bulk of our people so that all citizens bloom. Over a 32 year period and if truth be told even during colonial days, there has been distinct bias favouring one part of the nation over the other. Honiara has absorbed the lion's share of national wealth and has continued to do so at the expense of the well being of all our people.

One of the most effective means of keeping scattered and hard to visit villages is to use broadcast radio. Already some institutions—Don Bosco Society out at Tetere and SIDT here in Honiara—have found that a 3 to 4 hour daily broadcast time in language on a daily basis has increased significantly the information flow to people. Now that Government has allocated money to help Members visit their villagers, a broadcast radio set up in each constituency could only assist in this same work. Rather than a Parliamentarian visiting only 8 to 10 villages each time after a House sitting, the member could inform all his people through radio what exactly the recent sitting was about and how the member had addressed local problems.

A Growth Centre's major purpose is to give the majority of our people a chance to be part of the fashioning of a new Solomon Islands which works for all. For too long only the select few, found in urban centres, have been at the core of doing well while the rest of the nation saw their dreams of a better future falling further and further behind. A new government can implement a program where the majority of our people can look forward to a better and healthier life.

On Judgment Day we won't be asked what we read but what we did!

2010-09-20T17:30:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
21 September 2010
Honiara

Currently, there's much fuss about the fact that one of Danny Philip's cabinet ministers can't read or write. Yes, I too would have been more pleased had the MP selected for that ministerial post, was skilled at reading/writing. Although I have yet to met the man at all, I do know he's self made, runs a successful construction firm and knows how to get the best out of his workers. All these skills are vital in running a vibrant and productive ministry. Good luck to you, Minister!

But I think the public's concern would be better served by focusing attention on more fundamental weaknesses within our political system. Not being able to read/write, though serious, is not in the same league as ex-convicts holding down major political offices, or seriously sick members trying to carry out the duties of office and represent their constituencies and once again our political system's recent rejection at the polling booth of well qualified women all send red-flag signals that our political system needs serious review.

Years ago, I think it was in the late 1980s, Ben Kinika, a Makira man, held the post of Minister of Finance in a Mamaloni-led government. I knew Ben quite well and on one occasion asked him how did the typical member handle the complex, difficult bills coming up for parliamentary debate. I found reading these bills myself a challenge, one that forced me to read and re-read them again and again before fully grasping and understanding them.

Ben shared with me that, yes, a number of MPs had come to his office, some would throw the Bill Paper on his desk and say: "Ben, tell me what does it all mean?" These members had no trouble reading these Bills but understanding them was something else again. At least these Members knew well enough to approach a peer and get a proper and full explanation from a trusted source.

So although illiteracy at such a high level is a worry, there are other issues in our political system that cause more serious concern. The nation now has three ex-convicts holding down senior governmental positions which raises far more serious concern than not knowing how to read/write. The public service, especially at the Permanent Secretary level, is ideally positioned to assist ministers who find it hard to handle technically difficult position papers and such.

Not so the ex-convict! Although a lawfully discharged prisoner has served time and has now been set free, society must accept him back into the community. However, it should also be recognized that many times the community may well demand higher standards of public accountability and, in some cases, a better performance than other parliamentarians who have never been behind bars.

Hence, the former prisoner has a double hurdle to overcome. Not only must he do his ministerial work well but he must also be conscious that not all in society will be willing to listen and follow his directives. Our people are a forgiving lot but find it more difficult to forget which too often colours their response to government requests. The Public Service system has no ready answer to lighten a minister's work load but to constantly remind the world that the minister's previous serious faults have been paid in full.

A third category—seriously sick men—is more tricky. During the 8^th Parliament, 4 sitting parliamentarians died, although relatively young, while in office. Already the present government has suffered the loss of one of its youngest. It's not difficult to predict that more members will die while in office. The question that should be on our leaders minds, however, is how to minimize the number of seriously sick persons from entering the political race in the first place.

While the national Constitution is silent on the issue of physical health, one would think that political parties, the political elite and voters themselves would send a clear directive to all candidates that only persons who have passed a medical fitness test should be eligible for such high office.

The most serious challenge facing the Solomons, however, is the continued rejection of women entering Parliament at all. This error continues on even though its 32 years old. We are basically hurting ourselves, trying to fly with one wing when the rest of the world already knows that unless both wings—men and women—are part of political life, than expect more and more difficulties in the years to come.

The inability of a member to read/write is unfortunate but the system can manage it. Past serious criminal actions open a fragile and slowly steadying governance to stresses and strains it has little experience in handling. A seriously sick member will certainly test not only the individual Member but the constituency which voted him into a position of power. The continued rejection of qualified women, however, is dangerous to the nation's health and well being.

Each of the above challenges sends a message, a mixed one at that. How these are handled over the next four years will determine whether the message is mostly positive rather than negative. What meanings our young people read from these messages, however, will determine the future of our beloved Solomon Islands.

No one wants to be servant!

2010-09-14T18:17:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

15 September 2010

Honiara

Recruiting stewards and stewardesses for international as well as in-country airlines is getting harder and tougher these days. Yes, these airline people like the pay, they love travelling all over the world and they look forward to all the excitement but balk continuously about being servants . . . serving people during the flight.

People, these days, don't want to be considered servants. Leaders, yes! Big Men, certainly! Any title is fine so long as it doesn't have too much connection with service, putting others before oneself. Isn't this part of our national leaders current problem! How they love hearing the title 'Honourable' but find it hard to see themselves, their role and their duty primarily to serve those who have voted them into power!

And this attitude of not accepting that a Member's first and foremost duty is servant introduces dangerous practices. It's so much easier to hand out project proposal funds than making sure that No.9 is functioning well, that the toilets are not overflowing with human waste and the doctors, nurses and technical staff are hard at work, each day, every day.

Much the same could be said about teachers. Rural schools too easily loose out having the necessary teaching staff who are actually in the classroom for five days a week for the 40 weeks of the school term. Members have a duty to the people of his constituency to make sure that this happens.

Our young people cry out constantly for more employment, better jobs and ways of regularly making a few dollars. Waiting for the overseas investor to come in and magically produce these jobs does not work. Yet, parliament has yet to set itself up as a major help in this field. RAMSI, for instance, has poured in more than 6 BILLION dollars (1 Billion Australian) into the Solomons since 2003. Yet we don't have a fruit picking program for our young people in Australia as New Zealand has done in its own country. This is where an active Parliament comes in handy. It has the mandate to create legislation formerly requesting Australia to be as generous in their agriculture areas as they have been through RAMSI.

Over the years, certainly since 1989 when SIDT ran its first Report Card and published the poor survey results over a twenty year period of Report Cards, it became clear that a major shift was happening right under our noses. Parliamentarians were changing their understanding of what was primary and essential as members: law makers, monitoring government's performance, steering the ship of state away from reefs and danger.

But they began to view their work less and less as service to people and what was actually asked of them as law makers, monitors, and managers of the Ship of State. Many were giving higher preference to becoming project supervisors, social welfare workers and walking ATMs dispensing money.

Witness Transparency Solomon Islands recent report of the members of the 8^th parliament. According to its findings, five members could only drag themselves to parliamentary sittings 50% of the time and many, many of them actually participated little in the drafting of national legislation. The vast majority of members hardly ever spoke for or against the 44 bills brought to 8^th parliament.

And the national elections of last month once again underlined the close connection that voters see between Members primary work—legislation, monitoring state work and steering the Ship of state, the MV Solomon Islander--and what is much more secondary—funding project proposals, welfare work and dispensing hand outs.

The 2010 election results speak for themselves. Half of the members of the former house never returned to Parliament. Normally, on average, 44% of members don't make it back to the House. This year, however, there was a major increase in members failing to make it back to their seats.

It is early times for the 9^th Parliament. It can accept itself either as Servant to the people of this nation or continue down a road which has proven disastrous to many ex politicians.

The government truck is all gassed up and ready to roll; its drivers have been hand picked; but, no one is sure where it's going!

2010-09-11T23:47:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

13 September 2010

Honiara

The above statement sums up what is happening in the Solomons these days. The nation is anxious for the newly elected politicians to step up to their work and begin governing. Our elections, thank goodness, went off smoothly. We now know who is in Cabinet, but exactly what direction the nation is headed for is unknown as yet. What does the government think are the most pressing problems the nation faces and how we are going to overcome them remains still a deep, dark secret.

We are told, however, that the newly appointed government is currently working on a draft document, a plan, which outlines its strategies for the next four years. In the meantime, the 19 Crown Ministers who are suppose to direct hundreds of public servants, who are chewing up millions of dollars weekly, are not even at the starting blocks as yet. Yes, they are undoubtedly sitting at their desks but what exactly they will do while waiting for the government plan to roll out, is unclear. Do they carry on with the last government's priorities, experiment with something new, do their own thing or what?

This is no way to head up a government which will be spending millions and millions of tax payer's money in the next few months. The nation can't afford the luxury of waiting until this government plan is publicly unveiled and to find out where we are headed for this year. It's been almost six weeks now since citizens elected the 9th Parliament into office but we are still back in limbo, not knowing how government plans to tackle the many serious national problems. These won't go away any time soon but will become more difficult as the days pile up.

If ever there was a good reason for a strong political party system, some are saying, the present weakness of having to wait almost two months before a government begins to exert its power, proves the point. Yet, when studying the results of the recent poll, politicians themselves don't want political parties either. They feel they can make a better deal going it on their own.They much prefer standing as independents! Only the SIDP (SI Democratic Party), for instance, did well in the last election with 14 of its members gaining seats. Yet, few independent winners decided to cast in their lot with the SIDP.

I think, as in the recent Australian election and earlier this year, the UK election, both sent a clear message to their political masters: 'We don't like the way you've been running the country!' The Solomons voter has sent much the same message to its political elite. Rather than establishing political parties which generate more heat than light, more confrontation than cooperation and more conflict than harmony, do something different the electorate is telling us..

Before independence in 1978, there was little talk, much less action about starting political parties. During those days, Legislative Council business was conducted through a committee system. Politicians with different points of view, sitting in on the same committee, would hammer out compromises rather than having winners and losers. It was less a contest than a way of coming to solutions for hard problems where there was many more winners and a fewer losers. Of course, the committee system takes more time but it produces outcomes better for national life than one that is built on confrontation and conflict rather than harmony. It's a practice much closer to people's customs and practices.

Because of Australia's recent 'hung parliament' where none of the big parties won a majority, there had to be a great deal of 'horse trading' before a government could be formed. What was unthinkable before--working out compromises and cooperation with minor parties and different small groups--became the order of the day. It will be interesting in the next few months to see how Australia and UK work out politics in this new way of governing.

Our own citizens have shown much more wisdom than we give credit for. DSE (Development Services Exchange), for example, just finished a most successful Domestic Poll Watching exercise where every one of the nation's 50 constituencies were covered by trained and dedicated citizens. Locals from the 50 constituencies attended 15% of the 910+ polling stations across the nation on polling day last month. Overseas Poll Watchers some of whom have experienced many other countries' polling days, were surprised and pleased by these villagers who proved to be so professional. The overseas official report about local Poll Watching activity is making its way to the UN and The Commonwealth Foundation.

The nation has come a long way since 1978! Its people are much more experienced, informed and active. They want to be and will determine to be much more of a force in national political life. Writing them off as 'bush', or uneducated or lacking sophistication no longer makes sense. Our political masters will do themselves well and assist our own people in the process if they help this nation live up its full potential. It would be well, then, for the present government to draw in some of its ordinary citizens while the drafting of the new four year plan After all this same plan concerns people's lives and who would be more interested than the people themselves.

Lessons from Australia, UK and USA

2010-08-31T17:54:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

1 September 2010

Honiara

Australia's two leading political parties—Labour and the Coalition—recently found themselves in an awkward position. Not since the early days of World War 2—1940—has the Australian electorate told their political masters 'We don't like the way you do business! You politicians, political bosses and the whole political establishment are more concerned with you own ways than our lives.'

So rather than allow you to continue doing 'business as usual', we refuse to give either of the big parties a majority at all. Go back to parliament's independent members and small party groups, e.g. Green Party , work out a new way of doing politics and then come back to us, the Australian public. Start doing things differently to make our lives better.

And this serious change in politics is happening all over the globe. Earlier this year, British voters told the same story to their own political bosses. 'We won't give any major party—Labour, Conservative or Liberals—a majority to rule. Go back to the drawing board, work out a more sensible way of governing and then get on with the job.'

In three major countries—Australia, UK and last year in USA—the small people of this world have sent an unmistakable message to their political bosses: 'Shape up or ship out!' The old adversarial and confrontational ways of the past three decades has gotten the people of the nation nowhere!'

Isn't that the very message Solomon Islands voters recently sent to its political class in last month's poll? Half the members of the 8^th house were dumped and many newly elected members only got through by the skin of their teeth. Six new members, for instance, could only manage to attract less than 25% of the vote in their constituency. In other words, more than 3 out of every 4 voters—75% of the citizens--chose other candidates than the one who actually won the seat.

To compound events the sudden death of a government backer has already triggered off the latest version of the numbers game. The first order of business is not how to make the country stronger, better or more productive. No,, Solomons citizens will be forced to watch the spectacle of politicians chasing after votes, wooing weak members from the opposite camp with more and more handouts and political parties promising the moon.

Where in all this circus comes the well being of the nation? How does all this 'wheeling and dealing' decrease by a single cent the profound poverty of our people? Our impressionable youth must be shaking their heads in disbelief: 'They say to themselves; These are our national leaders who can't seem to come up with a more inclusive, more transparent, more helpful way of governing?'

Australia currently wrestles with its own set of problems in a 'hung parliament'! UK has had to stitch together a coalition government which is weathering the storm. What should we be doing ourselves? We don't have a 'hung parliament' just the closest thing, a one seat majority which makes the whole enterprise terribly weak. A sudden defection to the other camp, another unexpected death and the numbers game once again comes into play.

Government has within its power to begin a dialogue with the other camp to effect a coalition government, with a iron clan guarantee of no 'no confidence motions' for the next 24 months. During that 2 year period major legislation—youth employment, kick starting village level economic initiatives, adult education to help land owners come to grip with the land issue, women closely engaged in parliamentary business, etc.-- would be tackled head on to reduce our people's worsening poverty levels.

Squabbling politicians, ineffectual leaders and clueless parliamentarians only produces a fractured people, a degraded economy and a dispirited youth population. If much larger countries with long histories of governance are now forced by their own people to become more and more attentive to people's needs, what about our island nation? Don't our own people deserve to get leaders who actually pay attention to people's needs first and foremost!

You've come a long way!

2010-08-26T18:41:00.000-07:00

J. Roughan

27 August 2010

Honiara

Back in the late 1950s, the Solomons boasted of a single media outlet . . . a three hour radio program from Monday through Friday. Even to this day its two distinct voices I remember well were that of Bill Bennett and Ron Calvert, early Solomons announcers. Their five minute news summary at 7:00 in the evening, for instance, was something not to be missed, if you wanted to be up to date and informed about the Solomons of the day.

The country at that time didn't publish a single newspaper. Only a few provincial newsletters run off, now and then, on mimeograph machines were the sum total of the printed word. TV, of course, was years in the future.

Over the past 15 years, however, the Solomons media presence—radio, print, TV—has grown tremendously not only in different ways of getting news, information, national stories, etc. out to the public but more importantly itself has become a major player in its own right in the country's political life.

On Sunday last, for instance, one of the two candidates (Steve Abana) vying for the PM's job failed to front up to a special media event where SIBC, One TV's cameras and a slew of newspaper reporters were poised to ask questions. The hour long program, carried live on SIBC and shown on TV later that same evening, proved a major hit with Honiara's public and those living in provincial capitals who were lucky enough to catch the program.

There was obvious displeasure, however, among many personnel attending the media event and in the general public at large when the invited MP failed to be present at the conference. Fortunately, the missing MP rushed to correct the oversight. He fronted up early the following Tuesday when a hastily called meeting of media personnel gathered to ask questions.

The point of this essay is to show how the Big Men of politics know in their bones that proper media coverage is vital to their political well being. A few decades ago, however, certainly at the turn of the century media's fundament importance to the nation's political life was just beginning to make its mark among our people. Presently, however, its presence is essential to the life of any and all politicians.

Yet too many of our elite class—politicians themselves, party faithful and party bosses—remain stuck in the 20^th century. When the media starts to make noise, demands public appearance of leaders and ask the sticky question, then it is only the veteran politician who rises to the challenge.

But our political leadership should be light years ahead in this important field and be leaders in creating new and exciting ways to make politics and politicians alive and current.

For instance, those connected with political parties should be in the business of preparing touring theatre teams which play act a party's platform before election times. Rather than saturating local newspapers with party manifestos, steal a page out of NGO history and print up three to four thousand Pijin Komiks which graphically share the party's platforms in a rich and more influential way than the long columns of print in local newspapers.

In other words, the whole media scene has expanded out of all expectation during these past 15 years. What was quite small, unimportant and on the side line only a few years ago, has suddenly become vital and necessary in the last few years.

Although many of our people anxiously use the modern means of media, too often leadership lags, falls behind or uses outdated and old technologies. Perhaps in the 1980s and 1990s filling newspapers with party manifestos and political statements were good enough at the time. However, today's media presence is a different kind of reality.

The country has moved on from there and has come a long way in a very short period of time. It is up to our leaders to act as real leaders, look into the future and be ahead of events.

A blessing? A curse? Or something in between?

2010-08-19T23:26:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

21 August 2010

Honiara

Solomon Islanders finally know who is to represent them in Parliament. All 50 constituencies' votes have been counted and people's choice leaders has been determined. In the next few days, when these elected men meet in the Parliament Building, they and they alone will choose who will lead the country and which parties will form government.

However, already it has become clear that many winning parliamentarians already have their own agenda born out of many years work in the world of business. Some MPs currently in parliament have laboured many years in different kinds of businesses—retail, owners of large companies, casinos, ship owners etc.--others are lawyers, accountants, contractors and house builders.

In other words, these dozen or so newly elected are not simple village folk, rural farmers or a bunch of day workers. These newly elected members bring to parliament years of experience in the world of commerce, business and finance. Their commercial expertise will certainly be felt and they will share with the rest of the house how the business part of the world actually works. Their life skills—working tightly within a strictly defined budget, a 24/7 work ethic, closely following work plans, careful managing personnel, willing and able to take risks to strengthen their companies and other skill sets so needed in leading any new government these days will become obvious.

But that very history and years of working hard to make an individual company thrive and be successful has another side as well when viewed from what it takes to run government. For the business person, the Bottom Line—making a profit—, is not simply one goal of many but it is the basic, fundamental goal which drives successful businesses.

For without profit, and one that comes year in and year out, it is hard to see how any business can stay afloat for long. So the Bottom Line, for the business person, is critical and essential. All other goals are at best secondary!

Not so the goal, end and purpose of running the government enterprise. Government is for, by and of the people. It is not another form of business but something quite different. And in a Solomons context, it means that the actual resource owners, the many tribes, lines and people who control more than 90% of the nation's land, rivers, lakes, trees, reefs and fishing grounds cannot simply be treated as clients in need of help or customers to be served for a price. These very citizens are actually partners ready and willing to run the country for the good of the many with their servants, the members of Parliament.

In other words although these resource owners do have some very fundamental needs and face serious weaknesses in their lives, at the same time, they bring to the development dialogue the very core that enables the Solomons to exist in the first place. In a real sense, then, the nation's citizens bring more to the governance enterprise than any plan, fund or input that the politician, government official or aid administrator brings.

When the Solomons State dithered, faltered and failed its citizens spectacularly during five years of turmoil (1998-2003), it wasn't the business sector that saved the nation. It was the villager who just got on with life. In fact, even before RAMSI had ever set foot on our shores, Rick Hou, former governor of Central Bank, in his annual report to the nation in 2003, declared that it was the village person who jump started the economy.

It would be the same as if the customers of a failing business had stepped in, kept the enterprise turning over and made sure it survived during the trouble times. This is what the Solomon Islands people did for the nation during its darkest night. It is these same people, represented by the current members of Parliament, who must be at the forefront of members concern.

Of course the hard learned lessons of private business must find a strong place in this the 9^th parliament. But the purpose, end and goal of government is the well being of all citizens without exception. Its work must not be limited to those who can help government turn a profit. Government is not another form of business but a reality of its own. Marrying the skills of the business world and the work of strong government will be the task of the newly formed 9^th parliament.

The nation's pain remains!

2010-08-10T18:52:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

11 August 2010

Honiara

Congratulations Solomons! Voting for the 9^th parliament members went off smoothly. Yes, we experienced a few hiccups in the vote counting in a few places but the process itself was straight forward, professionally handled and successfully completed. So congratulations one and all!

But the country's major worries—the growing number of poor people in the country, illiteracy of so many of our citizens especially the women and fewer and fewer jobs for young people—have not gone away. In fact, these worries and a host of other problems over the past few months have grown more severe while the nation focused its energies and attention on the election process. The nation's pain remains!

That is why, while the newly elected members are trying to choose a new Prime Minister over the next two weeks, these same members must also focus their attention on national problems as well. Their own constituency, however, over the next few months should necessarily take a back seat to national issues. These very national issues, in many ways, lie at the root of many local problems.

Take the poverty issue, for instance. SIDT has been tracking how the shortage of modest amounts of money among the typical citizen has been affecting their lives since 1989. That's more than 20 years now! While the services of education and health have sometimes scored over the 50% mark a few times in these past 20 years, the one critical area of ordinary life, the availability of money, has remained stubbornly low. Last year's Report Card on the Sikua Government shows that thousands of Solomon Islanders scored the government with only a 45% mark. Since 1989, moreover, no sitting government has ever scored even a 50% mark.

No member on his own, no matter how gifted, how well resourced, can adequately respond to growing poverty levels of our people. Raising people out of the poverty trap is never accomplished by funding individual piggery, copra/cocoa drier, cattle, etc. projects. No! Poverty is a profound deeply seated national issue and parliament alone is best placed to address it through its legislative power and oversight of government's job creation work.

For instance, job creation—on the national and international levels, village and constituency levels, rural and urban—can best be accomplished by vigorous parliamentary action. On the national level, for instance, a parliamentary push to put teeth into a food production economy could yield many new employment opportunities at the village, district and national levels.

At present, each year in fact, many villages across the nation produce tons and tons of mangos, pineapples, lemons, etc. However, this super abundance happens during a short three month period . . . November, December and January. Villagers, one by one, descend upon local markets, all at the same time, to sell their wonderful tropical fruit. There's been little effort to add value to this valuable product.

Yet, we know that if these fruits could be processed—add value by extracting its juice to produce fruit ice blocks—villagers' return on their fruit product would jump in value. Rather than feeding our children on sugar, colouring and water ice blocks, the villager could produce a nutritional fruit drink, something much healthier for them.

In other words, the entire fruit production chain—harvesting, juice extraction, different and new uses of the juice, sale of fruit juice—could create jobs at the village and district levels. This same process could be duplicated with other foods—root crops, nuts, shell fish, fish etc.—so that the Solomon Islands food production ability could be at the centre of an expanding job market of food preparation, storage, transport and experimentation.

The village farmer, most often the woman, is a Solomons response to the need of the private sector to become the most productive job creator as in other parts of the world. Village life is the normal location of the factors for all livelihoods: land ownership, rich soils, ample rain, skilled personnel, a ready and willing work force, etc.

Recognizing a nation's strength—the growing ability to produce ample amounts of food for an expanding population—is not a plan to keep our people 'down on the farm'. On the contrary! It's a workable plan to buy time so that this platform supports other works—schools, community work, local jobs, etc.—to ease the nation's pain.

Dull! Dull! And deadening!

2010-08-10T16:38:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
5 August 2010
Honiara

Ordinary people, Honiara's citizens, are streets ahead of our political elite, political leaders and their parties. Last Wednesday's election showed up the large and growing gap between the political class' perceptions of how to run our country and those who do not have much power except their vote.

While much of Honiara was using up-to-date technology—cell phones, theatre teams, TV coverage , Pijin Komics—politicians, their masters and some of their followers were still bogged down in noisy car cavalcades along Mendana Avenue, picture posters of candidates and circus events.

Last Wednesday our national elections went off quietly, orderly and in general quite smoothly. Our 9th national election went off without any major hitch. Overseas observers as well as local or domestic observers were pleased with people's conduct.

Such an accomplishment is a major step in our country's political maturing which many an African nation would give its back teeth to pull off. But this maturity, this growing in political adulthood has been an uneven thing. In some respects part of our political landscape has grown significantly while other parts less so, much less so.

For instance, while the typical voter easily fitted in with the Polling Station's requirements—searching for one's name on the voters list, standing quietly almost reverentially in line waiting to cast his/her vote and professionally following the direction of the Polling Stations personnel—our political heavy weights seemed to be stuck in the past century.

In Honiara, for instance, candidates and their political parties staged a circus, something that had little or no information values, but was heavy on entertainment. Dozens and dozens of cars, trucks, taxis and buses, paraded up and down Mendana Avenue, blowing their horns, carrying upwards of hundreds of young people, many of them too young to vote.

To what purpose? How was the voting public informed, made more aware of the candidate's understanding of the problems facing the nation, his solutions, his responses to these pressing problems. On election day, I voted in the Central Honiara constituency—where 23 candidates were contesting the election. Of the almost 2 dozen candidates, I only knew four of them well and three others slightly. How I would have loved to have had a chance to listen to a public debated among these candidates!

What was needed, for example, would have been a public debate organized by Honiara City Council where candidates could have publicly debated the city's basic problems, how the candidate planned to work with other parliamentarians to solve them and where the money to tackle these problems would come from.

But Honiara got nothing along this line! What it got was a circus parade of cars, trucks, buses and taxis filled with young people shouting out slogans and indecipherable talk. All of this was happening while the rest of the nation was enjoying the modern miracle of cell phone technology and TV footage, our town politicians and their dull parties could only manage last century's technology: pictures of the candidates face, a few printed words and a circus of vehicles clogging up the streets.

No wonder the $50,000 campaign spending limit seems so small for many candidates. They're spending money on the wrong things. People need to know, to be informed, made aware of and brought up to speed. The last thing they need are spectacles which belong more to the world of entertainment than political understanding and awareness.

SIBC has made great use of reporters travelling out to the Solomons far reaches and reporting back to its headquarters in Rove. The Electoral Commission's use of mobile theatre teams, travelling across the length and breath of the nation, is another good indicator of getting into the 21st century. Back in the late 1980s SIDT pioneered the use of Pijin Komiks to teach villagers complex and difficulty subjects.

What are our political masters doing? They publish pages and pages of difficult political text on their policies, their party's agenda, most of which their own members have failed to read. Why couldn't at least one political party employ some of our clever and gifted cartoonists, to come up with a Pijin Komik which would cover the party's manifestos in picture form?

Newly elected parliamentarians know well your own people have already entered the 21st century. What might have been effective for the 20th century is fast going the way of the dinosaur. Please look around you and listen to your people!

--
Paul Roughan
Chair
Islands Knowledge Institute (IKI)
www.islands-knowledge.org
Unit 17, NPF Plaza
PO Box 1682
Honiara, SOLOMON ISLANDS
+677 28642

We give you a nation blessed with peace! Don't mess it up!

2010-07-31T16:59:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

31 July 2010

Honiara

This Wednesday Solomons people go to the poll to elect the country's 9th Parliament. These newly elected members carry a great burden, some thing greater than their own individual selves. For they have a nation of half-million people, their own wantoks and relatives, in their hands. This nation deserves much more than it has received over the past ten years or so.

First of all, our beloved Solomon Islands,enjoys a profound peace. The idiocy of Civil War which gripped sections of our people from 1998-2003 has passed. The tainted leadership of men with guns who led factions of Guale and Malaita young people has mercifully come to an end.

Unfortunately, however, not all in the country are convinced that the deep levels of poverty, lack of youth jobs and easy money can't be secured through the barrel of the gun. These and other social ills require quick, decisive and comprehensive solutions which only parliament can effectively address. Please don't mess things up!

Ours is truly a blessed country! Food remains abundant, its resource base of thatch, flooring, housing material is more than adequate and the 1/2 million people's health is solid and getting better by the year.

Although poverty levels, especially among villagers and the urban dwellers, remain stubbornly high the means of lowering them rapidly--a food security, processing and value added economy, villager built infrastructure projects, upgraded semi-permanent homes, etc.--are, with strong, dynamic national leadership, open to us.

We certainly are not a poor nation! Even with a severe decline of the forest industry, our copra, cocoa, oil palm, gold and fishing industries are significant big players in the national economy. Of course the revenues these enterprises generate can never be sufficient if 70% of the profit are gobbled up and pocketed by Central Government, Parliament and Honiara's elite.

There never will be enough funds for the nation's actual owners who control the nation's land, trees, fishing grounds, mountains, reefs, etc. but the greed of the political elite, power brokers and dominant ruling class make this impossible.

Solomons 9th Parliament starts off way ahead in the game. Not only does peace abound in the land, it's a peace created by the people themselves. It is not merely a product of RAMSI presence. If village-life wasn't as peaceful as it is then hundreds more of RAMSI personnel would have had to be called in. As it is, fewer and fewer troops and police personnel have been needed because people's peacefulness has dominated the scene.

Our resource base remains as solid as ever. What is needed is careful management, prudent stewardship and creative administrators able and willing to work in the roll as servants and not to insist in always being on top, master and boss.

Newly elected parliamentarians we put into your hands a country still trying to find itself, beaming with confidence and hope for the future knowing full well that it enjoys a hard earned peace and blessed with an abundant of national revenue. Please don't mess it up!. God Bless Solomon Islands.

Jobs! Jobs! And more jobs!

2010-07-28T15:45:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

29 July 2010

Honiara

World wide--workers from Europe, America, China, Japan, etc. etc.--more than 300 million of them, are looking for work but can't find any. In fact, this dramatic job decline is wrecking national economies across the world. No matter how well big companies and businesses are doing, if the unemployment rate is high and staying that way then that nation suffers greatly.

So too with our own country! If the Solomons isn't producing enough jobs--for men and women, young and old, educated and not so well educated--then poverty grows stronger, living standards fall and food becomes more expensive for everyone to buy.

Although there is no magic formula for creating more jobs, certain truths remain basic, fundamental. Government agencies are the least able to create new jobs and when they do, then, these jobs cost too much money to bring on stream. For instance, often a government job demands a permanent house for the worker to live in or at least a healthy housing allowance as well as other perks because the work area is in an urban centre.

Local businesses or the private sector, however, usually make more jobs and at lower cost than the public sector, the government. But in the Solomons, the most powerful private sector is usually over looked. It is the village part of our economy. That's where the major means of production--land, water, planting material, know how and labor abundance--are all based.

But to make more jobs, then, a food security economy has to root within our people's minds. Food security is not merely a matter of more tons of food grown but think of it as a system with links from the crop planting time right up to the moment when it is eaten at the dinner table. The whole food security economy is like a chain with many links each connected to the other and each link strengthening our society with more and more paid employment.

The first three links--planting, harvesting and food storage--are clear enough but little work has been done on the up grading of new storage techniques--drying, smoking and packaging--of the traditional root, fruit and nut crop products. Many southeast Asian countries sun dry cooked root crops, nuts and fruit products. Later on this year, during the November-January period, the country will experience a mango, pineapple and banana over-production which will flow into the urban area and glut the market.

Mango and pineapple prices will tumble because so many of these fruits land in the Central Market at the same time. Imagine if there were a thriving mini-industry which could extend the life of these nutritious food items so that people could have them practically all year long. Isn't it time to get the colored, sugar laced ice block off the market and replace it with healthier fruit juice ice blocks? There's a small industry just waiting to be born and create tens of dozen new jobs nation wide!

Traditional methods of preserving food--kept in dry conditions--extends the life of these products by a few weeks at the most. Sun drying of fruits, nuts and certain root crop is already practiced in the case of peanuts and ngali nuts but much more work along this line must be explored. Fish drying , smoking and salting in brine extend the usefulness of this food product so that it can be transported and sold at centralized markets around the country. All of this kind of activity is the foundation for new jobs and all at the local level.

No longer can we simply depend upon our women farmers and men fishers on their own. A food security economy depends upon many levels of workers producing the necessary food product, preserving or adding value--fruit juices--moving it around the country to feed our growing population and at the same time gaining a meaningful return on their work efforts.

Presently a single food item--imported rice--costs our poor people over $200 million a year. How helpful is this form of 'development' for our long term national health? Our nation can ill afford to send that kind of money overseas to those who already have much more than ourselves. Yet, we continue to follow this destructive 'development' path although our own women farmers have the proven ability to grow, harvest and distribute healthier and better food. The whole chain of production to plate means jobs, jobs and more jobs.

Villagers flex their electoral muscle!

2010-07-24T19:44:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

25 July 2010

Honiara

Come Wednesday next week, Solomon Islands Election Day, more than 250 village people—men and women—will take official seats in more than 150 polling stations. That's about 12% of the total 975 official sites designated by the Electoral Commission. These village people will closely watch the workings of the voting system and monitor how well our electoral system is working.

Having villagers closely involved with the nation's elections, monitoring polling station's officials conduct and judging the validity of the electoral system, is a far cry from what villagers are expected to do. In past years and right up to the present, for instance, a villager's only task, basically, was to turn up early at a polling booth, cast a vote and then disappear. Let the professionals take care of the rest was the common wisdom. Fortunately those days are fast coming to an end and are to be replaced by a new system.

For more than 32 years, the Solomons' political elite have assumed that they and they alone could govern the nation. All that villagers were allowed to do, they decreed, was to cast votes and then get out of the way. Now for the first time in three decades, ordinary people will be closely watching the electoral process right up close. As one of the newly trained poll watchers said: 'This is our country and therefore our election. We want to own all the steps needed to make sure this election is 'free, fair and valid'.'

Back in the 2006 national election, ordinary people attempted for the first time to be more involved in the electoral system, more than simply casting a vote for a candidate. During the last election cycle, for instance, a few dozen locals, mostly youth, witnessed and monitored a few polling stations. This time around, however, the number who will actively monitor polling stations has dramatically increased. The goal of Civil Society by 2015, hopefully, is to have each and every polling station monitored by one man and one woman, people from the area who have the necessary language skills and a long time presence in the area. Such an active presence should make voter fraud, misrepresentation and other irregularities hard to take place when trained and vigilant of local villagers are present.

However, government's recent past performance along this line leaves much to be desired. Governments of the day much preferred to call upon overseas experts and professionals, than call upon their own people to be involved with the electoral system.

In 2006, for instance, 50 overseas observers, who didn't know a single local language nor Pijin, were called into to monitor our national election at a significant cost: $3.3 million to cover their airfares, hotel accommodation, salaries and food needs. This year will be no different except that there could be more than 55 overseas personnel and at higher cost.

Yet, there will be a significant change from what went on in 2006. This election will see many more villagers taking an active part in monitoring the elective process and at significant savings. But this election will see a more involved participation of Solomon Islanders. Not only as voters but Solomon Islanders themselves will be actively monitoring the whole voting process right across the nation. Development Services Exchange (DSE), the premier NGO group representing more than 60 local NGOs, has been busy selecting, training and monitoring more than 60 local trainers who are expected to travel to each and every one of the nation's 50 constituencies this very week.

While in their own constituency, they will train 4 to 6 other villagers—one man and one woman to a polling station—who who will be present for the whole 10 hours that the polling station is opened for business while citizens cast their votes. DSE intends having a presence in every one of the 50 constituencies. It is hoped that by 2015, however, when the next national election rolls around, that each and every polling station would be so covered. This time around the Electoral Commission has designated more than 950 polling stations. For sure, by 2015, that number will have increased!

While it is fine that overseas people are invited in to observe our national poll, it is vital that Solomon Islanders be as actively engaged as well. After all, it is their election! The overseas observer brings special expertise. Many of them have witnessed other national elections and can inform us if our attempts are up there with the rest of the nations of the world. Their experience helps strengthen our system of voting and gives a objective judgement to our law makers for any future changes in national elections.

But local men and women officially participating in the voting process are critical as well. Our poll watchers have never had the experience of being official observers in other nation's elections but their language skills, local experiences and many years of living in the very area of the polling station is without a doubt a big boost to make sure our national poll goes off fairly, freely and validly.

Of course preparing this nation-wide outreach, covering the nation's 50 constituencies, is a complicated, difficult and long term work. Late last year, for instance, this project was conceived, brought to the European Union for possible funding and the Ministry of Home Affairs was made aware that this kind of work was forming. After many dips and changes, a number of international organizations came on board, gave their blessing and most importantly, the necessary funding.

The European Union has been the project's main sponsor with more than $1 million Solomon Dollars donated. UNIFEM, another major sponsor, earmarked SI$70,000 while the UNDP and Commonwealth backed the concept of local poll watchers by sending trainers and giving moral backing. It is hoped that the newly elected members of parliament recognize the sea change that is happening. Local poll watching is another step in the understanding how important the village person is to the health of the nation. Yes, of course feeding the nation with its food production is accepted by those in power. But here is another step in that same direction: enabling the owners of this country, the villager, to flex their electoral muscle as well.

Think Big! Start Small! and Grow!

2010-07-18T16:26:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

19 July 2010

Honiara

These three short sentences sum up Solomon Islands earliest years. Up until 1986, or there about, our national leaders closely followed these three ideals. They dreamt an impossible dream—starting a nation from practically nothing—and then moved slowly and carefully to fashion a young nation which then began to grow.

Our Founding Fathers were courageous enough to take the plunge in forming the Solomon Islands state and they backed up their vision by starting small—creating a parliament from the ground up, forming a workable government, setting things up in order for our small country to take its place among the mighty of the world—and then they began the long and difficult process of growing.

However, along the way, probably 1987, another vision began to root among a new brand of leaders. This new group did Think Big but it was all about themselves. Although all these men, and it was all men, had been village born, housed in leaf houses for most of their lives and raised on basic garden food, they dreamt of leaving the subsistence village life style and jumping straight into an affluent life style. But that could only happen if 'big bucks' were at hand. An education ticket, bought at government expense, of course, prepared them to cope with town life's easy going ways, living in government gifted houses and driving around in expensive cars. It is no wonder that the 500+ candidates are now seeking election, chasing after the 50 parliamentary seats.

These 500+ candidates who are currently banging on the election doors desire to flee village life and head for the pleasures of imported food and drink. Most candidates, unfortunately, are ill prepared to take on the heavy duties of parliamentary work. First of all the majority lack the necessary education levels, not a few of them are seriously sick people and probably more importantly most have little or no public service track record. But where else in the world could one with so little money—a $2,000 election fee—have the possibility of winning a million dollar lottery!

We the voters must be dreaming to think that these very same politicians will have much to do with village life once they safely secure their parliamentary seats. Yes, of course, any politician worth his salt and reading the signs of the times, currently talks about rural development, village life, the Bottom Up Approach, etc., etc. but their hearts are not in it. No, most unfortunately, have their sights fixed on affluence and the more of it as possible.

Also our new set of leaders refused to Start Small but after the 1986 period constantly dreamt of the BTO: the Big Time Operation. Big projects like oil palms, Taiyo cannery, Gold Ridge, Honiara itself were always upper most in their minds. The small, vital and potentially helpful project for thousands and thousands of our people were never seriously considered. We have always been a country with a modest resource base. The country does not have mineral and petroleum wealth. But it has been abundantly enriched by rich soils, ample rain fall, knowledgeable and hard working gardeners who actually feed hundreds of thousands of people on a daily basis.

This more than modest accomplishment of feeding a whole nation for long periods of time have been entirely lost on the new brand of leadership. If the nation doesn't have mineral wealth, they thought, the country did have another valuable commodity for sale, the nation's natural forests. These forests now have been harvested ruthlessly since the mid-1980s and the rape of the land goes on until today.

Since well before independence day and certainly during our Social Unrest Dark Days our women folk have literally fed thousands of the nation's citizens with scarcely a nod of recognition from central authority. This sector should have been the normal, natural and almost automatic area for investment. Just imagine what could now be happening to the nation each year if the glut of pineapple, mango, melon, etc. , could be processed into nutritious fruit drinks. Rather than feeding our smallest ones with coloured water and sugar ice blocks, they would be nutritiously fed and at the same time a new industry—fruit juice ice blocks—would be launched. How many jobs and new businesses could have been created across the nation rather than transporting these fruits long distances to central market areas.

Instead the new type of leadership changed our Founding Fathers motto: Think Big! Start Small! And Grow! They followed their own motto: Think Big (for themselves). Start Big and Take! As someone has said: If you want affluence, prepare for war! Why? Because only the select few will live in affluence while the rest of the nation is reduced to poverty. Isn't this a picture of our recent history? The new political leadership brought affluence to a few but the nation suffered Social Unrest for five long years, 1998-2003.

National systems are stacked against women!

2010-07-14T17:30:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

14 July 2010

Honiara

Ethel Sigimanu, PS of Women's Affairs, recently raised a critical question: Why do so few women ever make it to the national honours list? Last week, on 7 July, our Independence anniversary day, a single woman among seven men was publicly recognized on our annual medal presentation day. But every medal presentation day is always the same—many more men than women. Surely the answer can't be that this one lady was the only candidate that government could find out of the 257,323 (2009 Census) women in the country.

No, the answer lies in the fact that a number of major systems and structures—political, cultural, economic, historical, etc.—are actually and firmly structured against women and their vital interests. Is it by accident that 349 men have sat in parliament since 1978 but only a single woman in these 32 years has beaten the system and made the grade?

Over a three decade period, then, Solomons men have been announcing to the world and in no uncertain terms that they and they alone can safely steer the Ship of State! Women, least of all, should apply! Yet a brief review of men's handling of the Ship Of State is revealing. Their 32 year track record during is filled with many incidences of economic incompetence, political failure and miserable leadership.

Back in 1982, for instance, our currency was as strong as the American dollar. During those days, one Solomons dollar could be exchanged for a US banknote. Now it takes 8 Solomon Islands dollars to buy a single US note if you can find a bank willing to make the exchange. Certainly overseas banks won't touch our currency when you try to use it while travelling overseas. Some of our Pacific neighbours —Samoa and Vanuatu—have had to weather the same financial storms as ourselves over these past years but have escaped the worst poor leadership which we have had to endure.

Unfortunately, this economic mismanagement continues to this day in spite of the nearly one billion dollars Australia pumps into our economy yearly through RAMSI and other aid arrangements. As a matter of fact, Solomon Islands receives more foreign aid per person than any other Pacific Islands nation. What is wrong here? Could women do as badly?

But surely, I hear you say, our members know all these facts and are working furiously to correct the situation. Unfortunately, just the opposite is happening.

Take the issue of illiteracy. Back in 1989, Dr. Mosley, a medical practitioner working for Honiara City Council at the time, conducted a solid survey on literacy rates across the country. Her findings were upsetting: only 24% men could read but women's literacy rates were lower at 19%. With such poor literacy rates, you would think that Parliament would have long ago set up a strong literacy campaign. In today's world, no nation can safely exist if its citizens are unable to read or write. Yet, none of our political leaders and no political party could bring themselves to galvanize the nation into a major literacy campaign to raise literacy rates across the nation.

Yet, these same leaders are calling for more government money for university education when their own people, especially their own women, rarely enjoy adult education classes and instruction. There is no short cut to creating a strong nation. Focusing on the training and education of a select few at the expense of the many is a recipe for failure.

But the most dangerous thing about a nation unwilling to raise all its citizens equally is severe social unrest. We have already witnessed this very situation during the 1998-2003 period. Make no mistake about it, besides the poor development planning, deadly levels of corruption, land mismanagement, lack of solid leadership at all levels and money politics, the down grading of women is no less central in explaining why our nation went off the social rails during our unrest years.

Finding a proper place for women in our parliament must never be viewed as a luxury. Our nation needs their experience, insights and strengths to insure that our nation actually flies with two wings and is not grounded permanently in the mud.

Focus on track records. Forget the toktok!

2010-07-04T15:52:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
5 July 2010
Honiara

Most political parties are currently busy publishing lists of their preferred candidates who will stand for the party in the 4 August national election. Unfortunately when I read the names of former parliamentarians—those who sat in the nation's 8th Parliament—some should never appear in any party's candidate list.

Today's political parties have inherited a great tool for weighing up who should be included in the list of preferred candidates and who should never make the list at all. Transparency Solomon Islands did a marvellous job of studying which member of the recently dissolved parliament had attended sittings and how many times a member had contributed to the passing of legislation.

TSI's report covers the full four years of the 8th Parliament. Unfortunately, It makes for less than happy reading. Five members, for instance, could only drag themselves to the parliament building less than 50% of the time while national debate was going on. Another 13 members missed out on more than 30% of the time. Attending parliamentary sittings is a member's most important task. Everything else is secondary!

What's more upsetting however, many members not only missed out showing up at Parliament sittings but when they finally did get there rarely had anything to say. When it comes to actually participating in the legislative practice, they were conspicuous by their lack of adding anything to the process. For all intents and purposes, most parliamentarians added little to the legislative debate and simply sat mute in their chairs.

For instance, only 14 Parliamentarians had little to say in a third of the bills. The vast majority of members hardly ever spoke for or against the 44 bills brought to parliament. Solomon Islands uses representative democracy to govern. This means that its representatives—the Parliamentarians—have the right and the duty to speak on behalf of those whom he represents in parliament.

Not to speak up, to fail to be part of the public discussion and not to represent one's people during parliamentary debate times is a fundamental weakness among our elected members. Pushing development projects, acting like welfare officers or functioning as a walking ATM dishing out money is not the essential work of parliamentarians.

All of these kinds of work can and should be done by others. What can't be accomplished by others—representing voters in parliament,—can only be done by the elected member himself. All other works are simply secondary to the most important role of the Member, attending parliamentary meetings and participating in its debates.

It's important, then, for political parties to cast a serious and critical eye over candidates whom they wish voters to seriously consider when voting in a national election. Many potential candidates' track record on public service and leadership quality are hard to come by. But political parties have been given a gold mine with Transparency Solomon Islands findings. Its study makes it clear which members were serious about their commitment to parliament's essential work and who weren't.

Poor health, chronic sicknesses and serious physical weaknesses are other signs that a person is unfit to carry the heavy work of the parliamentarian. David Sitai's decision not to run in this upcoming election was a brave one. He had been one of the longest serving members of parliament since 1978. I wish that others who are just as sick as he make the same decision and allow their constituencies to be represented by some one of robust health, able to do the onerous work of being a Parliamentarian.

Put your money where your mouth is!

2010-06-21T15:41:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

22 June 2010

Honiara

In most parts of the world, if you are really serious about what you are saying and you want to see things go ahead, then the person backs up the words from the mouth by investing real, hard cash in the enterprise. If something is so important that you constantly talk about it, then, as the words above say: "Put your money where your mouth is!"

More than a dozen political parties, some new and some quite old, are currently in vigorous campaign mode. Some parties have simply confined themselves to words on the radio or newspaper write ups, while others are actually touring the provinces, holding meetings in provincial capitals and are seriously engaging rural populations on the merits of their party's political agenda.

Each and every political party, however, has one thing in common. At lease for this election they are all saying that the rural person, ( I would prefer if they would speak about villagers), is the most important person in these islands. Finally, at last, the political establishment is correctly reading the reality of the Solomons. Villagers, through their liens, tribes and clans, actually own the lion's share of this nation's land, trees, rivers, reefs, fishing grounds, etc. Unlike many other nations--Australia, New Zealand, America, etc.--Solomon Islanders do control more than 90% of this country. The government owns less than 5% of the land! The 29,000 sq. kilometers of land surface, and according to the majority of land owners, the riches beneath the surface of these islands, is owned, controlled and more and more directed by village people.

It's taken more than 30 years of independence and a mini civil war for our political class, educated elite and power brokers to realize the basic fact that Solomon Islanders through their clans are the real and only owners of the nation. Now for the first time it seems that this message has finally made headway with our leaders and they are beginning to craft policies which will help villagers get ahead.

But words floating in the air mean nothing unless they are put into practice. Hence, the expression: Put your money where your mouth is!" The worst thing that could happen from this up coming election in August is to stick with words alone and not immediately put into action the political party's manifesto when it comes to putting rural people first.

May I suggest here that the first thing done on the day after the election is for each newly elected member to appoint an Action Committee for his constituency to flesh out the details of a Growth Centre which would have three separate but closely tied functions?

1st: Create a communications hub where villagers of the constituency would have telephone access with the rest of the nation. The real owners of this country, although rich in resources, are terribly poor in getting rapid, clear and precise information about what is happening in other parts of the nation. With the advent of the newest telecommunication outfit, beMobile, it would be a treasure for this new company to be in on the ground floor in the establishment of newly formed growth centres. The newly elected member of parliament would be in an excellent position to pressure the new telecommunications company to set up a telephone system in the member's newly founded Growth Centre.

2nd: Part and parcel for a well functioning Growth Center would be to cluster basic people's services--postal, banking, repair, information, police post, clinic, government offices, etc.--which villagers would be able to access rather than having to travel over to Honiara or provincial capitals for each and every need. Up to 80% of villagers' service needs could be operational within a well functioning Growth Centre. Many services, rather than being physical buildings, could rely at the beginning on the use of a mobile phone system. In many parts of Africa, for instance, banking takes place over the phone and not in a bank building as such.

3rd: Establish a competent research unit made up of Solomon Islands' graduates and secondary students whose duty would be to gather vital information through a series of on-going surveys and research work to help the newly elected Member and the people of a constituency know quickly and readily what are the area's vital statistics, facts and information needed to make sound decisions. Every member needs a competent research unit to help establish vital, up to date and pertinent information to help the member formulate sound policies for his people.

By setting up all of these functions means creating jobs, employment and casual labor. A Growth Centre need not wait for a government handout to get started. Member's RCDF and other cash grants should be his first investment priority and over a four year period the Growth Centre could grow and become more useful for the very people who own the Solomons. Such investment would be an excellent example of: Putting money where the mouth is.

Myths driving our politicians (3)

2010-06-18T19:49:00.000-07:00

J. Roughan

21 June 2010

Honiara

Over the past two weeks we have been exploring some of the major myths--a notion that contains some truth inside it but is also filled with error, misinformation and falsehood--which are driving our current politicians. These myths centre on the development funds in the hands of parliamentarians. .

The first myth (12 June article) is about the idea that the most important work of a parliamentarian is to handle well the many development funds coming his way. However, it's clear from past election results that just the opposite is true. The more funds a Member distributes the harder it is for him to return to parliament. In 1997, for instance, over half of the members never returned to their seat. While in the 2001 election, the fall out was worse . . .64% of sitting members failed to make it back into office.

Last week's article explored the myth that raising people's quality of life came about in how well and how much the member could focus his attention and energies on development funds. Once again, not true!

Most citizens need and want to see the quality of their lives made stronger but they speak primarily of quality education opportunities, well stocked clinics and hospitals, assistance in their resource base and chances of gaining modest but assured amounts of money. Of course they are happy to see the funding of projects but these are not their top priority.

Two separate surveys--one from Canberra and the second from SIDT--both made the point that government failure in the nation's social infra- structure was more important than project funding. SIDT's eight Report Cards over a twenty year period makes it clear that people's quality of life issues are at the heart of their concern. Project funding, at the expense of people's fundamental quality of life issues, is going the wrong way.

# Myth 3

A member's best chance of winning back his parliamentary seat lies in his ability to distribute well and much development aid as possible. Other works--passing worth while national legislation, keeping government on its toes, monitoring government policies in the field and bringing to parliament strong views--are all seen as secondary, almost redundant, to many members of parliament. The poor attendance record by many parliamentarians and the thinness of their debate on matters of national interest over the past four years indicates where their hearts are.

Facts:

Although development funds handed out to members of parliament have substantially increased over the past few years, regaining one's seat in parliament has become more and more difficult. As mentioned above, on average, more than 44% of all sitting members lose their seats in any national election while in two recent elections--1997 and 2001--the failure rate soared. Come August this year the nation will witness even more members failing to carry their seats in spite of literally millions of dollars dispensed for projects by members.

Many of our parliamentarians do work hard but they focus their energies on the wrong things. They have not been elected to act as project coordinators/managers, certainly not to work as social welfare officers handing out funds for school fees, travel fares, medical visits, etc. and walking around like Automatic Teller Machines dispensing money to their constituents.

The nation's problems have much more to do with reducing poverty, creating more jobs especially for youth, strengthening our resource base of agriculture and fisheries and by adding value to our food and fish production. But these goals are not addressed by focusing on project funds for development as needed as it is. But dynamic and creative members of parliament could make a major dent in working for new job opportunities. For example, pushing for and insisting on overseas employment chances--fruit picking in New Zealand and Australia, home care in Canada, Taiwan and others should be the 'bread and butter' of parliament and its work.

Our members have been turning aside from these works and substituting other kinds of work which, as important as they may be, are not parliament's first task. The well being of the nation is and that's in the hands and hearts of our members.

Myths drive our politicians!

2010-06-07T14:56:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

7 June 2010

Honiara

It would do parliamentarians and those running for high office a great deal of good for themselves, but especially for the nation, if those seeking to be Members to thoroughly study why so many act the way they do. National elections, due this August, will probably vote in more new Members than old ones who are looking to come back to the House. This is the time, then, for all of them to take stock of their motives for seeking high office.

A myth is a notion that has some truth inside it but it is so surrounded by half-truths, falsehoods and errors, that it is often hard to separate the good from the bad. A popular myth in the beginning of the last century, for instance, had it that the Whiteman was better than those of an other color. Such an idea is understood as nonsense today but it did have its believers for a while. Our parliamentarians also carry around in their heads a set of myths which when deeply studied turn out to be false or at least misleading.

# Myth 1

A successful MP is one whose first task is to properly handle the RCDF funds (as well as the other money schemes:e.g. Rural Livelihood, Millennium, Special Mini Projects, Parliament Mini Project Funds).

FACTS

Although development monies given to Members have increased a great deal over the years--$400,000 in 1993 when the scheme first started to today's $2 million--the number of parliamentarians returning to the House after an election have gone down in number not up. At each national election, approximately 4 out of every 10 members are never re-elected. That number has stayed the same over past national elections. However, in the 1997 and 2001 elections, more members than ever lost their seats, although funding administered by Members had grown substantially, more and more of them have lost their seats in parliament. In 1997, 51% never returned while in 2001, the number of Members losing their seats rose to 64%!

If development funds were so critical to voters to help them gauge whether their member was doing well, one would be forgiven for thinking that the Members should easily gain back their seats because this development fund base was increasing, not decreasing. But as stated in the above paragraph, that has not been true.

Of course MPs mismanagement of development funds has become part of the current political picture. Some constituencies are already calling in the Courts to demand that their Member show how and where all the funds given have been properly accounted for.These cases have not come to trial as yet but when they do, it will show that properly handled RCDF funds is a two-edged sword--able to cut two ways.

Unfortunately, managing development funds has become, in the minds of many members and not a few of their voters, the most important aspect of judging whether the person is a good parliamentarian or not. Out the window has gone the idea that a member is first and foremost a law maker, keeps the government on its toes and guides sound policy for the good of the whole nation.

Isn't this why so many parliamentarians have been failing to turn up in chamber and when they do decide to be present hardly say a word in the debate which they are voted into office for? Transparency Solomon Islands recent study of Members poor daily attendance at Parliament was shocking. But worse still was the fact that few Members had anything to say about the laws that were past.

Next week I want to uncover a few more myths which are driving our politicians to act the way they do. No one is saying that proper care should not be given to development funds. But that's not the job of Parliamentarians. Their duty is much higher: to be our representatives in the highest reaches of government. Leave project management, social welfare work and acting like walking ATMs for those who are better prepared.

Competion is good for the soul!

2010-06-07T14:55:00.003-07:00

J. Roughan

31 May 2010

Honiara

Last week's essay--The Solomons biggest problem: Honiara--explained how our fastest growing, mega city has been driving the rest of the country down the wrong path for more than 30 years. That essay made it clear that Honiara will not easily change its ways, nor cease demanding more and more resources to feed its life style and will never be shy about pushing its weight around to make sure that things stay that way long into the future.

It would be wonderful, however, to report that with the new bunch of MPs elected into their positions in the up coming national poll in mid-year and marching off to the Big House on the Hill, things would indeed change. Don't hold your breath! It's not that this new crop of MPs are bad people, only out to fill their pockets and give little attention to the small people. It's the system! More than words are needed to bring change. That's why a healthy dose of competition could make a world of difference.

What kind of competition? Our nation has 50 constituencies, the backbone of our political system. Up to recent times, however, the monies and resources given to individual MPs have hardly made any lasting impression in their home grounds. In most places, it would be hard to take a photo of anything new or special in any of the constituencies. It seems that the $2 million a year pumped into these constituencies should have worked a miracle or two by now. $2 million yearly is a whole lot of money and if wisely invested in each of constituency, it could begin to make a big difference in how this country could be run for the health and welfare of the majority of our people.

Take for instance people's desperate need in these rural outposts to have a fair access to a phone service, banking facility, an information centre, a fully equipped medical outpost staffed by a doctor, a thriving food centre, etc. to bring to rural people some of the very services we in Honiara take for granted on a daily basis. Our people, on the other hand, must travel great distances, pay high ship fares and spend serious time away from their families for the simplest of services we in Honiara take for granted.

Other countries already boast of setting up these services in places called GROWTH CENTERS. Yes, villagers do like to come to Honiara but usually its for a distinct and clear purpose. They simply don't travel on uncomfortable ships for hours at a time costing a high price for the sheer joy of coming over to town. Usually these people time their journey visit so as to check in with a doctor, fix up their eyes/teeth/ears, do a bit of banking, find out about the extended family, check a child's progress in school, etc. etc.

If, however, many of these same services were firmly imbedded in a local GROWTH CENTRE, fewer and fewer of our people would be forced to travel long hours, on expensive, uncomfortable ships and then seek a place to sleep at the end of their journey. Part of the problem of why Honiara grew more than 30 times over the past 50 years, was it never really faced any kind of competition from the provinces. If a villager needed medical assistance, information, understanding, there was only way to achieve it:: travel to Honiara or do without the assistance.

And the time for the establishment of provincial GROWTH CENTERS seems to be well timed. Our new bunch of parliamentarians would be open to new, innovative ideas since the old method of MPs doling out bits and pieces of money but seeing little difference in their people's life style has gotten them nowhere. beMobile, the newest telephone company, will be rolling out its mobile phones about the same time as our new parliament is taking root. What better time than to make a deal with this new communication giant to be at the heart of any GROWTH CENTRE.

Of course a centre which brings together 'under one roof', as it were, information technology, banking, medical and other services also becomes by definition a job centre as well. Yes, some of these higher services would require specialists but at least half of all jobs--building, plumbing, electrical trades, food outlets, trucking, markets, accommodation, etc. would have to root in such centers. Up wards of 50-70 new jobs could be created by the formation of such centers.

In past years, an MP thinking along this line of drawing together many services for his people, ran into a fundamental problem: where does the money for this growth come from. Now that each and every MP is on the receiving end of a large grant, surely, over a four year period, large amounts of these grant monies could be focused on building up a service base which our people so desperately need. Once these centers begin to root, for the first time in Solomons recent history, Honiara would face stiff completion which would make it less and less attractive to the rest of the country. Perhaps then, MPs would truly make their own constituency their home base, NOT Honiara!

The Solomons biggest problem

2010-06-07T14:55:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

25 May 2010

Honiara

Honiara was my port of call--planes landed at Henderson only once every other week--when I first arrived in the Solomons in 1958. At the time, Honiara was truly a small town. It boasted of 2,300 people, about the same number that visit Central Market on a busy Saturday morning. Our 2009 Census hasn't come out with its report as yet but don't be surprised to read that this urban centre has reached the 80,000 mark. The last 50 years has seen tremendous growth, from a small town to a mid-sized city. In five decades, then, Honiara has increased its population about 35 times.

But our country is a Nation of Villages! 8 out of 10 citizens actively live village life. The basics of normal life--food, shelter, medicine, water, recreation, etc.--are found in the village. Not so in Honiara where the almighty dollar reigns supreme. A villager at home can go a whole day without ever buying a thing but it's next to impossible to live in town without deep, full pockets.

But give credit where credit is due. Honiara's rapid growth over very few years has helped Solomons people to become a nation. No other town--Auki, Kira Kira, Buala, Gizo, etc.--could have accomplished this work. But our current independence has come with a price tag, a rather high price tag. There has been an over centralization, over concentration of goods, services, wealth and influence in this one part of the nation and it has come at the expense of the rest of the country.

Honiara has not only become big but some would say fat and bloated. More than 90% of all commercial activity takes place in the tiny area between Henderson in the East and White River in the West. While favorable arguments for this fact can be made, the outcome for the nation has been less than helpful. The village is too often seen by Honiara's political elite as something foreign while the real Solomons is here in town. In other words, we are seeing the growth of two kinds of Solomon Islanders: those living in Honiara and the rest of the nation in the village.

But that type of growth was never part of the our Founding Fathers original vision. Our first years of independence--1978-1982--focused on establishing a workable state with the election of parliament members, passing laws, setting up ministries, etc. Nation building, it was thought, would come quickly enough once the trappings of statehood were firmly in place.

Unfortunately, however, by the mid-1980s some of the more powerful leaders of the time had another vision, round tree logging exports. This type of development was suppose to bring great material advances to those most in need, the villager. But just the opposite happened. SIDT's 8 Report Cards dating back to 1989 and stretching into 2009, twenty years of surveys, showed that from the people's point of view government after government was failing them. Services of quality education, strong medical attention, resource assistance and availability of money were growing weak and in many cases becoming non existent.

As Honiara grew, became more important and more dominating in Solomon Islanders lives, the village, the backbone of local society, was weakening and growing poorer. For example, the annual average revenue given to all 9 provinces between the years 1995-2000 was $96.6 million out of a national annual average of $336.3 million. Honiara alone absorbed almost $240 million each year. Honiara's domination of national wealth had resulted in a 70%/30% split with the lion's share going to the city. No wonder that provincial advancement has proven to be so difficult.

But this type of domination happened again last week. The World Bank plans to pump into Honiara almost $24 million over a five year period to tackle youth unemployment. Great! Good! But youth unemployment is a national issue and must be fought in all the provinces. If only one place--Honiara--gets funding then youth will simply flood over to town to get a job. Honiara's poorest people will then to asked to pick up the pieces since many youth will lodge themselves with their wantoks who already find it hard to feed and care for close family members. The last thing they need is another few mouths to feed and care for on a daily basis.

Parliament is the primary source of those who think that if Honiara grows bigger and fatter, it means that the country is also thriving. In parliament's last session in April, for example, it tried to increase its membership from 50 to 67 but fortunately did not succeed because the extra funding needed for these seats didn't exist. But this is the kind of strict diet which the country must use more and more. Honiara's tendency is to demand more and more without fully realizing what such demands do to the rest of the people of the nation.

The Respect Ruler: Early Warning System?

2010-06-07T14:54:00.003-07:00

J. Roughan

18 May 2010

Honiara

An early lesson Solomon Islanders taught me many years ago was about the importance of showing proper respect. Of course the customs and traditions of my own people also put great weight on the need to show respect for the other. From my earliest days, then, even as a child, I was taught to say thank you, please, pardon me, etc.etc. Not to do so, failure to say thank you when given something, for instance, showed a serious lack of respect.

In other words, courtesy, good manners and hence, respect were shown to others--those older than myself, my playmates, in fact all other people --were respected both in my verbal as well as my outward behavior. Not to do so was considered a social 'sin' and in some cases, simply rude and not to be tolerated.

However, in a Solomons context respect for the other, as I continue to learn, covers much more than mere public courtesy and certain social expressions. Respect means something deeper and more profound than saying some proper words and showing certain gestures. Respect for the other, his culture, relatives, history, was something that went deeper and had much more profound meaning than the mere saying "Sorry!" when another was hurt by words or a "Thank you!" for the unexpected gift.

Respect goes to the heart of how we publicly accept the other. Mere words, no matter how well said, hardly touch the core meaning of respect in the local context. It's made up of our whole approach to the other and our very life style which speaks much to our understanding of what we mean by showing respect to another.

But these words are not being written here to present a lesson on courtesy, public conduct and respect but something much more important. It's about our up coming national elections which will be upon us by the end of July or there about. Are we ready for them or not? Our 2006 election went off well, no violence and the nation conducted a 'free, fair and valid' election. But right after a calm, correct election came the 18/19 April 2006 Chinatown Burn Down, when a riotous mob burnt Honiara's Chinatown to the ground.

What special things has the nation done in the past four years so that such trouble won't befall us once again. If I could only point to a government sponsored Youth Employment Bill which had been created to produce thousands of jobs yearly, I would sleep a great deal more peacefully. But since 2006, I can't pin point one government initiative that would make this up coming election period a safe and secure one. Just the opposite!

Over the past few months, I have been using my own Respect Ruler to gauge how well or how poorly our young people have been acting in public space to conduct themselves. I have a feeling that our next riot will come from our young people who have been so pushed to society's sidelines. Most of them are desperately looking for work, even low paid jobs, but in our present economic slowdown, even such jobs are few and far between. As in the 1989 Riot, bored and discouraged youth are prime candidates to seek trouble. As one youth I interviewed back in 1989, said when asked why he had joined in the riot, "Nothing to lose and a good chance to pick something up worth while!"

Little things like poor public actions at Honiara's Main Market, stoning cars driving along the road at night, verbal abuse in Honiara's streets, jumping bank lines to get first, car/bus/taxi driver conduct along Honiara's roads, blocking back roads to force drivers to pay a 'road tax', etc. have been chosen for my Respect Ruler. All these actions are socially negative, cause unneeded publicly distress and are far from friendly.

These actions and others like them, I find, are on the rise and are making an appearance on my Respect Ruler. Are these actions fair examples showing that youth and the not too young are leaning towards trouble come election day? Perhaps there are more important early warning signals of trouble to come but I'm sure our authorities should be sensitive to them and preparing themselves if and when serious trouble raises its ugly head.

Cats can't talk because they have no eyebrows!

2010-06-07T14:54:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

11 May 2010

Honiara

An early lesson Solomon Islanders taught me when I first landed on Honiara's shores many years ago is that the locals are fond of using their eyebrows and the rest of their face to send messages. Of course, people here use many languages, more than 60 at last count, but their ability to use their facial muscles to send out messages is second to none.

Strangers to these isles soon find that answers to questions come more often than not from the flick of an eyebrow, a lift of the brow or a widening of the eyes. In a real sense, then, the lift and lowering of eyebrows and widening of the brow acts like another language. It's a language, however, that the eye alone catches but the ear misses completely. In the Solomons, then, one needs to pay great attention to the many messages sent by the eyebrow and face as well as those spoken out loud by the tongue. Shouldn't the nation employ this rich resource to the fullest?

Unfortunately, however, our political masters place much more emphasis on the overseas poll watchers rather than recruiting citizens right under their noses. In 2006, approximately 50 overseas personnel, using a budget of more than $3.3 million, parachuted into our country to be present at the national elections. Our leaders didn't seem bothered at all that these overseas personnel didn't speak a single local language, knew hardly a word of Pijin and were quite ignorant of our customs. Of course they never heard of the islanders' ability to communicate through eyebrows, eyes and face.

Yet, at the end of the day it was this team of overseas experts who verified that our 2006 election was 'free, fair and valid' having visited only a handful of polling stations and being present a few hours at the most in any single polling station.

It seems only sensible, then, that when polling date rolls around in the middle of the year, that local people with their language skills should be the major part of the monitoring system at each and every polling station across the nation. The nation has thousands upon thousands of people, young and old, men and women, who look forward to be part of the up coming national election, so vital to the country, if given a chance.

In 2006, for instance, just before our last national election, SIDT organized more than 140 young people who were primed and trained to be present at a handful of polling stations. With no budget, not even enough to give these volunteers bus fare, to help them turn up at SIDT's weekly training session, these young people were eager to assist at polling stations to insure that the election went off 'freely, fairly and validly'.

This time around, however, we hope things will be different. To prepare for this election, SIDT has submitted to the Ministry of Home Affairs a project proposal to train up approximately 2,000 local poll watchers. In the 2006, there was 970 polling stations but with the increase in population the number of official polling stations will probably rise to something close to 1,000.

The project proposal plans to place two locals--one man and one woman--in each polling booth station who would remain at post for the complete 10 hours while voting takes place. These poll watchers would be drawn from their own area where their language abilities--both verbal and non verbal--would come into play. As important, the funding sought--$2 million--would be supplied from outside donors and not burden the government of the day.

There is little time left to get this work on the way. Of course, bring in outside poll watchers but have them team up with local people who are already at post. Final reports coming from a combination of local and overseas personnel would carry the necessary weight verifying that the election was indeed, 'free, fair and valid'. Solomon Islands citizens with their great language skills, both those of the tongue and body, would out perform any overseas expert on their own and be a whole lot cheaper. Unlike cats, however, Solomon Islanders with their eyebrows and all could do a marvelous job in keeping this next national election on the right path.

Political parties finally catching up?

2010-06-07T14:53:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

5 May 2010

Honiara

Well before independence day in 1978, in fact hundreds of years before that date, the heart of Solomons life was already found in village living. Not only were most Solomon Islanders village born, but the vast majority of them lived their full lives in and in most cases died in these very same sites. Yes, these living sites were much smaller than present day villages, probably better termed hamlets, but villages still the same. And in a profound sense, village life continues to be at the centre of our people's everyday lives. Our political parties, at long last, have turned a corner, now publicly recognize this major sociological fact and are currently inviting themselves to the party.

Unfortunately, our political party personnel still can't speak about villagers but prefer to call these people rural dwellers, grassroots folk, etc. when what they really are talking about are men, women and children who live life to the fullest in a village setting. For a village is not simply a person's residential site, a place to sleep, but is a shorthand meaning for a completely different way of living than found in more developed parts of the world. Village is a symbol of and code word for the reality in which the overwhelming majority of our people choose to live.

The Solomons, then, is best and most profoundly defined as a nation of villagers. 84%+ of our people live, work and exist in these settlements which are much more than dormitory sites. Children are born, grow up and dwell in a particular a village setting because it's very location attests to the presence of life's essential resource base--food, water, shelter, medicine, fuel, etc. etc.

But culture, politics, economics, life education, security, world view, etc. and other essentials are also part and parcel of the typical village life as well. In other words, cultural, physical and mental basics of island living are found in the village setting. So it is with great satisfaction to finally read in newspapers and listen to on the radio that more and more political parties are at last turning their antenna towards this living reality of Solomons life.

In recent past years, both the Sogavare--Bottom Up Approach--and Sikua--Rural Advancement--governments have fully accepted the idea that our nation will make little headway in development and nation-building until and when the majority of our citizens' lives--read village lives--are at the centre of government concern. More recently, the People's Alliance Party (PAP) took this concern a step further. It made it clear that to insure ordinary people's lives are front and centre in government's thinking then the national budget must reflect that reality.

PAP detailed its deep concern for the villager by publicly disclosing how it would allocate funding to the betterment of people's lives. Overall, in the first year of its presence in office, PAP intends to increase financial allocation to the nine provinces by 5 times. From a bit more than $37 million yearly to almost $200 million a year. Such a bold step, putting in clear terms, what it costs to re-allocate funding to the majority of citizens away from Honiara's elite.

But more than money is at stake here! Of course, over the three decades which the Solomons has eked out its existence as a nation state, the bulk of national monetary wealth was cornered by a select few, found mostly in Honiara who are closely connected to its political establishment. For example, the annual average revenue given to the nine provinces between the years 1995-2000 (a five year period) was $96.6 million out of a national annual average of $336.2 million. This unfair distribution resulted in a vertical split of 29% to the nine provinces and 71% to Central Government.

At the heart of any explanation of our country's Social Unrest years in 1998-2003 can be traced to this terrible 70/30 split of national wealth to a select few which made sure it received the lion's share while the Poor's pockets received a lot less. If political parties begin to address this severe injustice by putting the village first and re-allocating financial assistance in that direction, then, the Solomons will begin to respond to its need to become a strong state.

But along with any re-allocation of funding towards the bulk of our people's lives must come a re-education program of our political masters, politicians and national decision makers. Money, funding and re-allocation of grants on their own without a revamping of our leaders mind set will fail. For more than 30 years now, Honiara and all it stands for has been the main winner for the country's vast wealth. Most newly elected members to parliament certainly think that way since it is the main reason why these men have decided to try their luck in the up coming election. The last thing they would look forward to is a revamping of the financial pie with larger and larger slices going to any one else than themselves. The nation has a major fight on its hands starting the middle of this year.

National Food Security is much more than agricultural issue.

2010-06-07T14:52:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

27 April 2010

Honiara

Last week Vanuatu hosted a Pacific Island agricultural minister's conference with many food experts in attendance. For a full week, serious toktok about Food Security became the focus of their discussions. Every island nation of the region, they agreed, currently faces growing serious food shortages. Island populations without exception are expanding fast and more and more scarce lands are pulled into production to feed all these new mouths. Yet outside food sources have not only become more expensive but are more and more unreliable to import.

Less than two years ago in 2008, for instance, Solomon Islanders stared in shocked disbelief at the cost of rice in stores. Right in front of their eyes a 20k bag of Solrise went from well below $200 to over that mark in a matter of weeks. People's beloved rice, the food which had become daily fare at the nation's food table and been taken for granted, had literally climbed out of reach for many local people.

Immediately ordinary town people as well as those from the countryside, from every walk of life, began pressurizing government to do something, to get new sources of rice, do something anything so as to reduce the great rice price hike. Unfortunately, across the whole world--India, China, Indonesia, etc.--were also feeling the same effects of the great rice price hike. In fact, it was only in the latter part of 2009 that rice prices began to slowly come down since new sources of this grain were now entering the market. But the lesson was there for all to learn: food security and secure, sound living are national worried and have to be worked on at a national level.

Fortunately, even today we in the Solomons have always enjoyed a back up position. Our women gardeners, masters at root crop production, produce potato, yam, pana, tapioca, etc. in great variety and output. Our fertile land, availability of abundant rain water and especially our skilled food producers churn out tons and tons of these precious goods without costing the nation a penny. Few of our farmers use pesticides, fertilizers and insecticides and yet they feed the majority of our people.

Only recently, for instance, during the Social Unrest period--1998-2003--when the nation's political elite were dithering and offering precious little leadership, most villages fed themselves. Our small farmers, fishermen and food/fruit gathers jumped in to fill the gap. Through painful political turmoil, a partial civil war on Guale's Weather Coast and unrest in Honiara, the bulk of people fed themselves, not so much with rice, flower and other imports but what they planted and harvested from their own gardens.

Now leaders of the country are beginning to grasp that to bring about food security means organizing, assisting and empowering the villager, especially the woman gardener, to produce greater amounts and different kinds of food to feed our growing population. Of course they can and are already planting, caring for and harvesting serious rice production. But the best scenario when it comes to local rice production must be counted in decades, not in months.

Our yearly import bill for rice remains close to $200 million which the nation can not afford. That is why planting, caring for and harvesting our own rice production is a smart way to go. But before we reach that level of rice production the nation depends upon its most productive sector for food production, the village woman. Yet, simply to ask her to produce more root crops is not enough. She must be assisted to get her production to the market place where she can receive a reasonable reward for her labor.

During the first days of the Ulufa'alu government in 1997, he commissioned SIDT to conduct a national survey: Government Investing in People's Lives. Almost 13,000 people across the nation were asked to pinpoint the best place for government to invest monies to increase people's chances to gain a bit of prosperity. Their first choice in Resource Investment was for government to focus on people's gardens Closely following was for the government to set up markets where villagers could bring garden production for sale. And second in their investment priorities was a system of robust shipping to get farm produce to these markets.

Here we are more than a dozen years afterwards and through five governments of the day and still they have failed to listen to people's priorities. Of course Food Insecurity grows more and more serious. Our recent history tells us that the market place with its rising prices, distance and unreliability is the last place we can place our trust. If we had no local capability, little fertile ground and hardly any rain, we would be in serious trouble. Yet, the nation has been truly blessed with all of these for abundant food production. The two last governments have said much about the Bottom Up Approach and Rural Advancement. Well, here in the person of the woman gardener is a perfect place to put rhetoric into action.

Gap between the super rich and the dirt poor grows alamrmingly

2010-06-07T14:51:00.003-07:00

J. Roughan

23 April 2010

Honiara

The public's response to the heavy-weight increases in Parliamentarian salary packets and their other perks rubbed a raw nerve among local citizens. Members couldn't have chosen a worse time for flaunting their immense wealth in the face of the vast majority of poor Solomon Islanders who don't know where the next few dollars will come from to feed the kids . . . and the other 13-15 wantoks who crowd around the dinner table each night.

Most members, however, are actively thinking, talking about and working on plans to be re-elected to parliament. Attendance at parliamentary meetings are secondary because their whole attention is to work on ways to get back into power. Yet, their right hand doesn't know what their left hand is doing! Do they really think that voters have such short memories that come election day--probably at the end of June this year--voters will already have forgotten how their members have pocketed thousands and thousands of dollars in a time when most of the country doesn't have much at all?

Solomons' electoral history, over eight separate elections, dating back to 1984, already shows clearly that at least 4 out of every 10 members never make it back to the House. In fact in the last two elections the number of parliamentarians failing in their re-election bids rose to more than half of all sitting members. In the 2001 election, for instance, more than 6 out of 10 sitting members failed to return to power.This will be, I suspect, the lot of most members in the present house--more than half of them will be looking for new jobs come the middle of the year when the polling day rolls around..

But most members still think that if they had a bit more money, then they could be reassured of getting themselves back to their parliament seat. But that's an illusion! It's not merely money that swings the electorate to back a person getting into office but how well has the member served his people. Since 1998, however, the Solomons nation has turned a corner, a rather disturbing corner. The average Solomon Islander is poorer now than at any time in its 32 years of history.

SIDT's eight Report Cards over a twenty year period, since 1989, show a disturbing trend. Thousands of Solomon Islanders have failed eight governments of the day on how they have treated the backbone of society, the small person, the villager, the woman gardener, etc. in their reachout programs. Now, Canberra's People's Survey 2009 of Solomon Islands, added its own voice. It said much the same thing: governments of the day were not doing their best to reach out to those who need the most help.

Over the past two weeks, also, the Bishops of PNG and the Solomons have been holding their annual general meeting in Lae. They pinpoint the growing levels of poverty as painfully worse in both countries in spite of the great natural wealth in both countries--minerals, timber, fertile ground, abundant water, etc. Bishop Panfilo, president of the Bishops Convergence stated bluntly, "we know that the conditions of our people are becoming worse rather than better. We know that social services are very inadequate and our people are becoming frustrated with the Government."

Too many of our senior politicians live in another world. They think that if they can hand out some project monies, take care of voters daily needs like pocket money, ship fares, school fees, doctor's visits, etc. then they have delivered as politicians. Of course, most people do need these kinds of help because job creation has stopped--really never begun with the CNURA government--, youth employment has dried up and simple ways of gaining a few dollars has become harder and harder.

Villagers currently stream over to Honiara because there are so few ways of making some money at home and think that the town wantok must have tons of money, enough to take care of his own family as well as many village visitors. Feeding 12, 15 and even up to 19 hungry mouths at dinner time each night has become part of the Honiara scene. Yes, our parliamentarians face much the same problem--feeding dozens and dozens extras daily--but at least they have deep pockets where too often RCDF monies and other rural assistance funds that should be spent in the constituency end up here in town in the mouths of visiting village relatives.

We fool ourselves, however, if we think there is none of the African poverty here where starving children are seen on TV, wolfing down bits of food to feed their bloated stomachs. Fortunately, we do not have that kind of poverty but poverty takes on a different face as you travel from country to country. Our poverty takes the form of begging, not the kind that one is growing on Honiara's streets, but using the wantok system or the modern version of it "Member's Slush Fund" to meet daily needs.

Perhaps it's foolish to think that the next lot into parliament will be different but things are changing. Voters have become much more savvy and are pressing their politicians to wise up, pay better attention to them and their lives and stop thinking that the odd hand out is the way to do it. Next parliament's main work will be to plan for new jobs, especially for youth and make sure that the rural funds actually get to the village and are not diverted to taxis, buses, stores, rest houses, member's family, etc. Otherwise, the gap between the very well off and our poorest will grow wider and more dangerous.

They still don't get it!

2010-06-07T14:51:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

13 April 2010

Honiara

Present government members plan to run as an united group in the forthcoming national poll. According to themselves, they have done such a marvelous job of leading this nation as a group over the past two years that their six party coalition should present itself to the voter as a unit. May I dare to disagree? In fact, the best thing for an individual government member would do to have half a chance of making it back into Parliament is to run on his own, distancing himself completely from government's so called track record.

Why? Because the Sikua-led government's accomplishments over these past two years are fundamentally weak! In its defense, government backers may well quote the number of bills it has passed and how these have become the law of the land. Good! Great! Yes, passing a bill into law is an essential part of governance but being solid leaders to the whole country is a much more important test. For instance, what about its two failing state enterprises--SIWA and SIEA--sitting right under the government's nose which seriously fail their customers.

Electric power is consistently cut twice a day during the middle of the daily business cycle for two hours at a time. Not a single government authority has made comment on the issue, much less doing something about restoring power to the country's one business hub over these past four months. Tens of dozens of local business houses, the Honiara Town Council itself, private citizens, etc. if they can afford generators, all have bought their own power generators. They have given up on government's miserable attempts to supplying power and find it cheaper, certainly more reliable, than SIEA's erratic and expensive power output.

SIWA is another sore point among people. Its constant denial to Honiara's 80,000 people's for clean, abundant water is fast becoming a serious health risk. Unless a householder has purchased at least one large water tank, then, counting on daily cooking, drinking, cleaning water remains a distant dream. Last week, the National Referral Hospital had become the latest victim of the poor water supply.

Parts of Honiara, for instance, have not had its rubbish collected since before the early days of the Social Unrest, 1998. That's more than 12 years now! The piles of rubbish along Honiara's back streets is the favorite nesting place for rats, cockroaches and other vermin. Perhaps the rubbish is collected in and around the city centre but most people live, not down town, but in and around the town. Failure to pick up and dispose of rubbish is another serious health risk.

Why in the world would anyone vote in a second round a government that has been inactive when it is currently unable to properly respond to people's basic need for water, power and rubbish removal. Government's select committee recently conducted a thorough-going review of the National Referral Hospital's failings. What it uncovered were serious issues in the nation's health outreach programs and the committee came up with dozens of recommendations. When Parliament had a chance to study the committee's findings, government's response was curious. Few recommendations have been acted upon.

And villagers living outside of Honiara and other urban centers haven't fared much better from the present government's outreach as well. Quality education, well stocked clinics, new roads linking markets and women's agricultural production and a major push for youth employment still remain at the planning stage level with little hope that these most needed basics will root in rural people's lives any time soon. Two separate surveys done the same year, 2009, said the same thing. Although the message was delivered by two different messengers, the message was the same in both cases.

SIDT's Eighth Report Card (July, 2009), for instance, showed that more than 2300 people marked the Sikua Government a failure. It showed how weak government had been in its handling of people's need for quality education, health issues and job creation. But the other survey, conducted by Australia National University personnel, said much the same thing. In both surveys, SIDT's and the Canberra survey, were in agreement: 40% of Solomon Islanders thought that the government's track record on improving basic services was not good.

Of course the government has run out of time! Parliament finishes its last seating on 24 April, less than two weeks away. May I suggest that the best and probably only viable strategy that members who plan to make a return bid to Parliament must clearly inform voters how their lives have been bettered since 2006, the country's last national election. How and where has the sitting member battled poverty? How many jobs, livelihoods and employment opportunities has the member funded, backed and worked on during his 4 years in office? With these facts in hand, the member can confidently appear in front of the voters with positive results and promise to do a better job in the future.

Grateful, heartend but saddened!

2010-06-07T14:50:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

6 April 2010

Honiara

Parliament's chamber echoed loud and clear last week when parliamentarian after parliamentarian stood up in the House and voiced out their sincere appreciation for Taiwan's people's continuous support for our country. Member after member recounted in great detail how a country so many miles from us. which had suffered greatly over past decades and only a few years older than ourselves has consistently been our friend. Taiwan has given generously to our well being, our elected members recognized this truth and told the world.

I was particularly grateful that our members' recognition was finally made publicly that they, not merely a government statement, were the authors of these sentiments. Yet, I was also saddened by what they said! Parliament's 50 members were right in their praise of Taiwan's generosity to the people of the constituency. They erred, however, in their misunderstanding of who the members of parliament actually are and what is their essential work. First and foremost they are the country's national leaders

No matter how well a parliamentarian has been able to serve his own constituency--paying for doctor visits, school fees, emergency help, ship fares, helping the poor, etc.--by using Taiwanese funds, parliament is fundamentally the one and only body which is mandated to the fundamental duty of steering this country, the whole country, to peace, tranquility and prosperity.

No matter how well a constituency has been helped, assisted and raised up by another country's generosity, the parliamentarian's main work remains the well being of the nation, its health and its future prospects. Members, of course, are truly elected by the people of a particular constituency but they are elected to effectively lead a nation, not merely a particular constituency.

I am the last to complain if a particular constituency rides high on the back of Taiwanese largesse. But such funding must not be at the expense of little or no government initiatives to get national youth employment policy out of the doldrums, conduct a massive drive pushing quality education at all levels, a drive to raise country wide literacy standards, an energetic push to tap into women's agricultural prowess, etc. etc. A truly effective national food security strategy, for instance, is an effective step towards raising the livelihood levels of thousands of families. Half hearted statements about rice cultivation is not a national food security strategy but something from a wish list.

In other words, insuring that one's constituency does well out of Taiwan funds can never be the primary yardstick measuring a parliamentarian's success or failure. As hard as it is and having little traction with the voting public, a national plan engaging our youth in jobs, for example, is worth much more to national well being than thousands of dollars spent on individual project proposals, welfare payments and personal handouts. If the only substantial thing a member brings to his electorate year after year, is another country's funding and fails to bring national policies and sound legislation, then that member ceases to be a national leader.

Of course many voters don't see it that way at all! If I am an olo in a village, youth employment, quality schooling, food security, etc. has little meaning to me. A hundred or two, given to me by my member, sitting nicely in my pocket, makes all the difference in the world. That's the reality of today's politics. It's a hard act to follow but if a member wants to be a national leader than he must constantly work on country-wide plans, come up with new ways of understanding the fast changing Solomons world and continuously work on changing people's thinking.

Some members currently call for the election of a completely new membership--except themselves, of course--in June's national poll. We have heard this tune before! However, even if each and every member of today's house was replaced by a brand new face, much of the same thinking and conduct would continue.

No, something more radical, more fundamental is called for. Parliament has become too bloated, too out of touch with the rest of the nation. What is needed is a complete review of how this country should be governed. Already the seeds of this new governance pattern is being hammered out where the bulk of decisions are made by people close to the action, close to the nation's resource base and closer to Solomons reality. The Solomons is a nation of villages NOT a group of Honiara people out of touch with this reality who have legislated the bulk of the national wealth flowing to themselves.

Our God is an action word!

2010-06-07T14:49:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

30 March 2010

Honiara

Languages world wide use different bits and pieces. People who speak a language string bits and pieces like nouns (names of persons, places or things), verbs (action words), adjectives and adverbs (helps to change nouns and verbs) and other small things--pronouns (take the place of nouns), prepositions (help connect things), together. When a speaker or writer brings these different bits and pieces together in proper order, then, meaning comes clear. That's how we communicate--getting our thoughts out of inside our heads into the ears of others.

And God has done much the same with us as well. He used words and sentences to have us understand him, his plans, what he wants us to do. The Bible, both Old and New, the Koran and other sacred texts make it abundantly clear that the Almighty uses the human way of communicat- ing. He uses human language. In fact, one could say that the written word is God's normal and usual way to get his meaning over to us.

Yet, we know that people use other ways to communicate. Words/sentences are great but they are not the only way of telling others our story, what's going on inside us. A wide smile, a crunched up painful face, a child's cry, etc. are powerful ways of getting messages off to others as well. Words are not used, yet the message is quite clear. Can God not do the same? Must He always be limited to the printed or spoken word?

We Christians believe that Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity, the Word, actually became man. The New Testament, the second part of the Bible, relates his life story in great detail. Words and sentences, especially Jesus' sayings, make up the bulk of the writing. Yet, some of Jesus' most powerful messages don't contain a sentence, not even a word. Yet, His message is crystal clear!

Take for instance Christ's clearest messages--befriend the down and out, sinners and worse still, tax collectors--when he actually ate with them and had all these awful people at table with him. No where in the New Testament are we told what was said while they eat, what he told them, what the table conversation was all about. Yet, His message is quite clear and compelling. Some call these events Silent Parables.

Christ loved using parables! It was his favorite teaching tool. Yes, parables are short stories but stories with a twist! The Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, the mustard seed, etc. these parables are known far and wide. A parable story gets to the innermost part of the heart well before the listener has time to throw it out or disagree with its message. But their long lasting effect comes through powerfully. Many Christians recite the traditional parable's very words by heart.

But His Silent Parables--washing the apostles feet at the Last Supper, his sand scribbles when the woman caught in adultery was being publicly humiliated, etc.--are powerful if less recognized teaching tools as well.

This week, Holy Week when the whole of Christ's life comes together as it were, is a continuous Silent Parable. His Easter story is about action words--suffering, dying, rising--with few words and sentences. The overwhelming feeling from the Garden of Gethsemane, through the court trial, carrying the cross, dying on Calvary and rising from the dead focuses on action words. It's as if the time for talking, words, explaining and clarifying have come to an end and only action words can make the point.

These scenes from the Garden of Gethsemane to the Resurrection contain few words but the power of this Silent Parable is unmistakable. Our God is an action God. Of course words are important. That is never in question. But what is more important is action, work and deeds which must flow from words.

Our God then is really a VERB! As wonderful as words are and the beauty that they bring fall into something small compared to the need for action, work and doing. That is why at the very beginning of this essay it's stated that God is an action word and why it is important that we too use Silent Parables--working with the down and out, serving others, standing up for the outcast--as our normal and most usual way of working with Christ.

An era ends but not without a fight!

2010-06-07T14:48:00.003-07:00

J. Roughan

23 March 2010

Honiara

In the Solomons, a few people, mostly by getting themselves elected into Parliament, have managed to absorb the lion's share of the nation's wealth. But those who actually are the owners of the nation--its land, trees, rivers, seas, reefs--the villager through the lien, clan, tribe, in other words the landowners, have had to do with so much less. That short sentence, in a nut shell, is a brief history of where the nation's wealth has disappeared over the past 30+ years. However, this year may well see the beginning of the end of that history.

At independence day in 1978, we had little time to work up a home grown constitution that would accurately reflect Solomon Islands customs, traditions and history. We left the writing up this vital document to a group of overseas experts who had, however, little knowledge of our country. Now with more than 30 years of experience under our belt, having suffered a severe Social Unrest testing period (1998-2003) and now with a people restless for basic change that would bring a better and more productive life to the majority, has arrived. The time is ripe for a deep review of our original Constitution.

And that is what's been happening! A group of dedicated citizens, men and women, from across the nation have been working on just such a project. That is exactly what the Constitutional Review Congress has been doing over the past two years. The initial step of reviewing the present Constitution clause by clause, shaping it to better reflect the nation's present needs and adding things that weren't thought of before has been their labor of love. The first part of that work was basically completed by the end of last year, 2009.

The second step in the process--presenting a Draft Constitution to the people for their approval--is currently taking place as you read these words. Since it is the nation's citizens who will live under any new Constitution it is only fair and just that they have a major say how they think Solomon Islanders should be governed in the future. Province by province, teams of those who crafted this new Constitution, currently travel across the nation, explaining the whole idea behind this new document and seeking, not only people's understanding, but more importantly, their consent to continue working to create a new Constitution.

The third step, having Parliament pass the new Constitution into law, will be the most difficult. There are other forces at work which prefer NOT to see a new Constitution take effect at all. These, the nation's political elite, the whole Honiara establishment, for instance, are more than happy to continue with a way of life which has brought them riches beyond their wildest dreams. Wealth they never worked for and certainly never paid a penny to enjoy have become theirs. A new Constitution would slow down and then stop the over centralization process in its tracks and devolve more and more power to the community level. That is exactly what the political elite and the Honiara establishment do not want!

The new Constitution's basic aim is to break down this over centralized process which has made it possible for a select few to gain so much but at the expense of the many. To re-allocate national wealth--overseas grants, the nation's resource base, multi-national funds, etc.--that has taken deep root over the past three decade is totally against what they, the elite, stand for. The new Constitution plans to empower people themselves and to have more and more governance take place at the local level where the vast majority of our people live.

And it's not simply a shift to provincial level politics but at the local, village level especially, that the new Constitution has in mind.. Don't forget that long before white, colonials came to this country, people were their own masters. They lived off their own resource base of food, housing, energy, medicine, etc. Yes, compared to today's needs, that resource base was skimpy. Recently, however, when pressed to become self sufficient all over again as they were forced to do during our Social Unrest years, they moved up and met the challenge. Less than 5% of our nation went off the social rails during the time of tension. Villagers protected their most vulnerable--olos, young, women, sick in their society--with little or no assistance from the political elite who were scurrying around protecting themselves.

The villagers reward for keeping the nation going, being the cement gluing our many provinces and people together and continuing to function has been just the opposite. Last year, for instance, Parliament passed into law making room for 17 additional seats. The nation already finds it hard to sustain a 50-seat parliament with its salaries, perks, travel, etc. etc. as it is! How then does an additional 17 seats make it easier for the nation's tax payers to sustain such an additional growth.

This type of thinking--the centre demanding more and greater wealth at the expense of those who live at a distance--is normal, natural, almost an inevitable way of understanding how our modern political and business leaders view the Solomons world. Expect them to protect that way of life since it has been so good and kind to them for so many years. They will not give up a single perk which, in their eyes, they have worked so hard to gain and will fight tooth and nail to keep that over-centralized world that has been so kind to them, unchanged.

RCDF destroying Parliament!

2010-06-07T14:48:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

16 March 2010

Honiara

Last week the Rural Constituency Development Fund and its various wantoks--Rural Livelihood, Millennium, Special Mini Project, Parliament Mini Project Funds--once again entered into the working heart of Parliament. Something that was suppose to be of secondary importance, a thing on the side, as it were, has become more and more a hindrance to Parliament's essential work.

MPs are elected first and foremost to work at law making, to look after the affairs of state and to keep government departments and its agencies on their toes so that they work in the best interest of the nation's people. Since 1993, when Solomon Mamaloni introduced it, the RCDF and its various off shoots have come to dominate members thinking, planning and operating. What was suppose to be a side line event, something set up to assist MPs better handle the needs of their people, has, instead, taken over and dominated the process.

And strange as it may seem, back in 1994 people already knew in their bones that the CDF (as it was called at the time) would prove to be too much a temptation for parliamentarians. The former Minister of Finance, Chris Abe, intended at that time to seek parliament's approval to put an end to the CDF because of the many abuses that were turning up. SIDT, before the CDF proposal came up for debate, had already conducted a survey asking approximately 1,200 people, rural and urban, what they thought about scraping the whole CDF idea.

Most survey participants, more than 90% in fact, demanded that the funding scheme must continue but they were also convinced that the Honorable must NOT handle the funds. Allow another group, reflecting different communities in a typical constituency--men, women, youth, pro- fessional, etc.--be elected and deputized to admin these various funds and, most importantly, be held legally accountable for all monies distributed. However, the member must not be involved in any way with the giving out of monies, passing judgment on project proposals or having a say on how the fund was administered. After all, these funds really do belong to the constituency, NOT to the member.

That event, unfortunately, never took place! Over the years MPs no longer focused primarily on law making, monitoring government's outreach programs to its citizens and working hard for the better implementation of the laws of the land. Instead, typically, a member's time is seriously taken up by acting as a Project Director, Social Welfare Officer and a walking ATM for constituents everyday needs, e.g. transporting dead bodies back to the village, paying out school fees, ship fares, bags of rice, Honiara walk-about money, etc. etc.

And most unfortunate, many constituents couldn't care less about their member's lawmaking ability and keeping a critical eye on government's education, medical and infrastructure work. All these tasks are government's business with little to do with the their member, so they say. But the member is fundamentally elected to be part and parcel of government's outreach work and must have much to say about how the nation is governed..

A good case also could be made out that members' attendance in parliament has grown weaker and weaker over the past years. MPs too often act as if parliamentary attendance is a kind of volunteer work and required if and when the member has enough free time to attend. On more than one occasion, for example, the Speaker of the House has suspended a sitting until a quorum of members has been reached and the meeting can go ahead. Even on the best of days, Parliament's chambers are far from entirely filled!

This essay is not a plea to abolish the many versions of CDF that have grown up over the past two decades or so. But it does call into question the wisdom of continuing along this line which is basically undermining Parliament and all it stands for. Of course a full public disclosure of how the more than $2 million has been spent by each and every member is still called for. But this current essay is a plea to disengage members from the nitty-gritty of dispensing money and other assistances in the vain hope that such an exercise will insure a member's re-election bid.

Past electoral history, however, disproves such thinking. No matter how much new money, new funding and new sources of income are uncovered, electoral defeat has remained constant: a 44% failure rate in the re-election cycle. Those who are actually re-elected to parliament count on other means than the distribution of loose cash. Proper attendance in parliament, strong advocates of certain policies like women's presence in decision making positions, job creation for the nation's youth, a strengthened school system, quality health care, etc. is the more important factor for re-election. Demanding more and more CDF money and seeking new funding sources has proven to be less successful in re-election bids.

Pushing the panic button!

2010-06-07T14:47:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
11 March 2010
Honiara.

Our MPs are in full panic mode! Each and everyone of them must face the voting public within the next few months. The majority of them feel they are ill prepared for this vote which will determine their fate for the coming four years. And they have every reason to run scared! They have lived well, better than ever before in their lives. But that life style is in serious danger of coming to a quick, inglorious end for most of them when they face their people's vote of confidence in mid-2010.

Ever since the 1984 national elections, on average, 44% of sitting MPs have failed in their re-election attempts. This up coming election will not only confirm this high turn over rate but more MPs than usual will bite the dust. In fact, according to my calculations, up to 55% of the present house will be out of a job come the end of June, 2010.

At this stage, our MPs are frantically pulling out all stops. Their first line of defense is to pressure the Government to immediately dole out their constituency grants--Rural Livelihood, Millennium Fund, Special Mini Project, RCDF and Parliament Mini Project Fund--or, as the rumor flying around town has it, they may threaten not to attend Parliament's very last sitting. MPs realize that their track record over the past four years has been less than sterling. Few of them can claim that most Solomon Islanders' lives better now than when they first arrived in Parliament.

The different kinds of development funds held by government are the only tools in their grasp to help convince voters that they should be re-elected. However, the history of sitting parliamentarians attempting re-election in national polls runs contrary to these expectations.Since 1984, 44%, on average, of sitting MPs have failed in their re-election attempts.

% of Parliamentarians failing in Re-elections.

(see separate printout)

Too many MPs are counting on a last ditch exercise of handing out development grants to constituents at this late hour to make up for their lack of concern for them since the last national poll in 2006. MPs' fading hope is to change voters minds by throwing development monies at them at this late stage. But that type of thinking has long since passed! SIDT's most recent Report Card (July 2009 below) can be viewed in a context of the last 7 Report Cards dating back to 1989. Not a single Report Card over a twenty-year period indicates that the politicians of those times were actually thinking and acting for the benefit of the ordinary Solomons citizen.

Report Card Summary(see separate printout)

There is a close connection between the failure of many MPs seeking re-election and their disregard to the lives of ordinary Solomon Islanders. As noted above, 44% of all MPs suffered defeat in their bid to be re-elected to parliament. The foundations of the Basic Life in Solomons does not rest on doing development projects but on getting the basics of island living right. People want and need quality education, well run and properly staffed health clinics and hospitals. resource assistance and the availability of modest amounts of money on a regular basis. Projects are only the icing on the cake but they are not the stuff which the cake is made of.

Of course people look forward to working on a development projects but their main concern is that their everyday lives offer hope for a better future for their kids and themselves with quality education, well staffed clinics, their resource base of food production helped and the hope for jobs are met first. Future MPs would be well advised to pay immediate and constant attention to past and future Report Cards to assure re-election rather than pushing the panic button at the last moment hoping that a project or two will turn the tide that is fast going out on most of them.

Different messengers but same message!

2010-06-07T14:45:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan
5 March 2010
Honiara

In 2009, Solomon Islanders were greatly helped in understanding the state of their nation by the findings of two general surveys The more comprehensive one,--People's Survey 2009, the third in a series, the first one dating back to 2007, focused on local living conditions, RAMSI's presence, social infrastructure, etc.--was conducted by a group from Canberra. An earlier survey also in 2009, SIDT's 8th Report Card, the first Report Card in the series starting back in 1989, 20 years ago, was also conducted during the Sikua Government's tenure in power.

Both surveys, although conducted by two completely different and independent organizations--one hailing from Australia National University in Canberra and the second from Solomon Islands Development Trust--came up with much the same message. The two surveys although using different methodologies and different ways of searching for the deep feelings and thoughts of typical Solomon Islanders had their conclusions reinforce each other's findings.

For instance, the Canberra survey found that 40% of the people asked thought that the National Government's track record on improving basic services and the economy was not good. SIDT's findings, on the other hand, gave the government a slightly higher but still failing mark when it came to asking villagers and town folk about the nation's basic social infrastructure base of education opportunities, health services and the availability of money.

SIDT's surveys have been tracking people's understanding of the national economy in its Availability of Money category in its eight Report Cards over a twenty year period. Over this time--1989-2009--citizens consistently scored the governments of the day with a low 44%, on average, for the Availability of Money. This one section in SIDT's Report Card of making a bit of money for normal living has always attracted low marks. During the Sikua Government's years, for instance--2007-2009--people scored the Report Card's section on Availability of Money with a low of 45%.

The RAMSI's sponsored People's Survey 2009 findings were not much different. It found that 47% of those asked thought that youth's chances for work were weaker than before, 72% had "no access to any agriculture program" and a serious number of those who had tried to start a business had experienced problems.

But the purpose of this essay is not to show that these two separate, independent surveys were sending the same thing. This writing was not a way to prove that the local survey instrument was just as valid as the one conducted by overseas experts. The main reason for comparing both surveys is to ask the question when will Solomons governments accept the findings of these kinds of surveys and more importantly, when will they start doing something about these findings.

By the middle of this year the nation holds its 8th general election and a brand new government will be formed before the end of June, 2010. It would be great if the newly formed government whoever runs it, would seriously study the findings of these two surveys and work on ways to respond to the shortcomings surfaced by the surveys. In past years perhaps parliamentarians had thought SIDT's 8 Report Cards were not accurate enough or the survey was poorly done and government didn't feel the need of listening to a home grown survey.

After all, as one MP said to me, 'a bunch of villagers had conducted these surveys and they couldn't possibly come up with a valid and worthwhile survey!' Now, it turns out that a professional and respected survey conducted by overseas experts has come up with many of the same responses as that of SIDT's Report Card. A national politician simply dismissing the findings of these Report Cards because they were conducted by village people doesn't hold water.

These surveys are telling our politicians and the political class that the bulk of Solomon Islanders are sending a clear message to government members. People are fed up with 'business as usual' approach to governance and want something new to happen in the newest sitting of parliament to take place later this year. It's too late for the present members to respond well and creatively to these surveys but the new parliament would not hurt itself if it accepted the findings of these surveys. After all, two different messengers, coming from different parts of the world sent the same message. Isn't it time to listen to our people?

Student Loan Scheme

2010-06-07T14:44:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

11 February 2010

Honiara

Solomon Islands government is one of a handful of nations worldwide that pays big bucks for its students to attend university classes. For the past 40,years now--during colonial days as well--governments of the day dished out money for air fares tickets, accommodation costs, tuition fees, pocket money and other costly items to insure that its students study in overseas institutions.

Few countries, including the richest ones like Australia, New Zealand, USA, etc.underwrite the costs of their citizens attending universities. Students, for the most part, pay for their higher education costs out of their own pocket. Of course they must repay the loan once schooling is finished and they have entered the labour market.

Rich and poor countries alike, however, have set up Student Loan Schemes which allow qualified students a chance to attend university courses and college level training. In other words qualified graduates from secondary school take out loans to cover the high costs of attending universities.

Most of the time, however, this loan money comes through commercial banks which loan out the necessary money to cover most of the costs of students attending university level education. Normally, banks shy away from lending out money for such worthy causes because it's the rare student who has enough security to back such a loan. However, if a commercial bank could secure a government guarantee to back such a loan, many banks would leap to get into this market.

Unfortunately, here in the Solomons I doubt if any of the three commercial banks now operating in Honiara would touch such a student loan scheme if it were simply backed by a Solomon Islands Government promise. No, any student loan scheme would have to be backed by an overseas government commitment before a local bank would seriously think about getting into the business of lending money to students for higher education.

As it stands at present, a qualified student has only two options to fund higher education: self funding which is hardly an option for the vast majority of Solomons families or secondly, to qualify for government sponsorship. As we have witnessed these past few weeks and in fact every year about this time, only a limited number of students win government sponsorship while the others have no other option.

Slowly, over the next 5 to 6 years, basic education--adult learning, pre-school, primary and early secondary--must become more and more government's focus. Upper secondary, post secondary and especially university level classes' costs, however, must some how be funded by the very students attending higher education classes.

From before independence, the most expensive education costs--those connected to university level education--have been borne by the nation while the vital education years--adult, pre-school, primary--have fallen to the nation's poorest, villagers and the urban poor. That trend which is slowly being reversed--government now pays for primary school fees--and a new era of students themselves paying for higher education must be introduced. In other words, basic education costs are government's work while higher education costs are to fall to those who will gain most from their diplomas and degrees.

But there are few if any ways for a budding student hoping to gain an overseas degree to secure sufficient money to cover high education costs. A Student Loan Scheme administered by a local commercial bank, with a guarantee from one of the nations donors--Australia, New Zealand, EU, Taiwan, etc.--is a viable option.

The nation can not continue its present course of funding the vast majority of overseas training even when much of this funding comes from other countries There is a great need for the Solomons to have its own university . . . USP and UPNG already recognize the Solomons great academic potential and have already set up their own universities right here in Honiara. The least our nation can do is convince one of its donors to guarantee local banks to make funds available for worthy students to cover the heavy expenses of higher education.

Get rich quickly! Build Roads!

2010-06-07T14:43:00.001-07:00

J. Roughan

2 February 2010

Honiara

The Chinese Government knows a bit about the art of making money and has practiced this art form for more than 5,000 years now. During the most recent world wide economic downturn last year, for instance, the Chinese economy hurt the least. Right now it currently grows at a faster clip, more than 10% a year, than any other nation. It is way ahead of America, most of Europe and Japan.

A favorite Chinese sayings is "If a country wants to get rich quickly, then build roads!" Of course their newest road in Tibet's mountain country serves military interests as well. China is currently experiencing some trouble in Tibet and to make sure it can get the necessary military muscle into this small mountainous country, the most efficient way is to have a good road system at the ready.

But stressing military muscle doesn't mean that roads aren't good for generating wealth as well. Our own people already know this. Back in 1997, when Bart Ulufa'alu was PM, he commissioned SIDT to conduct a nation wide survey: National Survey on Government Investing in People's Lives. More than 12,600 Solomon Islanders across the nation responded with their assessment of the best place to invest money. People's first investment demand was the creation of many more markets but not far behind, in second place in fact, was the need of good transport.

Few of our people have ever taken university courses! Certainly even fewer had any training in planning national economies but there was no doubt in their minds when asked by the survey where should the investment dollar go: make many more markets and link solid transport to them. Wealth creation is closely connected to both. Link them one to another and watch things spark. That fact remains true today as it was in 1997.

Last week villagers west of Honiara were beyond joy that the bridges and the road system ripped apart by severe flooding only days before were fixed in record time. They could hardly believe their eyes! One day villagers were staring at destroyed bridges and ruined roads. They knew that their chances of getting their garden food to market was near impossible.

Then, miraculously, within a very short period of time these same roads and bridges were mended. People had worried about sinking deeper into poverty because they couldn't get a few dollars by selling market goods. Now, in record time, road links had been restored and they could carry on.

Nick Warner, RAMSI's first director in 2003, asked me what one thing should be done first to get the nation back together and humming once again. Without hesitation I begged: "Build a labour intensive road from Kuma to Marau as the first and best solution to the Weather Coast's isolation and poverty." To this day, not a single cent has been invested in such a road! Weather Coast villagers are no better served now in their transport needs than they were in 1998 when the Social Unrest took root. Yet, still the nation expects peace, harmony and tranquility to flourish when we have done nothing of worth to turn things around.

Bringing Keke's gang to justice, flying helicopters around in a show of force and stationing dozens of police boots on the ground does little directly for a villager's well being. These people want to be part of the Solomons commercial world, to gain modest amounts of money and to invest their profits to bring about a better life for themselves.

We at least should learn a few lessons from the Chinese civilization that is more than 5,000 years old. They also follow their own advice and are busy building roads around their country. Of course roads are expensive but what is more expensive? Isolate people and drive them to despair is much more expensive when we are forced to bring in military, police and other nations to help us return peace to ourselves.

Right message, wrong audience!

2010-06-07T14:42:00.000-07:00

J. Roughan

19 February 2010

Honiara

Back in 1962 I was running a small school in Rohinari in West Are'are. On the side, as it were, I was also trying my hand at raising pigs. My first attempts at caring for a half dozen pigs went well. In fact, my pigs were doing a lot better than many village ones because of one thing--I was raising pigs on cement and not allowing them to roam all about to be infected with kidney worm which was basically killing local pigs. Villagers' pigs looked more like 4x2's while mine were getting fatter by the day.

One day, I invited twenty or so local villagers, 19 men and a single woman. After showing them my pigs, how fat and sleek they were, I let the villagers in on my little secret: raise your pigs on cement, don't let them wallow in mud and by doing so reduce kidney worm infections to almost zero. Without doubt, my small audience got the message and were happy to have the new information.

Feeling a bit proud of myself about the great turn out of villagers at my pig-raising meeting, I mentioned to Br. John who was living at the same mission station. He was a man from Iowa in the States and had been at Rohinari for many years. I told him about the great meeting I had with local Big Men and showed them how to raise pigs properly. Br. John asked me one question: "How many women attended the meeting?" When I replied that only a single woman had shown up for the meeting, he just wagged his head and said: "In Are'are, it's the women who feed, water and care for pigs! If only one woman attended your meeting, then, although you sent out the right message, the wrong audience was listening. You should have had 19 women at the meeting and perhaps a single man!"

This early experience in raising livestock at the village level came flooding back to me when I read about government's launch of a new National Agricultural and Livestock Sector Policy paper last week. The Star's newspaper's picture and story which covered the launching of the document said it all: 4 smiling men--the Agriculture Minister, PS of Agriculture, and two other officials but not a single woman in sight! History was repeating itself: Right Message! Wrong Audience!

Almost everything printed in this the newest agriculture document is spot on: poverty alleviation thorough food security, sustainable management of natural resources, investment in agri research, etc. etc. Yet, when villagers themselves, more than 13,000 of them, highly recommended that there be a major increase in markets for women's garden produce and cheap, reliable transport to these markets, then Solomon Islands decision makers turn out to be deaf, dumb and blind. It was one of Bart Ulufa'alu's first decisions as PM, asking SIDT to conduct a national survey on investment monies. More than 13,000 citizens, as a first order of priority, called for more markets and transport to get garden goods to market.

Yet, to this day, now 14 years after the survey, food markets remain basically the same in number and rural transport has more or less stayed stagnant as well. Of course food security must be a top priority for any future government. But simply publishing new documents without really listening to villagers pleas for more markets, better transport, clear pricing arrangements for food products, wholesale purchase of mangoes, bananas, citrus fruit, watermelon, etc. when in abundance leaves the woman gardener at the mercy of market forces.

Our most vulnerable food producer, the woman gardener, needs more than mere words to convince her that surplus food production must have a vibrant and growing market ready and willing to take her surplus food at a reasonable price. Our weakest link, then, in the food security arena is not that government policy is weak and unclear but that women who actually produce the surplus product are not at all convinced that extra garden efforts will be rewarded with modest amounts of income.

So rather than take the chance that her surplus food could be wasted or attract a miserably small price, the woman gardener tailors her labour efforts to what she can produce for immediate family needs. There's no doubt that village women could produce much more food if given proper incentives. How many marriage and other feasts when prepared for by the whole village, have more than enough food for all participants!

Many of the nation's newest political parties and even the government of the day are riding hard and shouting from the roof tops that the rural areas will be given special place if and when they get into power. Yet, so many of these promises remain merely promises because it's the men who make them, not the women who have to activate them. May I make a suggestion? Any official agricultural promise must have more women on the organizing body making the promise than men! Let's stop repeating our past mistakes: Right message but informing the wrong audience!