REPORTER: Mike Carey
This is Enga province deep in the central highlands of Papua New Guinea. Although it's two months until the national elections, today the first shots will be fired in an unusual campaign. Among the many tribes in Enga are the Apulin. They are adapting the Westminster system to fit this intensely tribal society.
PROFESSOR JOHN NONGGORR, CONSTITUTIONAL LAWYER: It's status - if you've got a member from your tribe then your status goes up, because they think you can influence, then you can have the whole government on your side. It's not just election campaigning taking place, for somebody to be voted into parliament - no, it's all these exchanges, local politics going on, with alliances that have been established coming up, and if tribal fights exist, then again, the tribal fight is being fought on the election front.
Unlike most other clans, the Apulin have two candidates from the one tribe contesting the single seat for provincial governor. The underdog is Kundapen Talyaga and this is his nomination rally. He believes he has enough support amongst the Apulin to topple the powerful sitting governor, Peter Ipatas. Governor Ipatas is campaigning nearby. He has all the advantages of incumbency. The governor would not normally campaign in this part of Enga province. These aren't his usual supporters and they soon let him know. In many cases, the very act of campaigning stimulates an outbreak of violence. Often the election serves to rekindle traditional rivalries.
DR BILL STANDISH, AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVRERSITY: On a few occasions, people have been stoned and killed if they've turned up to vote and it's been thought they will vote the wrong way.
Dr Bill Standish has been an electoral observer in Papua New Guinea since before independence in 1975.
DR BILL STANDISH: There's been increasing violence in every election I have known. It has now got to a stage where it is impossible in the Highlands electorates for candidates to campaign in other candidate's, their rival's base areas, what are considered their base areas. And people get beaten up, and in one case...several cases actually, candidates have been kidnapped when they've tried to campaign outside their base area, in somebody else's base area.
In today's Papua New Guinea, political prestige is gained through government office. And while some use violence to get their hands on the spoils, others use coalition-building. Peter Waieng is a sitting member seeking re-election in the Highlands province of Simbu. He has just made a deal with a neighbouring tribe. It's a pragmatic alliance designed to retain his seat in the national parliament. Post-election, he will not forget his new friends.
PETER WAIENG, SITTING MEMBER FOR KUNDIAWA IN SIMBU PROVINCE: Up in the Highlands, we live in the tribal system - once your tribe is with you, that's it. It's not your political party or whatever. So that grouping that came across was not from my tribe, it's a different tribe. They got different blood. They have got their own candidate standing. I've got two candidates standing down there, and they have to break some sort of boundaries to come into a new tribe. So it's like a Liberal going into a Labor camp. You see. So, it was very important for me, and very important for the people.
No-one should underestimate the sophistication of these deals. Their genesis lies in the moka, a complex culture of exchange, thousands of years old. In the moka, you give with the expectation of receiving in the future. Highlands politicians have successfully modernised the moka and made it part of their election strategy. With judicious giving and receiving, one can capture the votes of a whole tribe. This blatant and literal pork-barrelling is called 'big man politics' in PNG. It's a game not all candidates play. Sara Garap, also from the Highlands, is one of only nine women standing in this province. While electoral laws were recently changed to discriminate in favour of women, they still face enormous hurdles. She doesn't give and distribute gifts and not one pig has died in her name.
SARA GARAP, CANDIDATE IN SINASINA-YONGGAMUGL SEAT: None of us have actually done that, we have not been killing pigs. But I think it's a big man's show, you know, "I am a big man, and if I am able to do this, then I am able to bring goods and services and I can hand deliver to you." I had somebody from my village come and talk to one of my guys, and said, "You're not going to win. Just walking around like that, you're not going to win, so stop wasting your time."
It's a different scene in the islands. Elly Kimkim is a candidate in New Britain, to the north-east of the PNG mainland. Here, campaigning is personal, almost one-to-one.
ELLY KIMKIM, CANDIDATE FOR SEAT OF GAZELLE IN EAST NEW
BRITAIN: It's time for a leadership change. One of the things that myself and my generation see is that the old leadership are not willing to relinquish their position, they are not preparing new leaders to take over. If you look at, for example, the founding fathers and the people who were here from since pre-independence and independence, they have not prepared, or groomed, anybody to replace them. Apart from the lack of experience that I may have, I've got the qualification, and I've got a clean name, I've not been involved in any scandal. And I think they want to try out and to use their word - "new blood", they want new blood, so, I'm running on that, yeah.
Elly Kimkim's university education didn't prepare him for big man politics.
ELLY KIMKIM: It's unbelievable, I think I went through a lifetime. There was a lot of betrayals, a lot of lies, I learned a lot. If anything is coming out of this election campaign, I think I learned a lot about life, yeah, no matter what happens.
In the best of times, it remains incredibly difficult to run a successful election in Papua New Guinea. There are 109 electorates, many of which can only be reached by air. These ballot boxes were bound for more remote districts. This Defence Force helicopter was so unreliable that the election was well behind schedule. Some communities never received ballot boxes or papers at all. And as for the electoral roll, it was a work of fiction in many parts of the country.
DR BILL STANDISH: There probably are something like a million more names on the roll than there are adult voters, potential voters. Sometimes these ghost names are used during elections, sometimes they're not.
MAN: I'll be voting three times. In here, in the Abokomo electorate, and then in the Wapadamunda district. It's not my mistake, it's not of my making, but it's the Electoral Commission's making that I was enrolled in three different places.
DR BILL STANDISH: Apart from the fact that people deliberately put on ghost names, and false names, the funding for the Electoral Commission to update the rolls didn't come through until about January, it should have come through early in the last quarter last year, the field work wasn't done. Secondly, the Electoral Commission doesn't control the staff who do it, a lot of them are casual staff, who may come in with an agenda to stack the rolls in their home area, and perhaps cull out potential voters from other areas.
The Australian Government contributed $8 million to help clean up the electoral roll. This didn't seem to help Peter Waieng from the Highlands. He noticed something was wrong when neighbouring villages seemed to double in population overnight.
PETYER WAIENG: There are people in the neighbouring tribes who were 6,000 in the last election, and now they are 14,000 - that's scaring me. I am definitely losing, and these sort of discrepancies are visible everywhere.
Finally, two weeks late, the big day arrived, and the capital of Enga province was abuzz. Ballot boxes were unlocked, and the precious blank voting papers were distributed so polling could begin. Off to the side, the sitting governor's son began methodically marking each paper with a perfect cross against his father's name. Voting early and often in the best traditions of Tammany Hall. While a tribal deal to support the sitting governor had obviously been done, it angered some who wanted to buck the system and cast their own vote. The presiding officer wouldn't give this man 81 ballot papers to vote on behalf of his wife and large, extended family. Meanwhile, the governor's son kept crossing, oblivious to the theatre going on around him. Eventually, the chief released the 81 ballot papers in an attempt to keep the peace. Persistence and a few punches pay. With the vote for governor resolved, attention turned to the five parliamentary seats in the province. For most of these, the polling was done by calling. The voter responds by shouting out his or her chosen candidate's name. It's another collective procedure worked
out well in advance.
PROFESSOR JOHN NONGGORR: I keep on saying this to people - it is completely unrealistic to expect a person right in the village, who hasn't seen a white man until independence in 1975, to understand and vote in accordance with what a white man does. To expect them to do that is almost insane and that's what's happening, it is a transition we have to manage it.
Tribes agreeing to vote en masse was nothing when compared to what happened next. Someone didn't want the election to succeed, and sent in the Raskols. Police responded quickly and forcefully, but it didn't save the papers. They hacked open the boxes, invalidating their contents. Rather than try and save the remaining ballot papers, scrutineers decided to burn those papers which had been tampered with. Elsewhere in Enga, ballot papers were destroyed when a gunfight broke out on polling day. Two people were killed and dozens of houses burnt to the ground. This man was an election casualty, and fighting will undoubtedly resume once the burial is over. In the Engan capital, two nights later, more than a third of the completed ballots went up in smoke when the shipping containers in which they were locked were dynamited. This time, the police ran away. The raiders were heavily armed with M-16s and Kalashnikovs.
VILLAGER: It was just like a movie, this morning, around 4:00 or 5:00. Every man came with AK-47 guns. We were all powerless. Can't do much. All we have to do is just sit down and watch. It's all up to the Electoral Commission and the national government to decide whether to count all these boxes again, or... ..suspend this election, or I don't know what, but that decision is with the national government and the Electoral Commission.
Four days ago, the returning officer was forced to send a fax to Port Moresby at gun point. The fax declared the man suspected of masterminding this attack to be the winner. The returning officer immediately disappeared, or was kidnapped.
VILLAGER: Everyone's not really happy, they're very, very angry now for this incident. (Sighs)
PROFESSOR JOHN NONGGORR: We decided to bring in the Western system of government, and especially this parliamentary democracy system, and so it is inevitable that we go through these problems. And if people think that PNG shouldn't have these problems, people are completely wrong, they don't understand what it is, what is really happening. If it was possible for someone above to look down and see what was happening, they would say "Oh, yeah, it was inevitable, it had to happen."
How did our candidates fare? Governor of Enga Province, Peter Ipatas, was returned with an increased majority. His tribal rival, Kundapen Talyaga, came seventh. Peter Waieng lost his seat as he predicted, when he saw the electoral roll. Elly Kimkim from New Britain scored 5% coming sixth out of nine candidates. His new blood will have to wait. And after four months of campaigning with her megaphone, Sara Garap scored just 78 votes. There might be something said for killing pigs after all.
This is Enga province deep in the central highlands of Papua New Guinea. Although it's two months until the national elections, today the first shots will be fired in an unusual campaign. Among the many tribes in Enga are the Apulin. They are adapting the Westminster system to fit this intensely tribal society.
PROFESSOR JOHN NONGGORR, CONSTITUTIONAL LAWYER: It's status - if you've got a member from your tribe then your status goes up, because they think you can influence, then you can have the whole government on your side. It's not just election campaigning taking place, for somebody to be voted into parliament - no, it's all these exchanges, local politics going on, with alliances that have been established coming up, and if tribal fights exist, then again, the tribal fight is being fought on the election front.
Unlike most other clans, the Apulin have two candidates from the one tribe contesting the single seat for provincial governor. The underdog is Kundapen Talyaga and this is his nomination rally. He believes he has enough support amongst the Apulin to topple the powerful sitting governor, Peter Ipatas. Governor Ipatas is campaigning nearby. He has all the advantages of incumbency. The governor would not normally campaign in this part of Enga province. These aren't his usual supporters and they soon let him know. In many cases, the very act of campaigning stimulates an outbreak of violence. Often the election serves to rekindle traditional rivalries.
DR BILL STANDISH, AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVRERSITY: On a few occasions, people have been stoned and killed if they've turned up to vote and it's been thought they will vote the wrong way.
Dr Bill Standish has been an electoral observer in Papua New Guinea since before independence in 1975.
DR BILL STANDISH: There's been increasing violence in every election I have known. It has now got to a stage where it is impossible in the Highlands electorates for candidates to campaign in other candidate's, their rival's base areas, what are considered their base areas. And people get beaten up, and in one case...several cases actually, candidates have been kidnapped when they've tried to campaign outside their base area, in somebody else's base area.
In today's Papua New Guinea, political prestige is gained through government office. And while some use violence to get their hands on the spoils, others use coalition-building. Peter Waieng is a sitting member seeking re-election in the Highlands province of Simbu. He has just made a deal with a neighbouring tribe. It's a pragmatic alliance designed to retain his seat in the national parliament. Post-election, he will not forget his new friends.
PETER WAIENG, SITTING MEMBER FOR KUNDIAWA IN SIMBU PROVINCE: Up in the Highlands, we live in the tribal system - once your tribe is with you, that's it. It's not your political party or whatever. So that grouping that came across was not from my tribe, it's a different tribe. They got different blood. They have got their own candidate standing. I've got two candidates standing down there, and they have to break some sort of boundaries to come into a new tribe. So it's like a Liberal going into a Labor camp. You see. So, it was very important for me, and very important for the people.
No-one should underestimate the sophistication of these deals. Their genesis lies in the moka, a complex culture of exchange, thousands of years old. In the moka, you give with the expectation of receiving in the future. Highlands politicians have successfully modernised the moka and made it part of their election strategy. With judicious giving and receiving, one can capture the votes of a whole tribe. This blatant and literal pork-barrelling is called 'big man politics' in PNG. It's a game not all candidates play. Sara Garap, also from the Highlands, is one of only nine women standing in this province. While electoral laws were recently changed to discriminate in favour of women, they still face enormous hurdles. She doesn't give and distribute gifts and not one pig has died in her name.
SARA GARAP, CANDIDATE IN SINASINA-YONGGAMUGL SEAT: None of us have actually done that, we have not been killing pigs. But I think it's a big man's show, you know, "I am a big man, and if I am able to do this, then I am able to bring goods and services and I can hand deliver to you." I had somebody from my village come and talk to one of my guys, and said, "You're not going to win. Just walking around like that, you're not going to win, so stop wasting your time."
It's a different scene in the islands. Elly Kimkim is a candidate in New Britain, to the north-east of the PNG mainland. Here, campaigning is personal, almost one-to-one.
ELLY KIMKIM, CANDIDATE FOR SEAT OF GAZELLE IN EAST NEW
BRITAIN: It's time for a leadership change. One of the things that myself and my generation see is that the old leadership are not willing to relinquish their position, they are not preparing new leaders to take over. If you look at, for example, the founding fathers and the people who were here from since pre-independence and independence, they have not prepared, or groomed, anybody to replace them. Apart from the lack of experience that I may have, I've got the qualification, and I've got a clean name, I've not been involved in any scandal. And I think they want to try out and to use their word - "new blood", they want new blood, so, I'm running on that, yeah.
Elly Kimkim's university education didn't prepare him for big man politics.
ELLY KIMKIM: It's unbelievable, I think I went through a lifetime. There was a lot of betrayals, a lot of lies, I learned a lot. If anything is coming out of this election campaign, I think I learned a lot about life, yeah, no matter what happens.
In the best of times, it remains incredibly difficult to run a successful election in Papua New Guinea. There are 109 electorates, many of which can only be reached by air. These ballot boxes were bound for more remote districts. This Defence Force helicopter was so unreliable that the election was well behind schedule. Some communities never received ballot boxes or papers at all. And as for the electoral roll, it was a work of fiction in many parts of the country.
DR BILL STANDISH: There probably are something like a million more names on the roll than there are adult voters, potential voters. Sometimes these ghost names are used during elections, sometimes they're not.
MAN: I'll be voting three times. In here, in the Abokomo electorate, and then in the Wapadamunda district. It's not my mistake, it's not of my making, but it's the Electoral Commission's making that I was enrolled in three different places.
DR BILL STANDISH: Apart from the fact that people deliberately put on ghost names, and false names, the funding for the Electoral Commission to update the rolls didn't come through until about January, it should have come through early in the last quarter last year, the field work wasn't done. Secondly, the Electoral Commission doesn't control the staff who do it, a lot of them are casual staff, who may come in with an agenda to stack the rolls in their home area, and perhaps cull out potential voters from other areas.
The Australian Government contributed $8 million to help clean up the electoral roll. This didn't seem to help Peter Waieng from the Highlands. He noticed something was wrong when neighbouring villages seemed to double in population overnight.
PETYER WAIENG: There are people in the neighbouring tribes who were 6,000 in the last election, and now they are 14,000 - that's scaring me. I am definitely losing, and these sort of discrepancies are visible everywhere.
Finally, two weeks late, the big day arrived, and the capital of Enga province was abuzz. Ballot boxes were unlocked, and the precious blank voting papers were distributed so polling could begin. Off to the side, the sitting governor's son began methodically marking each paper with a perfect cross against his father's name. Voting early and often in the best traditions of Tammany Hall. While a tribal deal to support the sitting governor had obviously been done, it angered some who wanted to buck the system and cast their own vote. The presiding officer wouldn't give this man 81 ballot papers to vote on behalf of his wife and large, extended family. Meanwhile, the governor's son kept crossing, oblivious to the theatre going on around him. Eventually, the chief released the 81 ballot papers in an attempt to keep the peace. Persistence and a few punches pay. With the vote for governor resolved, attention turned to the five parliamentary seats in the province. For most of these, the polling was done by calling. The voter responds by shouting out his or her chosen candidate's name. It's another collective procedure worked
out well in advance.
PROFESSOR JOHN NONGGORR: I keep on saying this to people - it is completely unrealistic to expect a person right in the village, who hasn't seen a white man until independence in 1975, to understand and vote in accordance with what a white man does. To expect them to do that is almost insane and that's what's happening, it is a transition we have to manage it.
Tribes agreeing to vote en masse was nothing when compared to what happened next. Someone didn't want the election to succeed, and sent in the Raskols. Police responded quickly and forcefully, but it didn't save the papers. They hacked open the boxes, invalidating their contents. Rather than try and save the remaining ballot papers, scrutineers decided to burn those papers which had been tampered with. Elsewhere in Enga, ballot papers were destroyed when a gunfight broke out on polling day. Two people were killed and dozens of houses burnt to the ground. This man was an election casualty, and fighting will undoubtedly resume once the burial is over. In the Engan capital, two nights later, more than a third of the completed ballots went up in smoke when the shipping containers in which they were locked were dynamited. This time, the police ran away. The raiders were heavily armed with M-16s and Kalashnikovs.
VILLAGER: It was just like a movie, this morning, around 4:00 or 5:00. Every man came with AK-47 guns. We were all powerless. Can't do much. All we have to do is just sit down and watch. It's all up to the Electoral Commission and the national government to decide whether to count all these boxes again, or... ..suspend this election, or I don't know what, but that decision is with the national government and the Electoral Commission.
Four days ago, the returning officer was forced to send a fax to Port Moresby at gun point. The fax declared the man suspected of masterminding this attack to be the winner. The returning officer immediately disappeared, or was kidnapped.
VILLAGER: Everyone's not really happy, they're very, very angry now for this incident. (Sighs)
PROFESSOR JOHN NONGGORR: We decided to bring in the Western system of government, and especially this parliamentary democracy system, and so it is inevitable that we go through these problems. And if people think that PNG shouldn't have these problems, people are completely wrong, they don't understand what it is, what is really happening. If it was possible for someone above to look down and see what was happening, they would say "Oh, yeah, it was inevitable, it had to happen."
How did our candidates fare? Governor of Enga Province, Peter Ipatas, was returned with an increased majority. His tribal rival, Kundapen Talyaga, came seventh. Peter Waieng lost his seat as he predicted, when he saw the electoral roll. Elly Kimkim from New Britain scored 5% coming sixth out of nine candidates. His new blood will have to wait. And after four months of campaigning with her megaphone, Sara Garap scored just 78 votes. There might be something said for killing pigs after all.