FORCE confronts force – is that good or bad?
We’re prompted to consider the issue as a result of a shootout near Okapa in the Eastern Highlands province.
The area was once home to a number of expatriate-owned coffee plantations, and in recent times local Members of Parliament have made determined efforts to get the coffee industry going once again.
Part of that process has been to maintain and in many places rebuild the once excellent road that linked Okapa to the Highlands Highway.
What can perhaps be described as criminal neglect saw that road return to jungle with collapsed bridges and a high level of criminal activity.
Local people seem determined that those days are past.
There has been major reconstruction of the road and once again coffee, this time at the initiative of small holder proprietors, is once again a prime crop in the area.
The incident that has prompted this column, occurred last week when the acting Okapa station commander confronted a typical roadblock and holdup, having been warned by a village woman that criminals were in the area.
The details of the story appeared yesterday; suffice it to say that acting station commander Okoro confronted the group of seven men at the roadblock, shooting and killing one.
The rest fled into the bush.
The Okapa station commander pursued them, certainly a brave action given that the group was armed with AK47 and M16 firearms.
The gang made a stand; Mr Okoro stood his ground and killed a second criminal in an exchange of gunfire, then personally took the two bodies to Goroka hospital, many kilometres to the west.
We have no doubt that the majority of readers will applaud the policeman’s actions, and given the state of crime in PNG today, it is indeed hard not to do so.
We do not know other details of the incident; we cannot say whether Mr Okoro acted in self-defence or not.
But the incident leads to questions of the role of the police and the very real need for the citizenry and their property to be protected.
People along the Highlands Highway and along the many feeder roads in the five Highlands provinces are totally fed-up with the now ritual hold-ups along that main road.
We frequently receive correspondence from those who have had suffered this grim experience and who are united in demanding a more aggressive approach by the police.
The Okapa incident provides just such an answer; a policeman apparently putting himself at considerable risk in order to rout a gang of criminals.
It is difficult not to sympathise with the travelling public over this issue.
Only yesterday, we learned of a female colleague of ours who went through not one but two holdups while travelling from Mt Hagen to Madang.
Those who expect the police to be fully armed and in numbers along the length of the Highway are simply unrealistic.
The police, as indicated in the Okapa incident, can react quickly and decisively if they have information from those who live along the roads.
Had it not been for the village woman, it is unlikely that the Okapa commander would have been aware of the gang.
This underlines the message repeatedly issued by Police Commissioner Baki; if the public will meaningfully co-operate with the police, law and order will be much easier to monitor and enforce.
The police do not have the right to kill anybody – unless they are acting in self-defence.
Their role is to arrest and bring before the courts those who are suspects in criminal cases.
But to take the Okapa incident as an example, it is hard to see the outcome of this confrontation in anything but an affirmative light.
Perhaps if that kind of determination is displayed often enough we may be able to have some impact upon the crime levels in our country.
We have little doubt that the Okapa commander is something of a hero today and its hard not to agree.
Only when our roads resume the role for which they were built, and when the last cheap criminal has been removed from them, will we able to move our country ahead to its intended destiny.