| Sports |
Gearing up for
tomorrow
‘Come tomorrow’ is
the catch-phrase of a campaign of a different sort, writes JACK
METTA
TUPIRI is going to exercise his
democratic rights to the hilt.
He’s been planning a conscientious campaign for some time but it
has been quite a challenge getting the village people to flow with
his way of thinking.
“I am going to stand at the ma tao (river side) every day with a
poster for all intending candidates converging on the province,”
he says.
“The poster will have two words on it in very bold letters –
C-o-m-e t-o-m-o-r-r-o-w!”
Tupiri reckons it is time to pay back in kind for the treatment he
and his fellow villagers had received for years from leaders at
the Big House in Waigani.
Never has he fully benefited from one toea that his so-called
elected leader had politely handed out or distributed to the
villagers with a clear conscience.
Those days when they really needed their Member’s help, he was not
available and when he was on those very rare occasions, the
message conveyed through his staff was simply and precise, “Come
tomorrow”.
He came the next day, and the next and next for three weeks and
then a line from an old Skeeter Davie’s favourite broke through
his simple village mind – “tomorrow never comes” – and he realised
what the Member’s directive meant exactly that in no uncertain
terms.
Their case was indeed a pressing issue at the time – the floods
had washed away the highway bridge and urgent attention was needed
from the powers that be to span the river for the simple reason
that this bridge served as the only access to the nation’s capital
and the lifeline for the rural people’s meager income from their
crops.
“Come tomorrow” meant their income was not immediately forthcoming
and they were desperately cut off from a lifeline that supported
their livelihood.
Desperate needs warranted desperate measures and the villagers
resorted to the only means available – spanning the river with the
only resource available – a coconut trunk.
Hence the famed lasofa bridge came to the fore, the story of which
had graced this page on a couple of occasions over the past year.
Tupiri is now using the ‘come tomorrow” catch phrase for his own
campaign to discourage potential so-called leaders from indulging
in their “verbal diarrhoea” in the villages.
He’s had enough of being told or more precisely, promised, that if
elected into their office, the so-called leader’s office will be
open to every Tom, Dick, Harry and his dog at any time through
thick and thin and at the most odd hours.
He’s put a lot of thought into his campaign, taking into account
precedents from the past.
He remembers well the last campaign that the villagers embarked
on. It involved asking one simple question to candidates: “Where
is your house?”
This question was to them, many faceted; it asked where the man
lived and if he had a house in the village or in the city?
If the man replied that his house was in the city, the villagers
didn’t want to have anything to do with him.
If he replied that he had a house in the village, the people
wanted to know where and how long he lived there. They felt this
information was relevant to gauge how much the candidate knew
about the problems, the pains and the challengers the villagers
faced each day of their lives in the rural areas.
Many-a-potential candidate from the city was rendered too
embarrassed to answer the question, thereby revealing the true
nature of his or her disposition on the eve of the election.
Tupiri believes this was the basis upon which all Port
Moresby-based candidates never got anywhere near winning the
elections in the province since independence.
“They hang around the big city and when it comes to election time,
they think they hold the key to all the problems of the rural
people,” Tupiri recalls.
“The chances are that once a candidate is elected, he would remain
in the city and do his own thing. The plight of the rural populace
will be the last thing on his mind, which, no doubt will be filled
by the vices the city offered liked nightclubs, pokies, all night
binges and young street girls.”
Tupiri has already “recruited” the services of a couple of
die-hard anti-hot air village elders who make it their personal
business to uphold the truth.
Tupiri explained that these were a couple of old hands who had
been “in the system” as local level government leaders and were
wary of the hot air that circulates within the system.
They had lost their mandate, much to the regret of the locals
later, on grounds that they had not done anything for their
people.
This was despite their defence that they were not able to do much
as funds and practically everything else was controlled at the
national level.
One of them, at the end of his tethers had remarked once that “you
really had kiss someone’s bottom at Waigani to be able to get some
positive response, however small”.
His weakness was that he wasn’t that type of a guy and the bottoms
at Waigani repulsed him to the point of death.
Tupiri reckons his is a peaceful campaign, basically airing his
frustrations at the whole election process and the quality of
people who attempt to take advantage of the people’s ignorance.
“No more,” he exclaims. “Enough is enough. It is time to elect
good leaders – people who would understand us and our problems.”
Tupiri likens it to a good marriage. “Many are the times husbands
complain that their wives do not understand them or vice-versa.
Well, a good marriage is when both husband and wife are compatible
in harmony, truth and love. One is there for the other come, come
what may. One does not tell the other to come tomorrow if he or
she needed something.”
Tupiri for one is thankful that his people are not as desperate as
the Highlanders to drive their campaign forward.
“The last thing we want to see is blood shed. We are sensible
people doing sensible things. We fear and respect authority. The
bottom line is that we don’t want selfish and unscrupulous people
taking advantage of us.
“For far too long we have been living in the wilderness with
nothing to show for 31 years of independence. People say we are a
poor rich country and I tell you, the truth really hurts.
“I am not going to live for another 31 years in poverty, squalor
and misery. It’s time for a change.”
Indeed Tupiri has his mind set on seeing greater changes for the
better. Hence his campaign to stand at the river side with his
poster saying “Come tomorrow”.
If they persist, he’ll arrange for his back up poster with “Never
learn!” on it.
And if all else fails, he’ll invoke the powers of the great
spirits to bring the floods and wash away the bridge, install the
lasofa and charge toll for every candidate that passes through.
But he would be very selective.
He believes that with the number of self-assured candidates as
they are, he’ll make a killing and who knows, finance his campaign
to run for the next House in five years.
And that reminds us of the Wise Counsellor’s words: “If you are
not grateful with a meagre income, you will never be grateful with
abundance …”
 
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