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Mount Hagen
THE two words speak for themselves
and we suspect for the majority of the people of Papua New
Guinea.
Once a pleasant Highlands district headquarters, then a proud
provincial capital, the mountain city is heading at breakneck
speed towards complete chaos.
It’s become the custom in our country to minimise such
situations. Don’t attack the problem – attack the media for
reporting it. The media stands accused of sensationalism,
inaccurate reporting, exaggeration and a host of other
journalistic crimes.
Mt Hagen is a classic case.
For almost a year, we have drawn attention to the growing levels
of confrontation in our third city.
The clashes between city authorities and the endless bickering
over who controls what are ever-present negatives of Mt Hagen
life.
Then there’s the embattled commercial, agricultural and export
sectors and the continuing targeting of heavy transport along
the decaying Highlands Highway.
Add the blazing tribal confrontations adjacent to Mt Hagen that
regularly impact the city and the appalling lack of basic
infrastructure – and a dozen other deeply troubling scenarios.
The National reports on these matters in the interests of the
silent and often frightened residents of this once admirable
city. If it is sensational to point out that schoolchildren were
photographed looting shops following a fire, or that hundreds of
supposedly upright citizens fell over each other in a frantic
scramble to steal anything and everything from retailers, then
so be it.
The reality is that far too many of the citizens of Mt Hagen
have walked away from the concepts of orderly administration
that were once a feature of this and other Highlands towns.
The looters – and we’re talking about men, women and children of
differing tribes, ages and educational backgrounds – saw their
behaviour as no more than a lucky break.
Many of them are out of work loafers, the very people who should
be fully employed in creating the new society and culture of
their province.
We can only wonder at the provincial administration in recent
years. There has clearly been little or no effort to address
these issues.
A signpost of this social decay is the alarming level of
sexually transmitted infections in the Mt Hagen and Western
Highlands community.
This rural city, with huge potential to lead the region, is
behind only the nation’s capital in terms of place of origin of
HIV/AIDS victims.
There appears to be hopelessness, an overall apathy abroad among
the people of Mt Hagen and much of the surrounding province.
Much of the population seems characterised by a lack of
direction and ambition and any sense of creating a future.
There will be many loyal sons of Mt Hagen who will undoubtedly
be offended by that claim. Some will respond that urban
mismanagement and misappropriation, lack of funding from the
National Government and a host of other possibilities explain
the present state of the city.
Certainly they exist.
Certainly the desperate pleas of Western Highlands Chamber of
Commerce president Kevin Murphy echo at least some of those
failings and many others.
A proper fire service, for example, has been the crying need of
practically every provincial capital for decades.
Periodically some piece of equipment or some up-market training
course appears on the horizon. The impact is virtually nil.
Successive heads of the Fires Service have made the point over
and over again, but nobody listens – few if any local fire
services are equipped or trained to fight major conflagrations.
Then there’s the lack of building boards to monitor new town and
city construction; in some cases the boards exist but operate
under extreme pressure from wealthy investors.
Land marked for residences mysteriously morphs into land for
commercial properties; parkland erupts with squatters who have
been quietly encouraged to move there by some local
parliamentarian who needs their vote. Thereafter they become
approved settlers demanding services.
All concerned residents of Mt Hagen should now join in a unified
approach to the National Government to demand immediate action.
The Waigani excuse that it is a matter for the provincial
government is both hollow and worthless.
The National Government has the final responsibility for the
peaceful and harmonious running of Papua New Guinea.
It’s time that responsibility was met.
 
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