B’ville will still depend on PNG

Letters

The people of the former North Solomon province, now Bougainville, are advocating to break away from mainland Papua New Guinea.
While many are looking forward to the very day in 2019 when the actual voting will take place, others are still in dark  on how to decide.
However, we must as the people  of the collective Melanesian heritage, ask why independence when  we know that Bougainville lags behind in many social indicators compared with other provinces or will it be a recipe for another failed  state as the Australians always want to call.
All sectors need a lot of investments, whether it be education, health, road infrastructure, wharfs or jetties. The list goes on. Scotland has been developed by well-trained and well-educated workforce and has one of the highest living standards, better than England.
It has more advanced industries and some  of the biggest insurance, finance and banking  firms.
As they know  that  being small compared to the size of  UK  will always be a disadvantage when you want to trade, access capital and  negotiate on  treaties and agreements with other  countries.
Therefore, size matters in today’s world of specialisation and opportunity costs.
Finally, the only thing Bougainville will rely on to develop itself  will be  its nature resources, including the still remaining huge copper and gold deposits
In Panguna, the big question is  how will capital be raised to develop these resources and who will develop them?
The obvious answer is that they will need a foreign entity and capital to develop these resources, as they do not have the capital nor the expertise to develop them.
This will subject them to these foreign interest terms  and conditions.
Therefore, Papua New Guinea will still be needed for assistance and advice.

Be realistic, Via email