Bush meetings in Morobe

NATION

By FRANK SENGE KOLMA
[email protected]
WE turn now to Morobe to see close up how the provincial government system has operated on the ground.
If there was any place it was going to work it was here in Morobe.
The reason, as shall be seen, was simple: Morobe had a well-oiled planning apparatus and the gumption to stick to it.
We shall also observe how the major spoiler of all good things in this country, politics, happened along and swept all achievements with one brush into the Huon Gulf.
It is here in Morobe that we shall see the early evidence of success and why it all evaporated.
Morobe, the biggest province in PNG, could very easily be divided into two provinces.
Was that to happen there already exists a natural boundary for the division of the province: The Markham River.
The Markham runs nearly the entire length of the province’s most significant geographical feature – the Markham rift valley.
Running south east to north east, this fault belt is 193 kilometers long. The river of the same name meanders untamed through this valley in a haphazard manner, beginning its journey in the north at Umi-Atzera and entering the Hon Gulf some 170 kilometers distant, dissecting as it does the province in two.
On the Markham’s eastern bank lies provincial capital Lae, most of the Markham valley itself and the districts of Nawaeb, Finschaffen, Kabwum and Tewai-Siassi.
On the Markham’s western bank lie the two districts of Bulolo and Menyama encompassing historical landmarks such as Bulolo, Morobe, Salamaua and Wau as well as Mumeng and Aseki.
Only two districts – the Markham and Huon – straddle both banks of the Markham River with the Huon district taking up the delta area.
Morobe has a land area of 35, 968 square kilometers. The coast line extends to about 402 kilometers and the province holds some 12, 000 square kilometers of arable land mostly to be found in the Markham rift valley and in pockets of area in Mumeng, Wau and Kabwum. Some 450 hectares of land is under cash crop cultivation mostly of a subsistence type. The predominant cash crops are coffee, cocoa, cardamom, coconut, rice, chillis and now increasingly vanilla.
Morobe is predominantly Lutheran with the church’s national headquarters and seminary based in Lae. The province takes its name from the Morobe Patrol Post situated on an excellent harbour 128 kilometers south east of Lae, the provincial headquarters. Lae is located near the mouth of the Markham River and is PNG’s largest and busiest port city as well as its industrial city.
The 2000 population census counted 539, 404 people in Morobe. Only 1,989 persons were non-citizens. Out of every 100 persons, 75 live in the rural sector. The Morobe population is growing at 3.5 per cent, slightly above the national average.
After the first 14 years under the provincial government system the role of planning and implementation was certified as a bona fide and unshakable tool of development in the province.
In the first seven years when planning was detailed and based on needs and resources and where implementation followed the plans, Morobe experienced cohesive growth and development.
However, when planning was hijacked by politics in the next seven years, the gains of the first seven years were reduced to near anarchy.
“Planning,” former three-time Governor Luther Wenge likes to say, “is the primary function and the first step of effective and successful management in any organisation. All other roles and functions of administration and management only execute what is decided and determined by the plan. Through planning the management focuses on their goals and objectives, avoids wastage of resources, avoids obstacles and minimises risks.
“Those who conform to their plans diligently often succeed unless something drastic happens. Those who do not, never attain their goals.”
Morobe’s experience was unique
The Morobe experience in planning has been quite unique. It involved every party and began at the time when Morobe attained provisional provincial government on March 10, 1978.
There were at the time 25 members which formed itself into the provincial legislature calling it the Tutumang. The name, in the widely spoken Kate language of Morobe, means “meeting”.
On April 7, 1978 the Interim Premier, Pama Anio named a provincial executive council which is also called “meeting” or Sam Sewe in Yabim, the other widely spoken vernacular in the province.
The provincial government concept was only a year old and little understood but leaders of Morobe opted for a unique process that remains today and which has been responsible for the early signs of success of provincial government system and the rekindled hope in following the provincial government reforms after 1995.
Prior to and following the introduction of the provincial government process, a series of meetings were held between Morobe national politicians, local leaders and senior public servants to trash out the idea of a decentralised government and the lines of demarcation and responsibilities of this second tier of government, and the third tier, the local government council system, and how they would be implanted in the province. These series of meetings have come to be known as bus kivungs, which literally translate from Tok Pisin to bush meetings.
All the meetings were conducted outside the boundaries of Lae, the provincial headquarters, a tradition that has remained to this day.
This tradition is deliberate. It was felt that decisions affecting development policies and strategies were to be conducted close to the rural people on whose behest and behalf these policies were drawn up and directed. Social and economic policy and planning could not be drawn up in isolation and people were to be central to the concerns raised at these meetings and the considerations arising out of them.
The real meaning of development, it was argued, was not new roads, bridges, buildings or the growth of business. Rather it was to be the development of the people that all planning and policy would be directed at.
The first bus kivung was held at Gurukor in Mumeng District in 1978.
Interim Premier Pama Anio had been chairman of the interim legislature before his elevation to the new post as Premier of Morobe and carried with him a wealth of experience as an able administrator.
This first meeting was staged with the formidable task of introducing the provincial government concept as provided for under the Organic Law on Provincial Governments and to gather all senior public servants and leaders of Morobe to form a strong team to bring development to Papua New Guinea’s largest province.
This meeting was preceded by uncertainty and fear about the impact of the new system of government upon politicians and public servants alike.
There was the fear that national politicians, sensing an erosion of their power base, might swing their support and resources away from their provincial counterparts.
There was the fear that the new system might create a power base that would quickly ostracise the third tier community or local government council system, or that the new system of government would provide easy access for foreign business interests as well as those with other interests to gain access to and control of business interests in the provinces.
These fears were compounded by a number of factors: The few civil servants who were available and up to the task were under-paid and needed their conditions of employment drastically overhauled.
There was a severe shortage of money and skilled public servants and lack of training facilities to send people to acquire skills; and Public servants were still working and receiving pay under the national departments but were expected to answer the political dictates of provincial politicians.
The fears were genuine and experience has proved most of them to be true.
In the interest of providing good administration and government for the people. This was the beginnings of cooperation and a working relationship between political, bureaucratic and local leaders that was to be primarily responsible for the early success of the provincial Government system in Morobe.
Ideas from the Gurukor meeting were not conclusive but it was decided then that the bus kivungs would be the place for all the province’s development planning in the future.
The next bus kivung was held at Bosadi Village in Morobe North in 1979. At this meeting the interim provincial government formulated policy guidelines for all the divisions of the Department of Morobe. Each division was expected to use these policy guidelines to provide and receive budgets for their projects. This practice took root and remained until the 2004 budget when, driven by the austerity measures taken by the National Government and chronic money shortage, the provincial government withdrew individual divisional budgets and instead drew budgets only for priority divisions and agencies of government.
The guidelines, hatched at the Bosadi Bus Kivung, were brought to full flower at the third kivung on Tuam Island in September 1981. The plans, policies and programmes which were agreed to at this meeting became the Tuam (I) Declaration.
Tuam in the local dialect means bones. It therefore became Morobe’s planning skeleton, around which the flesh of all policy and implementation could be wrapped.
At Tuam the five National goals and Directive Principles were adopted by Morobe as its goals and directive principles. In addition, the national Eight Point Plan was adopted and expanded to a 12 point development plan.
Tuam I also set out the strategies and development guidelines for the years 1982 to 1987, Morobe’s first five-year plan.
The theme of Tuam I was Rural Development and 68 per cent of all of the period’s total budget was allocated in infrastructure projects, principally in works.
The period saw the biggest expansion in roads, bridges and education infrastructure in all partsw of the province ever seen up to then or since.
At the political and administrative level, the Provincial Government decentralized further political leadership and planning to the district and ward levels.
In September 1981, the Tutumang passed a Community Government act which replaced the Local Government System. Later in May 1982 the Provincial Government approved the Morobe Provincial Planning and Implementation system involving the local people in planning their own welfare of their communities.
Bottom-up planning set in motion
A system of bottom up planning, budgeting, implementation and review process was set in motion.
In 1983 the fourth bus kivung was held at Bundung and reviewed the Tuam Declaration and its effectiveness and short comings.
This review was extensive. It got down to analysing all expenditure in every category down to per capita allocation by districts between 1981 and 1983. In this way the government was able to tell whether the expenditure had benefited most of the people in the province’s rural districts. The results were enlightening.
The review found that the Government had neglected social and economic development in the province and spent the lion’s share (68 per cent) of the budget on infrastructure. The works programs spent 70 per cent of the money on maintenance, not new projects. It further revealed that K5.73 million had gone to Huon (Lae) District, more than the other districts.
The way ahead became clear through this process. Certain realignments in expenditure had to be made while priority areas had to be maintained.
On Oct 28, 1985 the fifth bus kivung was convened at Kabwum District. The Bundung review of Tuam I had shown that despite the positive results of the rural development drive good and equal efforts needed to be made in the area of economic and social development and to further decentralise power for the people to really benefit.
Socio-economic development and decentralisation became the theme chosen for Tuam II, the second five-year development plan for 1986 to 1990. The idea behind this plan was to enable the people to become sufficiently self-reliant and be able to participate in economic activity to enrich their own welfare and raise their standard of living.
True to this vision, a number of district authorities were set up. The Fisika (Finschafen, Sialum and Kabum districts) Authority and Angka district authorities which have been singularly successful in pushing regional economic projects since then.
With the benefit of the experience of Tuam I and the review of it, Tuam II was extensive and detailed. The implementation, sadly, was never carried out fully as the province was thrown into expensive political turmoil. The Provincial Government was embroiled in bitter political rivalry to the extent it was suspended.
In the political heat of the time, the Tuam II plan became obsolete and obscured. In almost all sectors, lack of funds increased overheads and political interference has led to underachievement of many of the goals of Tuam II. In a few instances overly ambitious goal setting was cited as the reason.
Following the review and after a measure of stability was restored at both the political and administrative levels following provincial elections in 1991, a third five year planning document was adopted at a meeting in September 1991 at Dreger, Finschafen. The Dreger I, in three volumes, summarized the successes and short comings of the previous two plans and focused on Social Order and Balanced Development for the years 1992 to 1996.
As a plan it was comprehensive, providing detailed project descriptions and budgetary allocations consistent with the province’s needs and government policy priorities.
In practice, the political bickering continued and resources and attention were directed increasingly away from the Dreger Plan.
This was a period when an important lesson was learnt. A decent plan without the will and the managerial ability to implement it is doomed to failure. Dreger I was without a constant, cohesive and stable management.
This was derailing Morobe’s success story. The province’s steady and confident stride faltered here and halted then shifted into reverse gear.
In the second term of the Wenge administration, the objectives sought to address the province’s development issues were the same nine objectives put out in the Dreger I and carried over into Dreger II plans. However, in the latter case the plans were modified to only five.
Back then, the suspension of the provincial government and demise of the biggest province added a final nail to the provincial government system.
The Hensingut Report on the Provincial Government system, prepared by Morobe’s own son, the Late Member for Finschafen Henu Hesingut drew much from Morobe’s experience.
Based on this report, Parliament in 1992 began the process that led to the reforms which resulted in Parliament repealing Organic Law on Provincial and Local Level Governments.
And then the provincial government reforms and all it bore impact in 1995 and Morobe went back to the drawing board.
The man who set the corner post for the bottom up planning and budgeting within provincial needs and means and who ushered in a period of unparalleled success of the decentralised concept of government in Morobe was Utula Samana.
Next: Morobe’s seven good years and seven bad years