Goroka history

Letters

The Apec Summit is a world-recognised event of high significance and it is being held in Papua New Guinea.
Preparations to welcome and host the Apec member countries are well underway.
The people of Eastern Highlands are proud to share this hosting right.
The surrounding villages in the township of Goroka are honoured and they remember what their forefathers did when they gave the land for the town.
This will be a lasting experience which will be passed on to future generations.
Another key point to raise is the origin of the name Goroka.
The provincial government must dig into history books to find out where Goroka got its name and the meaning of it.
Was it a name inveted by the colonial administration in the 1920s and the 1930s?
Or was taken from somewhere else?
The Apec members need to be informed.
Apec has put the name Goroka to the world. This won’t be reversed.
But how the name came to be must known.
Koloka – Garoka – Koroka – Goroka – “the dawn has come”.
Rings a bell?
The above names were given by the “white man” upon their hearing it from the forefathers of Gouloka.
They heard from a people who had no written history and to better pronounce their local name for a foreigner to hear is how it is recorded in written history.
Hence the people of Gouloka village deserves recognition.

Gouloka
Goroka, EHP