Let’s fix our issues

AN unhappy child becomes disobedient at times.
The child, being human, responds to situations.
As parents, we have find to out why our kids change moods and find ways to calm them.
Our resource-rich country is in a critical situation with the unprecedented Alotau lootings and killings.
These unfortunate events are occurring as we are going through the Covid-19 pandemic and expensive commission of inquiries while telling the world that we will hang on to our “Christian nation” status.
While the Union Bank of Switzerland loan inquiry is pending results, highly-paid scholars are flown around the country to discuss views on declaring Papua New Guinea a Christian country.
Their findings will influence amendments in our constitution.
The Christianity inquiry has been sanctioned last week by the National Executive Council amidst outstanding issues such as effecting the Independent Commission Against Corruption, the Vagrancy Act and ways to curb ethnic violence in the country.
We are experiencing civil disobedience.
The Alotau looting was unprecedented.
The attacks and killings in Hela, Enga and the nation’s capital reflects our disobedience and disrespect for the rule of law.
Just as a disobedient kid and his parents, if we did anything wrong as managers of this resource-rich country, we have to revisit our decisions and make amends.
We have to first remind ourselves that the gap between the “haves” and the “have nots” is widening by the day. Many are mere spectators on their own land.
Many in our rural areas walk long distances to get a taste of the outside world while most of them can’t even earn K1 for weeks.
If we mad decisions to suit a handful, we were wrong.
Our constitution stresses more on equality.
Have we been living up to that?
Our country is fragile.
We can’t deny that.
We do not need highly-paid consultants or rocket scientists to point out where we went wrong.
Go back to the drawing board, to the “haus tambaran” and get back our country.
A pastor once said: “Corruption, greed, and indecisiveness will one day bring this country, one of earth’s paradise, to its knees”.
There was a lot of wisdom in that statement.

Andrew Yhuai Dupre,
Minj