Niningi calls on nationals to start writing about us

MORE Papua New Guineans should write books to preserve our culture, says Minister for Higher Education, Research, Science and Technology Pila Niningi.
He said our libraries are filled with books written by foreigners who belong to a different culture.
“I have visited many communities and schools who say that they want libraries but you can’t just build libraries. We need books in there and many books by Papua New Guinea writers for that matter,” Niningi said.
“Our culture is dying. Why not we write about it and make a permanent record of it?”
Niningi was speaking at the Institute of Public Administration hall on Saturday for the launch of the book Time, Eternity and God Enarr, by David Gonol.
“It is important that we write our ideas down so that we can refer to them later,” he said.
“Most of the books about us are written by Westerners who don’t really understand us.”
Department of Justice and Attorney-General Secretary Dr Eric Kwa said we often complain of being misrepresented in writings.
“We can correct them if we start writing books of our own,” he said.
“In PNG, the fields to write about are so wide because people have not covered everything in this country yet. Write about your community, yourself and your culture.”
Kwa said books authored by Westerners were hard to understand because they were from a different culture.
“But when we read books written by Papua New Guineans, we identify with them and their experiences as Papua New Guineans,” he said.