NEWSPAGE 20 July
2011

(Photos: Tautai Contemporary Pacific Arts Trust)

NEW ZEALAND: (In search of or Navigating) Neitherland

(Photo: Pacific Insights)

SAMOA: PIF 40th Anniversary Leaders' Lecture Series
Source: Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat Press Release

The Prime Minister of Samoa, Honourable Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, in collaboration with the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, will be hosting the second lecture of the “Pacific Islands Forum 40th Anniversary Leaders’ Lecture Series, with a focus on the Pacific Plan”.

The theme of the lecture will be “PACIFIC REGIONALISM: A tale of lessons, identity and boundless opportunities” with the Honorable Prime Minister giving the keynote address.

Log on to the Forum Secretariat’s website, at this page, to view the live broadcast of the lecture scheduled for Thursday 21st July, 2011, at the Tooa Salamasina Hall, Apia, from 3:00-4:30pm (Samoa time), or from your time zone as follows:

* Canberra (Australia - ACT) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 12:00:00 Noon
* Sydney (Australia - New South Wales) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 12:00:00 Noon
* Brisbane (Australia - Queensland) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 12:00:00 Noon
* Melbourne (Australia - Victoria) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 12:00:00 Noon
* Rarotonga (Cook Islands) - Thursday, July 21, 2011 at 4:00:00 PM
* Palikir (Micronesia) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 1:00:00 PM
* Suva (Fiji) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 2:00:00 PM
* Yaren (Nauru) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 2:00:00 PM
* Auckland (New Zealand) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 2:00:00 PM
* Wellington (New Zealand) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 2:00:00 PM
* Alofi (Niue) - Thursday, July 21, 2011 at 3:00:00 PM
* Koror (Palau) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 11:00:00 AM
* Port Moresby (Papua New Guinea) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 12:00:00 Noon
* Majuro (Marshall Islands) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 2:00:00 PM
* Honiara (Solomon Islands) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 1:00:00 PM
* Nuku’alofa (Tonga) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 3:00:00 PM
* Funafuti (Tuvalu) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 2:00:00 PM
* Port Vila (Vanuatu) - Friday, July 22, 2011 at 1:00:00 PM

“The PIF 40th Anniversary Leaders’ Lecture series is an opportunity for Forum Leaders to mark a milestone moment for the region by addressing and expressing their personal and country viewpoints on the Pacific Plan,” said the Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, Tuiloma Neroni Slade.

The Pacific Plan is the master strategy agreed by Leaders in 2005 declaring their Vision for ‘a region of peace, harmony, security and economic prosperity, so that all of its people can lead free and worthwhile lives’.

“At this Anniversary year it is important for Pacific people to hear from Forum Leaders how we are faring with the Pacific Plan and its implementation, and whether it is setting the right directions for the region and the attainment of the Leaders’ Vision.”

Photo Caption: Samoan Prime Minister Hon. Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi.

AUSTRALIA: Reopening Manus likely to complicate PNG-Australia ties
Source: Australian Broadcasting Corporation

In recent months, Australian media reports about Papua New Guinea have largely focused on the Gillard Government's proposal to reopen an asylum seeker detention centre on Manus Island. But this focus on boat people misses the big picture in Australia-Papua New Guinea relations.

There are major changes underway in economic relations between the two countries, and Papua New Guinea's politics are being transformed with the announcement that long-serving prime minister Sir Michael Somare will stand aside due to ill-health.

Ongoing political and legal wrangling over Manus and asylum seekers won't help relations between Australia and Papua New Guinea, at a time when three major changes are transforming the relationship with our nearest neighbour.

The first of these transformations is a generational shift of leadership in Port Moresby. Grand Chief Sir Michael Somare has been at the centre of PNG politics since the early 1970s. Somare has been in and out of office ever since he assumed leadership of the PANGU Pati in the lead-up to independence in 1975. But with the retirement of the ailing 75-year-old leader, a new generation of politicians are coming to the fore. The sacking last month of foreign minister Dan Polye by acting prime minister Sam Abal is just one sign of the jockeying to come.

While Australia remains a key partner, PNG's new leaders are looking further afield, seeking membership of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and building ties to China. Increasingly, they will look at proposals like a return to the "Pacific Solution" without a sense of obligation to Canberra that marked an older generation of leaders.

We already see this, as up-and-coming leaders in Port Moresby raise questions about the legality of mandatory detention under the PNG Constitution. The Governor of PNG's National Capital District Powes Parkop - a noted human rights lawyer - has foreshadowed a legal challenge to any deal re-opening the Manus centre.

Will asylum seekers detained on Manus be given access to independent lawyers for legal advice about their rights under Australian immigration and refugee law? If so, this defeats the very purpose of processing them offshore - the "Pacific Solution" is designed to remove people from Australia's legal jurisdiction. If they are denied legal assistance, this may breach PNG's Constitution. Under section s.42 (2) of the Constitution, a person who is detained "shall be given adequate opportunity to give instructions to a lawyer of his choice in the place in which he is detained, and shall be informed immediately on his arrest or detention of his rights under this subsection".

The negotiations over Manus have bogged down over these issues, with the UNHCR concerned over possible human rights breaches (as shown with the leaking of internal UN documents to the ABC's Lateline program).

Canberra's pre-occupation with boat people comes at a time when there's another major shift that will transform PNG-Australia relations and our neighbour's society and economy: the expansion of an LNG industry to tap massive reserves of oil and gas in the PNG Highlands.

The LNG boom will be a central element of PNG-Australia policy in coming years, as both governments work to manage PNG's "resource curse". There has already been extensive conflict in the Southern Highlands Province, which the media often presents as atavistic tribal rivalry, but is driven by competition over the benefits flowing from state or corporate entry into customary lands, to construct a gas pipeline from the highlands to the coast.

This economic transformation is tied to new patterns of labour mobility. We are moving to an era of increased movement in both directions across the Torres Strait, with Australians cashing in on the LNG boom and PNG workers seeking opportunities in Australia.

For many years, PNG students have enrolled in Australian secondary and tertiary institutions and PNG's business and political elite have bought property on the Gold Coast. But overall, labour mobility has been largely internal within Papua New Guinea, in contrast to smaller Polynesian states like Tonga, Samoa or the Cook Islands (over decades, Tongan migrants have spread to Auckland, Sydney and other cities of the Pacific Rim and there are more Cook Islanders in New Zealand than in their home islands).

Today, we're seeing the first signs of new trends in labour mobility that will transform Australia-PNG relations. In May, the first nine PNG workers arrived in Australia under temporary visas to pick fruit under the Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme, with more to follow. We've welcomed many skilled migrants from the Pacific, but this pilot provides temporary jobs in the horticulture sector to unskilled workers from the region.

Papua New Guineans also ask why they are not eligible for visas under the "Working Holiday" program (subclass 417) or the separate "Work and Holiday" program (subclass 462). Indonesians, Thais and Malaysians can now obtain s462 visas and South Koreans make up the second largest group in the s417 Working Holiday program (there were 37,056 British backpackers under this program in 2009-10, but 34,870 visas issued to Koreans in the same year).

Many Papua New Guineans wonder why Australia opens its working holiday market to South-East Asian nations but not a fellow member of the Commonwealth.

The current Canberra debate about Manus and boat people misses this bigger picture. Regional labour mobility will only grow, at a time when remittances from overseas permanent and temporary workers far outstrips the amount of development assistance provided to developing nations (in 2010, OECD countries provided $US128 billion in aid to developing countries, but migrant workers from the south sent home $US328 billion in remittances, more than two and a half times the amount of aid).

Both the ALP and Coalition face complex policy dilemmas about asylum seekers. But their knee jerk "solution" - to re-open Manus or Nauru - will just plant the seeds of future crises.

People seem to have forgotten the diplomatic explosion between Canberra, Jakarta and Port Moresby when a boat load of 43 West Papuans arrived on Cape York Peninsula in January 2006. What if the next boat load of asylum seekers is full of West Papuans - as part of a regional processing deal, will they be sent to Malaysia or to Manus?

Our government, blinded by the current panic over boat people, may not want to answer that question.
 

HAWAII: Construction begins on Hawaii’s largest solar project
Source: BrighterEnergy.org

Construction is underway on what is expected to be one of the largest solar installations in Hawai‘i and one of the largest solar powered communities in the US, at Hickam Communities at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam.

The targeted total of four megawatts is expected to produce more than 5.6 million kilowatt-hours of electricity annually and help provide power to more than 2,000 military family homes.

That amount is enough to offset more than 260 million pounds of carbon dioxide over its lifetime, the equivalent of taking close to 23,000 cars off the road for a year.

The installations are also expected to create more than 55 green jobs in Hawai’i during the two-year installation period.

Hickam Communities, owned and managed by property solutions provider Lend Lease, is the preferred developer for the Air Force to develop, design, construct, renovate and provide asset and property management for homes at Hickam Air Force Base through 2057.

SolarCity will initially install solar on approximately 600 rooftops at Hickam Communities, with the solar electricity generated helping provide power to more than 2,000 homes currently on base.

Through a 20-year power purchase agreement, SolarCity will engineer, install and maintain the solar systems, which will be interconnected by Hawaiian Electric Company.


Cleaner environment

The project will promote a cleaner environment in Hawai’i and also help the Air Force meet Department of Defense goals to have 25 percent of its energy requirements met by renewable energy by 2025.

“Entering into this power purchase agreement with support from Air Force leadership has given us an opportunity to give back to our families today and into the future,” said Jerry Schmitz, project director of Hickam Communities. “In addition to reducing emissions, money saved can go back into maintaining our community and providing services and programs for our families.”

Hickam Communities will be the second solar-powered community on an Air Force Base in the U.S. In October 2009, Lend Lease and SolarCity announced the first solar-powered community on an Air Force Base in the U.S., and the nation’s largest distributed, community-wide solar power project at Soaring Heights at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona.

“Hickam Communities and Lend Lease’s use of renewable, solar energy will have a positive impact on the local environment and island economy,” said SolarCity CEO Lyndon Rive. “This project will help reduce the expense and pollution created by imported oil.”

Homes were selected for solar installations based on specific location and suitability for solar panels.
 

(Photo: Taimi Media Network)

TONGA: Commonwealth Secretary General visits Tonga
Source: Taimi Media Network

The Secretary General of the Commonwealth Mr. Kamalesh Sharma called on Tonga’s Prime Minister, Lord Tu’ivakanō after visiting the Samoan Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi.

It’s the first Official visits of Mr Sharma as the Commonwealth General Secretary to Tonga and Samoa, following his attendance at the Commonwealth Law Ministers Meeting in Sydney in mid-July.

He arrived in the Kingdom on Monday Saturday 16th and his visit includes meeting with other members of the Cabinet Ministers, Speaker of Parliament, Opposition Leader and Commonwealth High Commisioners.

The Secretary-General meets the two Prime Ministers primarily to exchange views on the agenda and key issues for the forthcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, to be held in Perth, Australia, in October 2011.

Mr Sharma also wishes to pursue a deeper understanding of Samoa and Tonga’s national interests and priorities, and discuss ways the Commonwealth can best strengthen its partnership with both countries in areas of shared interest, including democracy and good governance, economic development, gender, and youth matters.

Photo Caption: The Secretary General of the Commonwealth Mr. Kamalesh Sharma with Tonga's Prime Minister Lord Tu'ivakanō.
 

(Photo: Oceania Football Confederation)

WORLDWIDE: O-League and Pacific Games teams learn fate
Source: Oceania Football Confederation Press Release

The teams taking part in the 2011/12 O-League and XIV Pacific Games have found out their path to glory after the official draw ceremonies for both tournaments were conducted at the OFC Headquarters in Auckland yesterday.

In attendance were members of the OFC Executive Committee, General Secretariat staff and representatives from the eight clubs competing for the coveted O-League trophy and a place at the FIFA Club World Cup 2012.


2011/12 O-League

In June, the OFC Executive separated the sides into two groups but today’s draw was required to decide the position of each team within those groups. The groupings for the 2011/12 O-League are as follows:

Group A
1. Waitakere United (NZL)
2. Tefana (TAH)
3. Ba (FIJ)
4. Mont-Dore (NCL)

Group B
1. Amicale (VAN)
2. Hekari United (PNG)
3. Koloale (SOL)
4. Auckland City (NZL)
 

XIV Pacific Games

Immediately after the O-League representatives had learned their fate, the official draw for the XIV Pacific Games took place and was streamed live on oceaniafootball.com as the coverage continued.

A total of 11 men’s and nine women’s teams will take part in the football tournaments at the Pacific Games to be held in New Caledonia from 27 August to 9 September 2011. The groups for each tournament are as follows:


Men

Group A
1. New Caledonia
2. Vanuatu
3. Solomon Islands
4. Guam
5. American Samoa
6. Tuvalu

Group B
1. Fiji
2. Tahiti
3. Papua New Guinea
4. Cook Islands
5. Kiribati


Women

Group A
1. Papua New Guinea
2. Tahiti
3. Solomon Islands
4. New Caledonia
5. American Samoa

Group B
1. Tonga
2. Fiji
3. Cook Islands
4. Guam

Photo Caption: OFC Senior-vice President Martin Alufurai (left) and Head of Competitions David Firisua conduct the official draw ceremony.