A Cultural Divide in Papua New Guinea May Lead to a New Country’s Formation

Papua New Guinea, an island nation in the southwest Pacific comprising the eastern half of New Guinea and its surrounding islands, is a culturally and historically rich country which is often overlooked by travelers in favor of neighboring Indonesia and Australia.

One key component to the country’s diversity is the numerous ethnic groups which call the island nation home. While many of these groups have historically coexisted for generations in peace, the island of Bougainville, which is located at the far eastern edge of the country, has remained distinct from the rest of the nation, so much so that it is its own autonomous region rather than a province.

While a push for Bougainville’s independence has been ongoing since the 1980s , a recent referendum and presidential election may lead to negotiations between the autonomous region and the national government.

One Country, Many Cultures

Children attending class in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. CC BY 2.0.

Bougainville and Papua New Guinea are culturally and historically distinct. While both regions were at one point in time under German colonial rule, Papua New Guinea was later held by the United Kingdom, while Bougainvile was administered by Australia before being invaded by Japan in World War II.

While both Papua New Guinea and Bougainville hold Tok Pisin as the lingua franca and maintain English as a standard for government proceedings, the North and South Bougainville language families are commonly spoken within the autonomous region while the Trans-New Guinea language families are much more common throughout the rest of the country.

The differences between Papua New Guinea and Bougainville are also reflected in the composition of both regions’ governing bodies. Papua New Guinea is infamously one of three countries in the world without any female representatives in the national parliament. In trying to distance itself from this, Bougainville has reserved three seats within its regional legislature to be dedicated for women representatives. Two of these seats have been filled as of this article’s publication.

A Growing Push Toward Independence

A power plant in Arawa on the island of Bougainville, which was destroyed during the Bougainville civil war. madlemurs. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

The Bougainville independence movement dates back to the late 1980s following a series of conflicts between the region and the central government after immigration increased to the region in response to the discovery of vast copper reserves. This led to racial tensions between the native Bougainvilleans and the newly arrived Papuans and Australian nationals, coming to a boiling point in 1988 with the decadelong Bougainville civil war.

The Dec. 7, 2019, independence referendum was a result of the 2001 peace agreement which formally ended the civil war, the results of which were overwhelming in favor of the region’s independence. While the referendum was nonbinding, it did open the door for renewed negotiations between the autonomous region and Port Moresby.

“The essence of what our people want is still empowerment of a Bougainville government that can truly manage its own affairs,” then Bougainville President John Momis said in an August 2019 speech. “Just as we did when negotiating the peace agreement, the national government and Bougainville will have the rare privilege of developing something new.”

Should Bougainville gain independence, it likely will galvanize more support for other independence movements throughout Melanesia, the surrounding region of islands north of Australia. Protests and referendums for independence in New Caledonia and West Papua occurred throughout the late 2010s and are expected to continue in the coming years.

Recent Electoral Victory

People fishing off the coast of New Britain, Papua New Guinea. Asian Development Bank. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Citizens of Bougainville elected former rebel military commander and Bougainville independence activist Ishmael Toroama as president of the region during the Sept. 23 election. While campaigning, Toroama proposed a two- to three-year timeframe for achieving the region’s independence, something which experts consider to be at best ambitious given that the referendum was nonbinding.

“We conducted a clean campaign, we did not give money to the voters and we did not intimidate any voters: people have used their God-given wisdom to vote for the right candidate,” Toroama said shortly after he was declared winner of the election. “I will stand up for independence in Bougainville … it is now time to work together.”

While it is unclear yet as to whether or not Toroama will be able to fully transition Bougainville from an autonomous region to a full-fledged country, he at the very least will be able to begin negotiations with the central government given the support he gained while campaigning as well as the results of the Dec. 7 referendum.

Jacob Sutherland

is a recent graduate from the University of California San Diego where he majored in Political Science and minored in Spanish Language Studies. He previously served as the News Editor for The UCSD Guardian, and hopes to shed light on social justice issues in his work.

Elections Strive to Avoid Contributing to Upticks in Coronavirus

The coronavirus is one of democracy’s newest adversaries, especially when it comes to running elections. Although each country is subject to its own set of laws and customs during this formalized process, no one wants to let voting become another opportunity for virus numbers to spike. With governments dissuading large public gatherings and social distancing still being a critical asset to the prevention of COVID-19 across the globe, democratic countries need to organize upcoming voting events with new considerations in mind. 

COVID-19 has been labeled by the World Health Organization as a pandemic since March 11, and many voting events have since come and gone. Although elections across the world have been postponed, there are some countries that have pursued the process anyway. The elections that have occurred are on both national and local scales and have been met with varying levels of success. The Council on Foreign Relations released a short video on the optimal way to have an election; although this organization is American and focuses on United States elections, the suggestions are broad enough to be applicable in most democratic countries and include an emphasis on mail-in ballots, careful fund management and safe-in person voting procedures. One of the best examples was South Korea, which on April 15 became the first country to attempt a national election. The country had the highest voter turnout for a parliamentary election in 28 years, with 66.2% of about 44 million registered voters casting ballots. 

Prior to April 15, the country came out with a set of election guidelines that all voters and polling places would need to follow. This included the downloading of a self-quarantine app so voters’ movements could be tracked and social distancing at the voting stations. Voters had their temperatures taken on location, wore masks, and had gloves and hand sanitizer at their disposal. South Korea also made sure to account for people in quarantine and active COVID-19 patients, all of whom had to abide by additional voting guidelines. Despite all of these extra precautionary steps, one person reported that it took them less than 10 minutes to go through the whole voting process. When asked about why South Korea was so successful, many citizens said they had a lot of trust in the country’s actions involving the health care system. South Korea has recorded over 13,300 cases of the virus, but the number of new cases has not exceeded 80 since early April. Although an early voter in the city of Busan tested positive some time later, contact tracing later determined that only one person they came into contact with on Election Day had contracted the virus as well. 

Other places have also attempted to hold large-scale voting events, although none of them quite as successfully as in South Korea. For example, Croatia ran a presidential election with a 46% voter turnout (average of 53%), and Japan ran multiple elections as well. Tokyo’s election for governor resulted in about 52% of eligible people coming out, just above the average gubernatorial election turnout rate of 48%. In Poland, the presidential election was originally scheduled to occur in early May and would have been Europe’s first try at a presidential election since the pandemic. The country attempted to modify the voting standards beforehand (it wanted to offer more remote voting options so that there would be less crowding at polling places) but long-established laws prevented the country from making major changes to the process less than six months before the scheduled election. There was some conflict between the parties about the timing of the election—the incumbent party wanted a quick, on-time election while the challenging candidates asked for a delay—that ultimately resulted in the vote being postponed to June 28 and done with a larger number of postal ballots than the country had seen before. 

With a string of elections still on the horizon for this year, now-completed elections offer a template to copy or learn from, ultimately proving that safe voting is doable despite the pandemic. There are ways to work around the dangers of congested polling stations and there is considerable value in encouraging people to vote remotely (if the laws allow for it). While online voting is still very vulnerable to potential cyberattacks and other security concerns, postal ballots are an effective alternative. Safe and sanitary in-person voting is potentially the greatest universal asset for elections going forward. Although there are a multitude of factors that must be addressed when organizing elections, it is clear that ultimately, with sufficient and well-allocated resources, voter turnout does not necessarily have to suffer during this pandemic.

Phoebe Jacoby

is a Media Studies major and Studio Art minor at Vassar College who believes in the importance of sharing stories with others. Phoebe likes to spend her free time reading, drawing, and writing letters. She hopes to continue developing her skills as a writer and create work that will have a positive outward effect.

How New Media Can Be Used to Spark Interest in Elections Among Young Ghanaians

There has been growing evidence around the world that young people are increasingly becoming apathetic about taking part in events such as elections, according to Ceron in a study conducted in 2015. Given that university students are also increasingly using social media, scholars have started to look at how it can be used to invigorate their diminishing interest in governance as well as in elections.

We conducted research  on how students in Ghana used new media. The aim was to understand the motivations and political information needs that influenced them to use new media technologies for elections.

We found that young people were drawn to use new media technologies to have conversations on elections. Posts going viral gave them a sense of relevance and empowerment. Another reason was that it gave them the opportunity to engage in the comfort of their private spaces – offline.

The findings should enable more strategic targeting of university students by political actors and institutions. This could be in terms of turn out efforts, political messaging, communication as well as political campaigning. This has already been done successfully in a number of countries.

How it’s been done elsewhere

New media technologies have been used in a myriad of ways to mobilise people to vote in various countries. For example, in Italy in 2014, Sweden in 2010 and in the 2010 British elections.

Astute use of technologies was also evident in Barack Obama’s campaigns for the US presidency in 2008 and 2012.

In Africa, social media was used during the mass protests of 2011 in Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco. In all three cases, people uploaded photographs of the protests which then went viral. This reinforced global appreciation of the need for democratic change in the countries.

Social media has also been used to monitor elections and disseminate results. For instance in Nigeria, young Nigerians embarked on the “Enough is Enough” campaign on election vigilance to hold politically elected leaders accountable.

In Ghana, some civil society groups launched the “the Voter Decides” campaign in 2012. This sought to track the process of voting, monitor collation of results and ensure that the right results were announced.

But the deployment of various new media technologies by political actors for elections and other civil engagements hasn’t necessarily translated into reversing the dwindling interest in politics. This is clear from research by communication scholars like Christian Vaccari.

It raises the question: what motivates the young new media user to deploy the technologies from an informational and communications perspective?

Why Ghanaian Students use new media technologies

In our research on Ghanaian students, our main findings were that:

• Students are drawn to deploying new media technologies for the currency and breadth of information they can access.

• They are both consumers and producers of media content.

• They are able to navigate their way around the gatekeeping or filtration process conducted by editors.

• The opportunity to go viral or become virtual celebrities in seconds when they click the “enter” or “send” button is an experience they relish.

• The virtual space is a safe haven for many.

• They spend a great deal of time on social media. This is attested to when a student asserts: “my world is on the mobile phone.”

The potency of social media

Our findings reinforce the view that social media is a viable resource that can be relied on for voter mobilisation, campaigning and voting. Students suggest that political candidates must find ways to woo Ghanaian students into conversations before election fever catches on. If the candidates delay, their efforts will be perceived by the youth as self-serving.

Practically, many young people want to be part of the process of constructing political narratives offline rather than on campaign platforms. They want to be in their safe haven – online and anonymous – where they can’t be reproached for their youthful exuberance.

These kinds of conversations have the potential of reducing apathy and getting young people involved in the political process.

Political actors and candidates should seriously look at how media technologies can be used for effective reciprocal political communication with university students. If they understand what motivates and influences students to use new media technologies for conversations on the elections, political actors are much more likely to be able to count on the involvement of young people in conversations on the elections and participation in the electoral process.

Adwoa Sikayena Amankwah is a Senior Lecturer of Communication Studies, University of Professional Studies Accra

THIS ARTICLE WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON THE CONVERSATION

In Romania, 500 Days of Silence Mark Movement Against Corruption

For citizens of tiny Sibiu, Romania, “watchful eyes” nestled in the city’s roofs have become a symbol of ongoing protest.

Houses with eyes in Sibiu. lucianf. CC BY 2.0

Each day at noon, in the picturesque little city of Sibiu, the red-shingled roofs and the protestors silently assembled in the streets send the same message to the corrupt government of Romania: We are watching you.

Visitors to Sibiu take note of the standard Central European attributes: the quaint, historic architecture, punctuated by the Gothic Lutheran cathedral, whose steeple looms high into the sky; the houses clinging to the bank of the river Cibin, which winds lazily down from the main waterway of Olt. But they are likely to do a double-take upon noticing the ever-watchful Sibiu eyes—narrow windows rising up from the city’s roofs, giving the impression of a perpetual half-lidded gaze. Originally designed to ventilate attics where meat, cheese, and grain were stored while keeping the harsh sunlight out, the eyes have become a potent symbol of Romania’s anti-corruption movement—specifically, a grassroots organization called V Vedem din Sibiu, or “we are watching you from Sibiu.”

V Vedem din Sibiu came about in December 2017, when the government moved to shift judiciary statutes in a way that was widely regarded as tightening state control over judges and undermining the National Anticorruption Directorate. The attempt further inflamed tensions ignited at the beginning of the year, when the ruling Social Democrat party (PSD) decriminalized a range of corruption offenses, triggering Romania’s most sizable street protest since the fall of communism in 1989. The emergency ordinance—which, among other stipulations, dropped charges of official misconduct in cases where the financial damage did not exceed 200,000 lei ($47,000)—passed at 10 p.m. local time; by midnight, more than 10,000 infuriated citizens had taken to the streets in the capital of Bucharest, and around 10,000 in other cities across Romania.

Anti-corruption protesters in Bucharest. Paul Arne Wagner. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Corruption is considered a serious problem in Romania, and the country’s fragile political state is exacerbated by its status as one of the European Union’s newest and poorest members, leaving citizens concerned for their rights and constantly at the ready to mount a protest. In the years and months since the events of 2017, Romania has seen ongoing organizing against corruption and in support of judicial independence, and the government has endured criticism from the European Commission, the U.S. state department, and the centrist president and National Liberal Party leader, Klaus Iohannis, who has made strong calls for governmental transparency. In January 2018, approximately 50,000 Romanians marched towards parliament in Bucharest, waving flags, contending with riot police, and raising raucous chants of “Thieves!” And in August of that year, up to 100,000 members of the Romanian diaspora descended on Bucharest to protest the PSD—an event that took a violent turn when police deterred marchers with tear gas and water cannons.

Anti-corruption protesters in Bucharest. Paul Arne Wagner. CC BY 2.0

Relative to the chaotic, overwhelming tableau of the ongoing demonstrations in Bucharest, the soundless walkouts occurring daily in Sibiu present a stark contrast. This July, the Sibiu protesters commemorated their 500th day gathering in the city center, sacrificing their lunch breaks or school recesses to stand in silence outside the headquarters of the PSD. “Those 15 minutes every day, it is like a flame that never goes out,” said Ciprian Ciocan, one of the founders of V Vedem din Sibiu, in an interview with The Guardian. “Somebody knows that there are still people in Sibiu, no matter whether it rains or snows or whatever.”

Ciocan posts live videos of the protests on V Vedem din Sibiu’s Facebook page, where they reach more than 20,000 followers. During the events of December 2017, allies from around the world sent in more than 68 versions of the Sibiu eyes—scrawled on walls and scraps of paper, carved into sand at the seashore, inscribed with branches laid on fresh snow, from Berlin to Chicago to Kuala Lumpur. Though the initial tide of eyes has slowed, the page continues to share media coverage of the protests along with its regularly scheduled live videos. The “about” section defines the sit-in as a form of protest, stating, “We are protecting the values and principles in which we strongly believe, the state of law and the independence of Justice.”

Sibiu. Camelia TWU. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

In May of this year, under pressure from the EU and overwhelming dissent from Romanian voters, the PSD abandoned some of its most controversial measures. Even more devastating for the party was their loss of seats in European Parliament elections and the departure of the PSD leader, Liviu Dragnea, who was jailed on May 27 and is expected to serve a three-and-a-half-year sentence for corruption.

Despite small steps in the right direction, however, citizens remain on high alert. “There are many other dangers,” Bianca Toma of the Romanian Centre for European Policies told The Guardian. “There are still things to be undone and it’s a matter of fact, not just [making] statements.” And in Sibiu, the ongoing protests have had little impact on the PSD, whose workers drew the blinds when sit-ins began and issued a statement accusing the activists of “aggressive” behavior. Still, like clockwork, citizens will keep turning out in the streets, and the watchful eyes will keep gazing from Sibiu’s rooftops, waiting for a day when Romanians at home and abroad can live without fear of corruption.

TALYA PHELPS hails from the wilds of upstate New York, but dreams of exploring the globe. As former editor-in-chief at the student newspaper of her alma mater, Vassar College, and the daughter of a journalist, she hopes to follow her passion for writing and editing for many years to come. Contact her if you're looking for a spirited debate on the merits of the em dash vs. the hyphen.