ational elections in Papua New Guinea (PNG) appear to be headed toward chaos. Intense lobbying, scattered violence, ballot box discrepancies, and inevitable alliance shifting among the 111 Members of Parliament (MPs) will feature heavily in July 2022 when the South Pacific nation cast their votes. Yet despite these ruptures, optimistic observers of democracy still see a healthy civic spirit symbolized at PNG’s national election booths. They are encouraged by the days of travel some take to arrive and que for hours without shelter—everyday Papua New Guineans support democracy and elect national politicians. However, the mechanics of the election itself can lead to challenges in governing the country—opening the door to shifts in the nation’s foreign policy. This year’s elections are more important than ever with great powers watching the elections closely.
PNG’s voting system uses a system of limited preferential voting where voters are given three preferences on the ballot paper. A candidate is elected when they reach more than 50% of the vote. Prior to 2007, PNG applied a First Past the Post system that, although decisive, presented wildly unstable electoral outcomes. Yet with half of the 111 MPs anticipated to lose their seats—a common occurrence, according to the University of PNG’s Michael Kabuni—it is not clear how PNG’s game of political ‘musical chairs’ will abate anytime soon. All of this makes governing the country challenging. PNG politics is downstream of its culture, which ultimately means that with a 1,000-plus cultural groupings and over 900 languages—the most of any nation in the world—make building a consensus more than difficult. Governing effectively, let alone delivering consistent political outcomes, is not always forthcoming.
However, while PNG’s ‘predictably unpredictable’ election outcomes may continue, the age of great power competition has elevated PNG’s strategic profile. The broader South Pacific has become more important in the wake of the recent Solomon Islands-China Security Pact, which has reversed the Solomon Islands’ long-standing ties to Australia and New Zealand. As the South Pacific’s largest nation, PNG is not only resource rich but has long been a South Pacific leader.
Before the outbreak of COVID-19, Beijing started accelerating a range of tangible deliverables on PNG soil—shovel and spade commitments. These have ranged from building PNG’s national data center to backing a Chinese company’s proposal for a new fisheries facility near Australia’s northernmost border in the Torres Strait. For now, Beijing’s assistance to PNG, if not smoothed by persuadable MPs, has been met with pragmatism.
“We are thankful to Australia for giving vaccines and we are thankful to China for giving vaccines,” noted PNG’s Health Minister Jelta Wong in response to COVID-19. “Both countries help us in many ways,” Wong adds, “and we will always be in debt to them for the times Papua New Guinea was in need and they came to our aid.”
Another factor to consider is that Beijing has not had an easy road into PNG. Indeed, it has been “surprisingly slow,” according to former Australian High Commissioner Ian Kemish, citing the PNG government’s refusal to extend mining leases and stiff anti-Chinese sentiment within PNG’s social media circles.
Despite this hesitancy, the United States and Australia have not kept pace with China’s physical infrastructure engagement in Papua New Guinea. One symbolic example has been the trilateral U.S.-Australia-PNG 2018 APEC commitment to upgrade PNG’s Lombrum Naval Base at Manus Province. Done right, the base has the capacity to serve as a ‘Guam-lite.’ However, four years later, there has been little progress. Meanwhile, a Beijing-subsidiary company expedited a full upgrade to the province’s airport—a mere twenty-minute drive away.
Australia, as former foreign minister Alexander Downer notes, simply cannot play the same game as Beijing and neither can the United States. Yet Washington and Canberra share values with PNG—freedom, democracy, the rule of law, and mutual respect. These are the values that former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull noted when linking the Pacific ‘step up’ strategy in the landmark 2017 Australian White Paper. These may appear vague, but stitch together a range of outputs—sports diplomacy, legal and policy commitments, skills sharing, a hostility toward corruption, genuine people to people links and a historical commitment to stable long-term outcomes.
This is not to say Australia can improve its South Pacific approach in the wake of the Solomon Islands-China pact. Diplomatic ‘resets’—of which new Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong has recently led—can certainly be helpful. The United States meanwhile just simply has so much more to offer PNG—a bilateral tie that has more than enough room to grow across economic, trade, security, and other domains.
As the election nears, leaders from China, Australia, and the United States are going to pay increasing attention to Papua New Guinea. Indeed, reports have emerged that Beijing may step in to help PNG’s fledgling police force during the election—a noticeable upgrade to its usual hard infrastructure-style commitments. This is a clear sign of Beijing’s attention to the country while U.S. and Australian leaders are more reticent and appear to be waiting to see how the elections shake out. They do so however, at their own risk.
Add in Beijing’s regional advance and it only intensifies the complexities and the potential for more instability. As Kabuni notes, “politicians are not lawmakers, they are service deliverers. And sometimes, you know, commentators refer to them as walking ATMs.” Beijing can certainly ‘deliver,’ as some of its projects show, and can pull the appropriate strings in political terms. However, Beijing cannot penetrate PNG, nor even the wider Pacific, without attaining the cultural fluency evident in U.S. and Australian engagement with the region. Come July, one thing is clear—more outside eyes will be on PNG.
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The PNG Election in the Shadow of Great Power Competition
Photo via Pixabay.
June 23, 2022
Papua New Guinea’s political and cultural environment make political shifts in the country a common occurrence. However, with growing attention from great powers on the country’s election, these shifts are more important than ever writes Sean Jacobs.
N
ational elections in Papua New Guinea (PNG) appear to be headed toward chaos. Intense lobbying, scattered violence, ballot box discrepancies, and inevitable alliance shifting among the 111 Members of Parliament (MPs) will feature heavily in July 2022 when the South Pacific nation cast their votes. Yet despite these ruptures, optimistic observers of democracy still see a healthy civic spirit symbolized at PNG’s national election booths. They are encouraged by the days of travel some take to arrive and que for hours without shelter—everyday Papua New Guineans support democracy and elect national politicians. However, the mechanics of the election itself can lead to challenges in governing the country—opening the door to shifts in the nation’s foreign policy. This year’s elections are more important than ever with great powers watching the elections closely.
PNG’s voting system uses a system of limited preferential voting where voters are given three preferences on the ballot paper. A candidate is elected when they reach more than 50% of the vote. Prior to 2007, PNG applied a First Past the Post system that, although decisive, presented wildly unstable electoral outcomes. Yet with half of the 111 MPs anticipated to lose their seats—a common occurrence, according to the University of PNG’s Michael Kabuni—it is not clear how PNG’s game of political ‘musical chairs’ will abate anytime soon. All of this makes governing the country challenging. PNG politics is downstream of its culture, which ultimately means that with a 1,000-plus cultural groupings and over 900 languages—the most of any nation in the world—make building a consensus more than difficult. Governing effectively, let alone delivering consistent political outcomes, is not always forthcoming.
However, while PNG’s ‘predictably unpredictable’ election outcomes may continue, the age of great power competition has elevated PNG’s strategic profile. The broader South Pacific has become more important in the wake of the recent Solomon Islands-China Security Pact, which has reversed the Solomon Islands’ long-standing ties to Australia and New Zealand. As the South Pacific’s largest nation, PNG is not only resource rich but has long been a South Pacific leader.
Before the outbreak of COVID-19, Beijing started accelerating a range of tangible deliverables on PNG soil—shovel and spade commitments. These have ranged from building PNG’s national data center to backing a Chinese company’s proposal for a new fisheries facility near Australia’s northernmost border in the Torres Strait. For now, Beijing’s assistance to PNG, if not smoothed by persuadable MPs, has been met with pragmatism.
“We are thankful to Australia for giving vaccines and we are thankful to China for giving vaccines,” noted PNG’s Health Minister Jelta Wong in response to COVID-19. “Both countries help us in many ways,” Wong adds, “and we will always be in debt to them for the times Papua New Guinea was in need and they came to our aid.”
Another factor to consider is that Beijing has not had an easy road into PNG. Indeed, it has been “surprisingly slow,” according to former Australian High Commissioner Ian Kemish, citing the PNG government’s refusal to extend mining leases and stiff anti-Chinese sentiment within PNG’s social media circles.
Despite this hesitancy, the United States and Australia have not kept pace with China’s physical infrastructure engagement in Papua New Guinea. One symbolic example has been the trilateral U.S.-Australia-PNG 2018 APEC commitment to upgrade PNG’s Lombrum Naval Base at Manus Province. Done right, the base has the capacity to serve as a ‘Guam-lite.’ However, four years later, there has been little progress. Meanwhile, a Beijing-subsidiary company expedited a full upgrade to the province’s airport—a mere twenty-minute drive away.
Australia, as former foreign minister Alexander Downer notes, simply cannot play the same game as Beijing and neither can the United States. Yet Washington and Canberra share values with PNG—freedom, democracy, the rule of law, and mutual respect. These are the values that former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull noted when linking the Pacific ‘step up’ strategy in the landmark 2017 Australian White Paper. These may appear vague, but stitch together a range of outputs—sports diplomacy, legal and policy commitments, skills sharing, a hostility toward corruption, genuine people to people links and a historical commitment to stable long-term outcomes.
This is not to say Australia can improve its South Pacific approach in the wake of the Solomon Islands-China pact. Diplomatic ‘resets’—of which new Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong has recently led—can certainly be helpful. The United States meanwhile just simply has so much more to offer PNG—a bilateral tie that has more than enough room to grow across economic, trade, security, and other domains.
As the election nears, leaders from China, Australia, and the United States are going to pay increasing attention to Papua New Guinea. Indeed, reports have emerged that Beijing may step in to help PNG’s fledgling police force during the election—a noticeable upgrade to its usual hard infrastructure-style commitments. This is a clear sign of Beijing’s attention to the country while U.S. and Australian leaders are more reticent and appear to be waiting to see how the elections shake out. They do so however, at their own risk.
Add in Beijing’s regional advance and it only intensifies the complexities and the potential for more instability. As Kabuni notes, “politicians are not lawmakers, they are service deliverers. And sometimes, you know, commentators refer to them as walking ATMs.” Beijing can certainly ‘deliver,’ as some of its projects show, and can pull the appropriate strings in political terms. However, Beijing cannot penetrate PNG, nor even the wider Pacific, without attaining the cultural fluency evident in U.S. and Australian engagement with the region. Come July, one thing is clear—more outside eyes will be on PNG.
