Comments

Unfortunately, the community of people in the Aibai area in South Simbu Province are now completely without cell service. There is no indication of when service will be restored. If anyone there knows anything about this problem we would appreciate hearing from you. Our daughter provides medical care to the community in Aibai and we have no way of communicating with her unless she travels 45 minutes to find a cell signal in a different area.

Good observation Amanda, I hope such exercise will minimise some chronic challenges such as elections, as you mention, and improve communication accessibility thus achieving the National government's ambitions. The sustainability of such initiatives is always a point of contention in PNG.

Thanks Stephen. Interesting. I am curious. What emerged from your conversations as the benefits of the UK ICAI?

Well articulated, Amanda! The ramifications of this rush exercise is certainly great.

Interesting summary of the situation.

It's tough being poor and even harder being a poor woman.

Hi Great work Rohan a very useful resource as I'm in a similar boat not having the luxury of access to a university library anymore. I have just come across this resource that I want to share - https://openknowledgemaps.org/index#search A clever bit of kit and a useful addition to the arsenal.

Thank you to all those who have posted comments on this blog post. Your time, ideas and input are very much appreciated. Many of you have shared similar experiences or concerns to mine. Some of you have raised questions, which I’ll aim to address here. Joseph D Malabag and John I Tambiabu asked about whether SIM card registration is legally binding. Yes it is, under the SIM Card Registration Regulation 2016. The National Gazette was signed by the Governor General in April 2016. Festus Maiginap asked whether telecommunication companies could send officers to rural areas to register their customers. Another option mentioned in media reports since this blog post was published is that churches could perhaps assist with the registration process. Sabine asked about the potential for comments posted online to be traced to a user’s phone number. Stanley Spenzii Mark and Joys also posted similar queries. As much of the Internet access in PNG is through mobile phones, this may be a genuine concern. However, I am not a telecommunications engineer and I am not sure whether a phone number can be traced back – for instance, to a comment published on this blog. I’d welcome some input, if any reader has this technical know-how. Some new points have been raised, which could be worth further investigation. Bobby Kunda, Festus Maiginap, and Stanley Spenzii Mark raised the religious and spiritual beliefs around giving away personal data which are strongly held by some groups within PNG. Sabine raised the issue of handsets being shared. In my research in rural villages in Madang Province during the early days of mobile phone adoption, it was common for a woman to say that she did not own a mobile phone, but her husband did. If a woman does something illegal using a phone registered in her husband’s name, he could be wrongly brought before the courts, as Sabine implies. Stanley Spenzii Mark shared his experience of needing to register a post-paid SIM card. He was able to register his relatives’ numbers at a bmobile Vodafone outlet in Port Moresby, even though his relatives are in the highlands! Some suggestions have been put forth too. Urith suggested that the SIM card registration exercise could have been undertaken in partnership with the National Identification (NID) project. To me, this seems like a good idea, but it’s possibly too late to implement it now. Stotick Kaprangi suggested that Digicel could register SIM cards through an online system. Stotick, this may not help rural villagers too much as many of them would struggle to have the Internet access needed to complete the process. In Indonesia, telecommunication companies are registering SIM cards through online systems, through text messaging, through stores, or through a call centre. The difference is that in Indonesia citizens have identification numbers, so they can use these to register. The PNG context is different and the challenge of so many people not having any form of written identification (or an identification number) is a big hurdle when it comes to SIM card registration.

Hi Jo Thanks for your contribution - I think you have raised some interesting points. One of the things that struck me about Jack's presentation was how many of the key 'outsiders' were ex-insiders - or occupied some kind of hybrid space in which they managed to be both. I hope your presentation goes well at AAC.

I should add that the criminal responsibility/sim card registration issue was central in the Australian Haneef case: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhamed_Haneef

This was a really interesting read. Unfortunately I didn't have time to read all the comments, but a couple stuck out: 1) Cracking down on activists as a motivation for the scheme. Does the registration therefore mean that mobile phone users cannot participate in online discussions anonymously? 2) The possibility that national security could be worsened if corrupt officials are able to get their hands on otherwise private data (if I read one of the comments correctly). I'm also interested in what happens if people share a mobile phone. Is the person whose name the SIM is registered to responsible in any way for crime committed by another person who is using that phone?

Hi Amanda, Great and timely write up From my observation, most people living in the rural areas are yet to register their Sim Cards and possibly will face deactivation of their Sim Cards.