Comments

Thank you Terence for your views on PNG 2017 national election Your views that the 2017 is not good enough is not only correct but also much worse in this election. As for an educated local experience person going through; the campaign, the polling, counting and the declaration of winners using and abusing the conventional election laws and guidelines covering this important democratic process, I would say this 2017 is much worse than the previous elections. We should not blame the legal elements governing the election process or the institutions mandated to run the 2017 election. As a man on the ground, I saw there is no anomalies with that. The only problem is that the process is driven by personalities of power brokers in authorities and by trend of the prevailing circumstances/situations over the last few years. People in authority are not doing what they are mandated to delivery but only serving a few people interests, and in doing so has caused problems across the whole process of election and democracy. The recent 2017 election is the 10th, and there should be little doubt if it is going to be a failed election, rather it should be a successful one. We are willing to support any post-election research in the future as a man on the ground and went through the 2017 election.

Please, get me a copy of the "Anti-corruption and its discontents.........in Papua New Guinea". Thank you.

Stephen, basic service provision - health, education, sanitation - would get my vote as making the most decisive difference and I think has the most evidence in support of its impact and cost effectiveness. I might agree with you on disaster relief if a bigger part of that was preventive and the (expensive and inexpert) military was less involved.

This is an important topic which is largely overlooked and merits further consideration. However, it is important to ensure that we start with information that is factually correct. Section 32(2) of the Public Service Act of Vanuatu states: "(2) A person who intends becoming a candidate for election to Parliament must resign from the Public Service before accepting nomination as a candidate for election to Parliament." This is markedly different from what appears here, that public servants must resign in order to be a member of a political party.

Agreed this is a great resource for which we are all very grateful - Clive is now leaning on me to prepare one for Vanuatu!

With respect, I must disagree with your characterisation of this blog, Mark. I think this blog addressed the basic facts surrounding the conduct of the 2017 PNG election (that you write of) and did so pointedly, whilst maintaining an objective, academic and dispassionate character - as one would expect from a professional social scientist writing in a credible forum such as Devpolicy. Perhaps you were looking for a more polemical piece? If so, I can understand that, having seen the 2017 elections firsthand and being personally concerned with what happened. But such writing is best left for other forums. There's more than enough emotion surrounding the conduct of the 2017 elections already, and there's an important place for dispassionate well-informed analysis, to try and get to the bottom of what went wrong. And this article in my view does that very well and is a very good contribution to the conversation.

"Depending if I was working five days or less, I would send NZ$200 or more home per week. My family used the money for the church as we have to help pay the village loan for our new church building." This issue of using remittance income to make loan payments for Church buildings (spiritual v community development and poverty alleviation) is quite serious for some Samoan families struggling to make ends meet.

Hi Mark, I'm used to people commenting on my blog posts without having read them carefully. But you clearly didn't even bother to read the first paragraph. Terence

Thank you Clive and Terence. Fantastic.

Hi Kurt, Thank you for the question. It's a very interesting one. It's still not exactly clear to me what in practice was decentralised vis a vis some previous elections (although some additional decentralisation did occur). Certainly, you can imagine decentralisation having an impact of the sort you describe (regardless of whether the impact was or was not intended). Terence

Typically wishy washy, platitudinous, feel-good gibberish. Next time start with the 80 election deaths (likely to be more from continuing violence), retributative rape of girls, murder of policemen by candidates and their supporters, etc etc. Then move on to blatant fixing and manipulation of EC official appointments by candidates and parties, examples of roll-fixing on a grand scale, voting-day violence, intimidation and outright fraud, the rigging of counting by EC officials and candidates, manipulation of declarations and return of writs ... I could go on but it's too depressing.

Thank you Dr Wood for this very good commentary. In my view you have correctly pointed out that the central and key cause of state incapacity in PNG is political, and the authors of this incapacity are the central political powerbrokers in PNG, many of whom are senior members of government. And they act so deliberately, because state incapacity directly benefits their personal and private interests. Following, I have one question for you - is it possible that the political decision to decentralise PNGEC administrative control over the election was made so that local subversion of formal electoral law and processes would be made easier?